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TroubleshootingPage BuildersWPBakery Page Builder

WPBakery Page Builder

WPBakery (formerly Visual Composer, still sold under the WPBakery name for the classic product) attaches to the_content via its shortcode system. When enabled on a post, it swaps the block-editor output with its shortcode-driven layout; if the post doesn’t actually contain WPBakery shortcodes, the front end can render blank.

What Structura does automatically

As of the 2026-04-23 release, every Structura post is created with _wpb_vc_js_status = false written atomically as part of the wp_insert_post call. This flag is WPBakery’s own “don’t render this post with the builder” signal, and because it’s persisted before WPBakery’s save_post handler runs, WPBakery leaves the post alone and WordPress renders the Gutenberg blocks normally.

You shouldn’t have to change anything in your WPBakery settings for Structura posts to render correctly. If the body is still blank, the cause is usually a site-level configuration — keep reading.

How to verify your theme template still renders post content

WPBakery does not have a Theme Builder of its own, but many WPBakery-compatible themes ship with custom single-post templates that strip the_content() and replace it with a shortcode-only rendering path. If your theme is WPBakery-branded (e.g., Salient, The7, Enfold), check:

  1. In wp-admin, go to Appearance → Customize → Posts (or the theme-specific equivalent panel).
  2. Look for an option like Single Post layout or Default post template. Make sure it’s set to a layout that renders the standard post body, not “Page Builder only”.
  3. Open a single post on the front end and use View → Page Source in your browser. Search for the opening words of your Structura post. If the words are in the source but not visible, the theme’s CSS is hiding them; if they’re missing, the theme’s PHP template is skipping the_content().

What to check if the body is still missing

  1. Clear any caching plugin. WPBakery-heavy themes often ship with aggressive caching.
  2. Look at the _wpb_vc_js_status meta directly. Use WP-CLI wp post meta get <id> _wpb_vc_js_status. The value should be false. If it’s true, something is re-enabling WPBakery on the post after Structura writes false — usually a theme-level save_post hook.

Status of this page

This page is a placeholder — the _wpb_vc_js_status opt-out is defensive and may not cover every WPBakery-themed site’s specific template behaviour. If you hit this issue on a WPBakery site and the steps here don’t resolve it, contact support so we can add your case to this page.

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