Tutorial

Database Cleaner tidies up what WordPress and your plugins leave behind: old revisions, expired transients, orphaned data, heavy autoloaded options and tables from plugins you removed years ago. It tells you who uses what before you delete anything, and it’s built for big databases, cleaning in small batches so nothing times out.

In 30 seconds

  1. Make a backup of your database, as before any cleanup.
  2. Open Meow Apps → Database Cleaner and click Auto Clean: it removes the safe, common clutter.
  3. Switch to Expert mode to look deeper: post types, tables, options, metadata and cron jobs.

1. Start in Easy mode

Database Cleaner opens in Easy mode, with two tabs: WordPress Core and Tables. The size of your database is at the top, with a small chart of how it changed over time, so you see right away what a cleanup gave you.

Database Cleaner in Easy mode: the WordPress Core tab with revisions, auto drafts and spam counts, the Auto Clean button and the database size

WordPress Core lists the usual suspects: revisions, auto drafts, deleted posts, spam and unapproved comments, expired transients, orphaned and duplicated metadata. Each one shows how many entries it holds, with a magnifying glass to look at them first and a button to clean only that one. Auto Clean takes care of the safe ones all at once.

The Age Threshold in the settings keeps recent entries safe: only what is older gets cleaned. It’s 7 days by default, so a first Auto Clean is a good place to start. More in the docs: WordPress Core items ↗.

2. Look deeper in Expert mode

Flip the switch next to Auto Clean to Expert, and more tabs appear. This is where the real weight usually hides.

  • Post TypesLogs and leftovers stored as posts, like old order logs, often by the thousands.
  • TablesEvery table with its size and the plugin that created it. Optimize them in one click.
  • OptionsSettings left by plugins you uninstalled, and the autoloaded ones that slow every page.
  • Cron JobsScheduled tasks still running for plugins that are gone.
Database Cleaner in Expert mode: the Tables tab with each table size, its share of the database and the plugin that uses it

Expert mode also gives every item a mode, so you decide what Auto Clean does:

  • Auto: cleaned each time Auto Clean runs.
  • Manual: cleaned only when you click its own button.
  • Never: left alone.

There are also Metadata for posts and users, and Custom Queries for your own cleanup rules. More in the docs: every section explained ↗.

3. Know who uses what

The hard part of cleaning a database isn’t deleting, it’s knowing what is safe to delete. For each table, option, post type and cron job, the Used By column tells you which plugin or theme it belongs to, and whether that plugin is still installed. Anything used by WordPress or an active plugin is protected (its button is blue and disabled), so you can’t remove it by accident (unless you allow it in the settings).

Database Cleaner Options tab: used, unknown and removed-plugin options, with their size and autoload flag

The free version recognizes the data of about 270 popular plugins. Pro knows more than 6,000, which turns a long list of mysterious names into a short list of things you can safely remove. You can also assign an unknown entry to a plugin yourself.

4. Lighten your autoloaded options

Autoloaded options are read on every single page load, even when nothing needs them. A few big ones, often left by plugins long gone, can slow the whole site. In the Options tab, filter on Autoloaded, sort by size, and either delete what belongs to removed plugins or simply switch autoload off for what is still needed but rarely used.

More in the docs: options ↗ and tables ↗.

5. Keep it clean on its own (Pro)

Turn on Enable Scheduled Auto-Clean in the settings, choose how often, and the Nyao Sweeper runs Auto Clean for you in small, discreet tasks, so your visitors never feel it. Everything set to Auto is handled, and nothing else.

Database Cleaner Settings and Logs: Age Threshold of 7 days, Nyao Sweeper running hourly, and the cleanup log

6. Ask your AI assistant

Database Cleaner adds its own tools to the MCP server of AI Engine. Turn on MCP in Database Cleaner’s settings, connect Claude or ChatGPT to your site, and simply ask: “what’s taking space in my database?”, “which tables belong to plugins I removed?”. The assistant shows you a sample of the rows before suggesting any deletion, never deletes without your explicit yes, and can’t touch WordPress’s own tables.

Database Cleaner settings with MCP enabled, so an AI assistant can inspect and clean the database through AI Engine

More on connecting an assistant: MCP docs ↗.

Questions

My database is huge. Will it time out? No, that’s what it was built for. Deletions run in batches, several per request, and you can lower the Batch Size in the settings if your server is slow.

I cleaned a lot, but the database size barely moved. MySQL often keeps the freed space for itself until the table is optimized. Optimize the tables you cleaned, in the Tables tab, to get that space back. It deletes nothing.

Can I undo a cleanup? No, deletions are permanent. That’s why protected items are locked, why you see a confirmation first, and why a backup before a big cleanup is always a good idea.

Stuck somewhere? The docs ↗ and common issues ↗ cover most cases, and our support is here for the rest.