How To Cancel Your WordPress Subscription

The charge usually lands a month before the date you had in your calendar.

Working out how to cancel a WordPress subscription is harder than it should be, mostly because the cancel button sits somewhere different depending on where you paid. WordPress.com checkout, the App Store, Google Play, and WooCommerce.com each run their own screen.

This guide covers the exact click paths, plus the parts people miss:

• Refund windows of 14 days, 7 days, and 96 hours
• Domain registrations, which never cancel alongside the plan
• Exporting your content before the site drops to the free tier
• Fixes for charges that keep arriving after cancellation

By the end you will know which subscription is billing you, and how to stop it for good.

What Is a WordPress Subscription

A WordPress subscription is a recurring charge tied to a WordPress.com account. It covers hosting plans, domain registrations, Jetpack tiers, Akismet, Professional Email, and add-ons. The open-source software at WordPress.org carries no subscription at all.

Every paid product on WordPress.com renews automatically unless you switch that behaviour off yourself.

Billing cycles run monthly, annual, two-year, or three-year, and the longer terms come with the steepest discounts.

Every subscription record sits at wordpress.com/me/purchases. That single screen is where almost all of this happens.

WordPress.com Plans vs WordPress.org Software

Two different things share one name. WordPress.org is free software you install on a host of your choosing, so any bill you get comes from that host, not from WordPress.

WordPress.com is a hosted service run by Automattic, and the question of who actually owns the WordPress brand confuses a lot of people who only ever see the same logo on both.

Forbes Advisor lists the 2026 annual rates at $4 (Personal), $8 (Premium), $25 (Business), and $45 (Commerce) per month, roughly half the monthly-billed price.

Products That Renew Separately From Your Plan

Cancelling a plan touches the plan and nothing else. These bill on their own line:

• Domain registrations: renew yearly on their own expiry date
• Professional Email and Google Workspace: per seat, refundable within 14 days on annual licences
• Jetpack and Akismet: tied to the account, not to any one site
• Partner themes and premium plugins: annual or monthly, listed individually

Automattic’s refund policy confirms the same 14-day annual and 7-day monthly windows apply to add-ons.

Where Your WordPress Subscription Was Purchased

The cancellation path depends on the billing source, not on the product. Four sources exist: WordPress.com checkout, the Apple App Store, Google Play, and third-party marketplaces. Purchases made inside a mobile app cannot be cancelled from the web dashboard.

Check your card statement before you click anything. The descriptor tells you who is actually taking the money.

WordPress.com staff point people to wpchrg.com when a charge appears under an account they cannot find. You look the charge up there and reach billing directly.

Managed and enterprise setups sit outside all of this. Pressable bills through its own dashboard, and the enterprise platform Automattic runs for large publishers works on contracts rather than a self-serve cancel button.

Cancelling in the wrong place leaves the charge running. That is the single most common reason people get billed again after they thought they were done.

How to Cancel a WordPress.com Plan From Your Account

Cancelling a WordPress.com plan takes six clicks from the dashboard. Open your account profile, go to Purchases, select the plan, click Cancel plan, confirm on the review screen, then complete the short cancellation survey. A confirmation email follows.

The exact path, as of the May 2026 revision of Automattic’s guide:

1. Open your site dashboard and hover over the profile icon top right
2. Click My WordPress.com Account
3. Select Purchases from the side menu
4. Click the subscription to open its Purchase Settings page
5. Scroll down and click Cancel plan
6. Confirm, then answer the survey until you see the confirmation screen

What happens next splits two ways.

Inside the refund window: the subscription is removed straight away and the eligible amount comes back automatically. A “Remove and claim refund” link appears on the cancellation screen only when you qualify.

Outside the refund window: cancelling disables auto-renewal. The plan stays live until its expiry date and no further charge lands.

Only the person who bought the subscription can cancel it. If a collaborator paid for the plan, the button will not work for you.

Seeing “There was a problem cancelling”? Refresh the Purchases page, then try an incognito window. Browser extensions and stale sessions break the cancellation form more often than you would expect.

How to Turn Off Auto-Renew Without Cancelling

Turning off auto-renew keeps every paid feature running until the term ends, then drops the site to the free tier. No refund is triggered. The toggle sits under Subscription Renewal on the individual purchase page.

Click the plan from Purchases, then flip the switch next to Enable auto-renew and confirm on the popup.

Two labels confirm it worked: “Auto-renew is OFF” under Subscription Renewal, and “(this will not be billed)” next to the stored payment method.

