How to install XAMPP and setup WordPress Locally (Without Paying For Hosting And Domain)
Do you want to build a WordPress Website but are not ready to pay for hosting and a domain name yet? Fortunately, there is a way you can do this very easily.
All you need to do is to follow the few steps I’ll be teaching you below and in no time, you’ll have a nice website setup all for you.
Step 1: Download and install XAMPP on your computer.
Once the download is complete, run the installation file to install the software. If you have an antivirus running, you might see something like this.
You just click yes and you’ll be fine. Depending on your Windows configuration, you might also see a prompt about User Activation Control. Go ahead and click next or yes on that prompt and all other prompts that might come up and you’ll see the standard installer screen.
Click Next and then you’ll be prompted to select which of the components you want to install. You do not actually need all of them, but just to simplify things for you, go ahead and install all of them by clicking Next only.
At this point you have to specify what folder to install XAMPP in. Go ahead and install it in the default folder “xampp” by just clicking “Next”.
Go ahead and choose your preferred language on the next screen.
After that you’ll be asked to install Bitnami for XAMPP. Installing it would actually make the whole install process a bit easier, but it has a lot of limitations which you wouldn’t want to encounter in the future so kindly uncheck the box and click on “Next”
The install is ready to fire on as soon as you click “Next”. You need to exercise a bit of patience here as this process will take a few minutes.
This is what it looks like when it is installing.
Once this completes, go ahead and launch the XAMPP control panel by leaving the box checked and clicking “Finish”. This is what XAMPP looks like when it is newly launched.
So we are done for the installation of XAMPP, now let’s test to know if it’s working!
Step 2: Startup the modules on XAMPP control panel
On your XAMPP control panel, you need to click on the start button for Apache and MySQL.
On your XAMPP control panel, you need to click on the start button for Apache and MySQL.
You’ll see them having a green background to know if they are working well. If one of yours turns yellow, just give it some time and it will become green.
Step 3: Add the WordPress files
Try to download it into this folder “Localdisk C:/xampp/htdocs” or (locate the drive you installed XAMPP into and put it in the htdocs folder contained in the XAMPP folder. In my case, the name of the drive is Backup).
When you download it, you’ll get it in a .zip format. All you need to do at this point is to unzip it.
Go into that folder and you will find a folder named “wordpress”. Rename that folder to what you want your site name to be e.g “wearsandshoes”, or “standardkitchen”. Don’t add dot.com! That’s not meant for you to do.
So if you want something like wearsandshoes.com, just name the folder wearsandshoes for now.
After you do that, cut (CTRL + X) that folder you just renamed and put it in the root of the htdocs folder such that the folder named WordPress-6.1.1 (or whatever version you downloaded becomes empty).
Step 4: Create a Database for WordPress
The next thing you need to do is to create a database for WordPress. You start by opening your XAMPP control panel and clicking “Admin” on the MySQL module.
Look to your left and you will see “New”. Click on it, and then enter a name for your database then click on “Create”.
Step 5: Install WordPress using the visual installer on your browser
localhost/wearsandshoes/ (or whatever you named your wordpress folder in place of “wearsandshoes”).
Choose your language if your prompted to and move on.
Next you are brought to a page like this. All you have to do is to click “Let’s go!” 
And now you are on this page
What you have to do here is to enter your database name which you formed in the phpMyAdmin tool. Check your database name again if you can’t remember.
Next, type in root as your username.
As for the password field, clear it out and make sure nothing is there because we did not set a password for our database.
As for the database host and table prefix, kindly leave those ones untouched and click the “Submit” button to proceed
And now you are on this page! Go ahead and run the insallation
Don’t get tired yet, we are almost done. As soon as you Run The Installation, you are brought to this page
Now you need to enter what you want the title of your site to be. The site title is what shows up here.
Then go ahead and put in what you want your username on the site to be.
NOTE that this is not the same as your database username
After that, input a password and email of your choice. You can leave the last box unchecked. It’s for SEO purposes which we will deal with some other time.
After you have entered all necessary information, go ahead and click on “Install WordPress”.
Now you’ll find yourself on this page, just click on the log in button and when you get here
Type in your username or email address and your password and click on login.
As soon as you click on the login button, you’ll find yourself here!!! Now you can celebrate. You just installed WordPress without paying for hosting or a domain name. You can start building whatever you desire to build from here.
