Share a local WordPress site

Start a tunnelCopy Anchor Link

Use the port your local WordPress listens on. This guide uses 8080. Use -s with a subdomain you reserved. Without it, the subdomain is random and changes every run, and you would change the WordPress URL each time. Reserved subdomains are a paid feature, see Pricing.

hrzn tunnel http://localhost:8080 -s my-app

HORIZON: Tunnel connected
  URL          https://my-app.hrzn.run (reserved)
  Forwarding   http://localhost:8080
  Request log  https://hrzn.run/dashboard/tunnels/my-app

Set WP_HOME and WP_SITEURLCopy Anchor Link

Add both constants to wp-config.php. WordPress's docs say they override the home and siteurl values in the database without changing the database. Include https:// and leave out the trailing slash.

define( 'WP_HOME', 'https://my-app.hrzn.run' );
define( 'WP_SITEURL', 'https://my-app.hrzn.run' );

WordPress's migration guide warns that this hard-codes the values. You can't edit them on the General settings page while the constants exist. Remove the constants when you stop sharing.

If you want the database values to change, use WP-CLI instead:

wp option update home 'https://my-app.hrzn.run'
wp option update siteurl 'https://my-app.hrzn.run'

Pick the constants for a short share, because you can delete them in one edit. Pick WP-CLI when the new URL stays.

Tell WordPress it is on HTTPSCopy Anchor Link

The tunnel serves HTTPS, but your local WordPress receives plain HTTP. WordPress's HTTPS guide shows how to set $_SERVER['HTTPS'] to on in wp-config.php when a proxy provides SSL. Its example checks for https anywhere in the X-Forwarded-Proto value, because that header can hold a list such as https,http. Horizon appends to that header, so use the check as written. Don't compare the header to the string https.

if ( strpos( $_SERVER['HTTP_X_FORWARDED_PROTO'], 'https' ) !== false ) {
    $_SERVER['HTTPS'] = 'on';
}

The guide pairs this with FORCE_SSL_ADMIN. Leave FORCE_SSL_ADMIN out unless you need it.

Fix hard-coded http URLsCopy Anchor Link

Your tunnel serves HTTPS. A page loaded over HTTPS that requests an http:// image or script has mixed content, and browsers block or warn about it. Post content, widgets and theme settings can store absolute http://localhost:8080 URLs in the database. The constants don't change those. Replace them with WP-CLI, which WordPress's migration guide shows with --skip-columns=guid:

wp search-replace 'http://localhost:8080' 'https://my-app.hrzn.run' --skip-columns=guid

Run it with --dry-run first to see what changes. This rewrites your local database, so back it up first.