Renewal timing catches people out. Yearly plans charge one month before the expiry date, so a plan expiring 15 October bills on 15 September. Monthly plans charge on the expiry date itself.

You lose nothing by the early charge. The new term extends from the original expiry date, not from the payment date.

One more thing worth knowing. If you signed up on a promotion or a coupon code, the renewal charges at the full undiscounted price once the promo period closes.

Domains carry their own auto-renew toggle. Switching the plan toggle off leaves the domain renewing exactly as before.

How to Cancel a WordPress Subscription Bought in the Mobile App

Subscriptions bought inside the WordPress or Jetpack mobile app are billed by Apple or Google, not by Automattic. The web dashboard shows them as managed elsewhere and gives you no cancel button. You have to use the store that took the payment.

Deleting the app changes nothing. The billing agreement lives in your Apple Account or Google account, and it keeps charging an empty phone.

Cancelling on iPhone and iPad

1. Open Settings and tap your name at the top
2. Tap Subscriptions
3. Tap the WordPress or Jetpack entry
4. Tap Cancel Subscription and scroll if you cannot see it

Apple Support notes that a missing Cancel button or red expiry text means the subscription is already cancelled.

Cancelling on Android

Open the Google Play Store, tap your profile picture, then Payments and subscriptions, then Subscriptions.

Tap the WordPress entry and choose Cancel subscription at the bottom.

Android gives you an option iOS does not: pausing the subscription instead of ending it, under Google Play’s own terms.

Getting Money Back on an App Store Charge

Refund requests go through reportaproblem.apple.com, never through Automattic. Apple asks for 24 to 48 hours to update the claim, and card refunds can take up to 30 days to appear on a statement.

Cancelling and refunding are two separate actions on Apple’s side. Cancelling a subscription does not reverse a charge that already went through.

How to Cancel a Domain Bought With a WordPress Plan

A domain and a plan are separate subscriptions. Cancelling the plan leaves the domain registered to you until its own expiry date, and it keeps renewing. To give it up, cancel the domain on its own line in the Purchases screen.

The refund window is brutally short. Domain registrations and renewals refund only if cancelled within 96 hours, using the “Remove and claim refund” option.

Past that point there is no way back. A renewal adds a year to the expiry date, and Automattic’s documentation states plainly that the renewal cannot be reversed while you keep the domain.

Want to keep the name? Move it out before you touch anything else. Cloudflare Registrar, Namecheap, and GoDaddy all accept incoming transfers from WordPress.com.

The transfer steps: open the domain from Purchases, switch off Transfer lock, then click Get authorization code. Registrars also call this the EPP code or auth code.

The code lands in the email listed in your domain contact details, which is often not the address on your WordPress.com login. Allow 15 minutes, and up to 72 hours for .com.br and .net.br names.

ICANN blocks any transfer for 60 days after a registration, a previous transfer, or a change of registrant contact. The domain shows a clientTransferProhibited status during that period, and no registrar can lift it. Point the nameservers where you need them and wait it out.

Never cancel a domain mid-transfer. Cancelling ends your ownership immediately and the transfer fails. Our full walkthrough on moving a domain away from WordPress.com covers the sequencing in detail.

Domain privacy and email forwarding stop the moment the registration lapses.

How to Cancel Jetpack, Akismet, and Woo Subscriptions

Jetpack and Akismet bill through the same WordPress.com Purchases screen as plans, because both are tied to the account rather than to a site. WooCommerce.com extensions use a different screen entirely: My Subscriptions, with a three-dot menu on each row.

Disconnecting is not cancelling. Jetpack’s own support page spells it out: disconnecting the plugin or deleting the site leaves the subscription active and billing.

Akismet says the same thing in different words. Purchases attach to the WordPress.com account, not to a website, so a deleted site keeps its subscriptions alive on the account.

Deactivating a plugin inside wp-admin has zero effect on billing. Nothing in your WordPress dashboard talks to the payment system.

WooCommerce.com Extensions

Log in, open My Subscriptions, click the three-dot menu on the extension, then Cancel subscription.

You keep the extension working until the expiry date. After that it stops receiving updates and support, which is a security problem more than an inconvenience.

Woo no longer uses licence keys at all. Access runs through the account connection between your store and WooCommerce.com.

GoDaddy’s help centre tells its Managed Ecommerce customers to switch auto-renewal off per extension for exactly this reason: the hosting plan already covers what they are paying twice for.

What Breaks When Jetpack Stops

Real-time backups end with the subscription. Existing restore points fall under Jetpack’s retention rules rather than staying available forever.

