This happens about once per week… I’ll make a change for a client in their theme and let them know an issue is fixed. They’ll go take a look and see that the problem appears to still be there.
I’ll tell them to clear their browser cache. Either they’ve been through this a hundred times already and can do it in their sleep, or they have no clue what I’m talking about.
The Browser Cache
Every browser is different in some ways, but they all have a cache – a place where they store elements of websites like graphics – and even entire pages – for future use. If you visit a page one day and go back the next, you’re likely seeing a cached version of that page, because it’s faster to load from the cache than to pull a fresh version of the file from the server.
But what if a file has changed? If something about the theme or the page changed between yesterday and today, you wouldn’t know it, because you’re seeing yesterday’s version.
The way to get around that and force the browser to show you a fresh file is to clear your browser cache. How you do that varies from browser to browser, but here’s a handy guide to browser cache clearing for all the major ones.
Happy browsing! Remember if you see something that looks odd, or are missing changes you know you made on your own site, it’s time to clear your browser cache.