My shortcodes stopped working.

Hi @senribb,

Thanks for the detailed report — the error code and shortcode examples made it much easier to investigate.

We tested your exact shortcode syntax against the codebase and confirmed the shortcodes are working correctly. The root cause is error 101 — it’s blocking the tracker from saving new visits, which is why all your counts show 0.

Here’s what’s happening: error 101 means the security signature embedded in your pages no longer matches the key stored in SlimStat’s settings. This breaks every time the plugin is reinstalled, because a new key is generated — but your pages still serve the old signature. Even without a caching plugin, most hosting providers run server-level caching (Nginx FastCGI cache, LiteSpeed cache, Varnish, or Cloudflare) that you wouldn’t see from WordPress.

Here’s how to fix it:

1. Ask your hosting provider to purge the server-side page cache for this site completely
2. Clear your browser cache (or test in a private/incognito window)
3. Visit a few pages on your site
4. Wait 2-3 minutes, then check SlimStat’s dashboard — you should see new visits appearing

Once new visits show up, your shortcodes will return the correct numbers again.

Since your other site on the same server works fine, this confirms it’s a per-site cache issue — that site likely had its cache cleared naturally or wasn’t cached when the plugin was reinstalled.

Also, if you have GDPR Compliance Mode enabled, SlimStat won’t track any visits until the visitor accepts the consent banner. If you want the banner completely off, make sure GDPR Compliance Mode is set to Off under SlimStat > Settings > Consent Management. With it on, visitors who haven’t accepted the banner won’t be tracked — so your shortcode counts would also stay at 0 for those visits.

We’re tracking this at: https://github.com/wp-slimstat/wp-slimstat/issues/176

Let us know if purging the cache resolves it!

• This reply was modified 1 month, 1 week ago by Parhum Khoshbakht.

Hi @senribb ,

Glad to hear the shortcodes are working again!

The geolocation provider issue you’re seeing has been fixed in version 5.4.2, which we just released. We rewrote how the geolocation settings are handled — the provider selection now saves and applies correctly, and the database downloads are much more reliable.

Please update to v5.4.2 through your WordPress dashboard (Dashboard > Updates), then go to SlimStat > Settings > Tracker, select your preferred geolocation provider, enter your MaxMind license key, and save. The setting should stick and the database will download automatically.

Let us know if everything works as expected after the update!

Hi @senribb ,

Quick heads-up — we just released v5.4.6, which is a major stability update for the entire 5.4.x line. Upgrading to 5.4.x broke tracking for many users: visitor counts dropped to zero, IPs were masked without permission, and a consent banner appeared on sites that never asked for one. This release fixes all of that — after updating, your site works the way it did before 5.4.0, no manual steps required.

Since your original issue was caused by a stale data signature after reinstalling, this update also addresses cache-related tracking failures more gracefully, including better fallback transport when a request fails.

One thing to keep in mind: if you’re using any caching plugin (or your host runs server-level caching), clear the cache after updating. Then visit a few pages and check SlimStat’s Access Log to confirm new data is being recorded.

If anything comes up after the update, we’re here — just open a new thread.