Download anything you might need before the expiry date arrives, not after.

WordPress Refund Policy and What You Get Back

WordPress.com refunds annual, two-year, and three-year plans within 14 days of purchase or renewal, monthly plans within 7 days, and domain registrations within 96 hours. Refunds are never prorated. Money returns to the original payment method.

Check the window before you cancel. Outside it, you get nothing back, and cancelling early only forfeits time you already paid for.

Nothing is prorated. Automattic’s policy states it plainly: cancel a 12-month plan after nine months and the remaining three months are simply gone.

Mixed purchases refund in parts. Buy a plan and a domain together, ask for money back on day five, and you get the plan cost back while the domain charge stands.

A downgrade inside the refund window works differently. The price difference between the old tier and the new one comes back automatically.

Refunds land in seven to ten business days on most cards. The record shows up in Billing History straight away, which is the fastest way to confirm the request went through.

Some banks reverse the original charge rather than issuing a credit. The payment vanishes from the statement instead of appearing as a refund line.

What Never Comes Back

• Multi-year domain renewals: only the latest year is refundable
• Transfers already in progress: refundable only if the transfer fails
• The redemption fee: US$80 to rescue an expired domain, non-refundable
• Third-party plugins: handled by the seller, not by Automattic

WooCommerce extensions follow WooCommerce’s own refund policy, which sits on a separate page from the WordPress.com one.

Why a Chargeback Is the Wrong Move

Disputing the charge with your bank looks faster. It is not.

Automattic’s guidance puts a chargeback at up to 80 days, against seven to ten business days for a refund requested directly.

A chargeback issued in error can usually be cancelled within the first 10 days. Ask your bank, then request the refund the normal way.

What Happens to Your Site After Cancellation

The site stays online. Posts, pages, and media files remain exactly where they are, and the address reverts to the free .wordpress.com subdomain. Free-tier limits return with it: ads reappear, storage drops, and plugin-enabled features get stripped out.

Timing depends on the refund. A refund-eligible cancellation removes paid features immediately, while a cancellation outside the window leaves everything running until the expiry date.

If you would rather nobody sees the downgraded version, switching the site to private takes about ten seconds in Settings.

Features You Lose at Each Plan Level

Business and Commerce sites take the hardest hit. Plugins and every piece of content those plugins created disappear along with third-party themes and unsupported custom code.

The stripping process runs somewhere between 10 minutes and a few hours, and an email confirms when it finishes.

What Stays Live and Public

Posts, pages, media files, WordPress.com themes, and your customisations all survive. The site keeps serving visitors on the subdomain unless you pull the site down yourself.

Free sites carry 1 GB of media storage, or 3 GB for anything created before 31 March 2022. Existing files over that limit stay put, but new uploads stop.

Audio and video already embedded keep playing. New audio and video uploads need a paid tier.

Sites that had plugins come back private, so you can look them over before making them public again.

How to Back Up Your Content Before Cancelling

Export first, cancel second. Tools then Export then All content generates a WXR file, an XML format holding posts, pages, comments, categories, tags, custom fields, and users. The file links to your media rather than containing it.

That last detail costs people their images every week.

The export references media by URL. Your new site copies the files across during import, which can run for several hours on an image-heavy blog, and it can only do that while the original site is still public.

So keep the WordPress.com site live and public until the import finishes. Then compare the media library counts on both sites, since matching numbers confirm every file made it.

Grab the files themselves as insurance. Our walkthrough on pulling images out of the media library covers the methods that work when FTP is not an option.

Business and Commerce plans add a full site backup download, which includes the database rather than just the content export.

Those automatic daily backups stay on Automattic’s servers for 30 days after a plan is removed. Buy the plan again inside that month and the site restores to its pre-cancellation state.

Running a store or a membership site? Pull the order, customer, and user list exports before Woo features lapse, because the CSV tools go with the plan.

Sequence that works: export, open the file to check it is not empty, download the media, then cancel.

How to Remove Your Payment Method After Cancelling

Saved cards sit under Purchases, then Payment Methods. Delete the card there once every subscription tied to it is cancelled. WordPress.com blocks deletion while an active subscription still depends on that card, so clear the line items first.

Changing the card on one subscription changes nothing else. Each purchase carries its own assigned payment method.

Watch the backup card. A card marked “Use as backup” gets charged automatically when the primary one fails, which is exactly how people end up billed on a card they thought was inactive.

Paid with PayPal? Cancel the billing agreement inside your PayPal account as a second layer, since the agreement lives on PayPal’s side.

Closing the Account Entirely

Account Settings, scroll to the bottom, Close your account permanently. The option stays hidden while any active plan or domain remains on the account.

You get 30 days to reverse it through support. After that the data is purged and the email address only becomes reusable once the deletion completes.

Closing the account kills every connected Automattic service: Gravatar, WooCommerce.com, Crowdsignal, and IntenseDebate all go with it.

Getting a Human Involved

Support runs through the contact form, with an AI assistant first and 24/7 human support reserved for paid plans.

Cancel your last paid plan and that live chat door closes behind you. Sort out any billing dispute before the plan lapses, not after.

Cancellation Problems and How to Fix Them

Most post-cancellation problems trace back to three causes: a second subscription nobody noticed, a purchase made under a different account, or an in-app charge billed by Apple or Google. Each has a specific fix, and none of them require a chargeback.

Cancelled by accident? If the subscription has not expired yet, flip auto-renew back on from the same Purchase Settings page and it continues without a gap.

One exception matters. A subscription cancelled inside the refund window is removed and refunded, and it cannot be reactivated. You buy it again at the current price.

Plans that already expired need a fresh purchase, then a restore from the 30-day backup window on Business and Commerce.

Locked out of the account holding the subscription? Reset the password first, then use the account ownership verification form. Our guide to login errors on WordPress covers the ones that are not password related.

For a charge you cannot match to any account, Automattic runs wpchrg.wordpress.com specifically for unrecognised payments. Enter the charge details and it finds the account for you.

Refund refused because you missed the window? The policy holds, and support cannot issue a prorated amount. What Happiness Engineers can do is cancel the subscription so it never bills again, and restore a cancelled domain that has not yet left your account.

FAQ on How To Cancel WordPress Subscription

Does cancelling my WordPress subscription delete my site?

No. Posts, pages, and media files stay in place and the site keeps running on a .wordpress.com subdomain. Only the paid features drop away. Sites that used plugins come back private so you can review them first.

How do I cancel a plan without losing my domain?

Cancel the plan line only and leave the domain registration alone. The two bill separately, so your domain stays registered until its own expiry date. Turn the domain’s auto-renew off later if you want it to lapse.

Can I get a refund after cancelling?

Only inside the window. Annual, two-year, and three-year plans refund within 14 days, monthly plans within 7 days, and domains within 96 hours. Eligible refunds process automatically when you cancel, with no support ticket needed.

Why is there no cancel button on my purchase?

Two usual reasons. Somebody else’s WordPress.com account owns the subscription, or you bought it inside the mobile app and Apple or Google now handles the billing. Neither shows a cancel option on your dashboard.

I cancelled and I am still being charged. What now?

Check your statement descriptor. A separate domain, add-on, or Jetpack line often keeps billing after a plan is cancelled, and app-store charges run independently. Unrecognised payments can be traced at wpchrg.wordpress.com.

What is the difference between cancelling and turning off auto-renew?

Cancelling inside the refund window removes the subscription immediately and returns your money. Turning off auto-renew keeps every paid feature until the expiry date, then lets the plan lapse. No refund either way outside the window.

How do I cancel a WordPress subscription on iPhone?

Open Settings, tap your name, then Subscriptions, then the WordPress entry, then Cancel Subscription. Refunds go through reportaproblem.apple.com, not through Automattic. Deleting the app does nothing to the billing agreement.

Does deleting my site cancel the subscription?

No. Subscriptions attach to your WordPress.com account rather than to a specific website, which is why Jetpack and Akismet keep billing after a site disappears. Cancel each purchase from the Purchases screen yourself.

Can I reactivate a subscription after cancelling?

Yes, if it has not expired. Flip auto-renew back on from the Purchase Settings page. Refunded subscriptions cannot be restored, and expired ones need a fresh purchase at whatever the current price happens to be.

How long does a WordPress refund take?

Roughly seven to ten business days to reach your card, longer on international payments. The record appears in Billing History straight away. Some banks reverse the original charge instead of showing a separate refund credit.

Conclusion

Knowing how to cancel a WordPress subscription comes down to one habit: cancel every line item, not only the plan.

Open the Purchases screen, work down the list, and check each entry shows an expiry date rather than a renewal date.

Then handle the three things people skip:

• Move the domain out before the transfer lock or the expiry date catches you
• Download the media library and the WXR export while the site still sits on a paid tier
• Watch your billing history for one full cycle after the confirmation email arrives

Missed the refund window? The Happiness Engineers cannot issue a prorated amount, though they can stop the next charge and restore a domain you cancelled too fast.