New installation of Local on Windows 11 but cannot create a new website.
I’m the only user of this machine, I’m logged in as an admin user. I have removed ‘read only’ from the Hosts file i.e. Local has read/write permissions for the Hosts file. The machine has a 1Tb SSD with 730Gb free. There are no special characters in my user name. I’ve read a number of the other posts describing an identical error but they reveal no clues as to what the problem is on my machine.
System Details
Edition Windows 11 Home
Version 24H2
Installed on 02/01/2025
OS build 26100.4652
Experience Windows Feature Experience Pack 1000.26100.128.0
The errors in your log mention EBUSY: resource busy or locked and one thing I haven’t seen in your list of troubleshooting steps yet is checking if you have any Antivirus or security systems running that could be interfering with Local as those could be contributing to this type of error. Is that something you’ve checked yet?
My apologies, I forgot to mention that I had seen comments regarding this and set Local up with access through the firewall. So, unfortunately, that is not the cause of the error.
I’m testing a Windows 11 setup on my end and Local is working without any issues so it doesn’t seem to be anything widespread but we can continue to dig in here @Old-Spice - Could you share a fresh Local Log with us so we can compare and see if anything is different?
Can you give a little more detail about the machine this is running on?
From the logs, I notice lines like this:
{"class":"Updater","level":"info","message":"Checking for updates for: win32-ia32-production","thread":"main","timestamp":"2025-08-01T13:39:40.696Z"}
which makes me think this is a 32bit computer (note the ia32 part of this string: win32-ia32-production)
Local stopped supporting 32bit computers in version 8.3 (see help doc). You might try installing an older version of Local (like 8.2.1) and/or creating a new site with older versions of PHP (7.4.39) and MySQL (8.0.16)
The only other thing I can think of is as Nick mentioned about Antivirus preventing things from working. I know that you mention opening the Firewall and disabling the VPN.
In this case, errors like this:
{"class":"SiteProvisionerService","level":"error","message":"Unable to provision site.","stack":"Error: Command failed: %%userDataPath%%\\lightning-services\\mysql-8.0.35+4\\bin\\win64\\bin\\mysqld.exe --defaults-file=C:/Users/jan/AppData/Roaming/Local/run/hFv_AU79j/conf/mysql/my.cnf --initialize-insecure\n\n at genericNodeError (node:internal/errors:983:15)\n at wrappedFn (node:internal/errors:537:14)\n at ChildProcess.exithandler (node:child_process:414:12)\n at ChildProcess.emit (node:events:518:28)\n at ChildProcess.emit (node:domain:489:12)\n at maybeClose (node:internal/child_process:1101:16)\n at ChildProcess._handle.onexit (node:internal/child_process:304:5)","thread":"main","timestamp":"2025-08-01T06:40:28.460Z"}
doesn’t give much context, but sort of makes me think that something at the OS level (like Antivirus) is preventing the MySQL process from starting.
I’m using what was originally specified as a ‘gaming machine’, I don’t ever game, so although it’s old(ish) it was always (intentionally) overspec’d for my purposes. It’s not a 32bit pc.
I also changed my startup apps so that neither Windows Defender nor my Brave browser start on boot up. Complete shutdown, cold boot. Only Local running, Same error.
Thanks for sharing the extra things you’ve tried, @Old-Spice.
It looks like you’re missing DLLs that MySQL needs to run. (The 3221225781 error code from your logs is status_dll_not_found.)
Local normally installs these DLLs for you, but it could be that the DLL installer was blocked by antivirus or similar. Please could you try installing the DLLs from Microsoft’s site? The process is not too complicated:
Oooooohk… I downloaded and installed the MS DLL package. Restarted my machine and started Local. I attempted to create a site but I suspected special characters in my WP.com password caused issues… twice. Maybe the logs will reflect this. Having removed all special characters from the password, I deleted the partially created Local site and restarted my machine.
I started Local and attempted to create a site, the process gets further than before but appears to hang (I watched it for more than 10 mins) on the screen shown below. You will note that I checked my internet connection, dialog box shown bottom right.
I created a set of Local log files and checked them for instances of my passwords, still suspicious that it was they that caused earlier failures. I didn’t find any instances of my passwords, I did see a reference to the path for the WP (compressed) install file, so I downloaded it. I haven’t extracted it as I assume Local is expecting it to be in a specific location on my drive?
Thank you for the update, @Old-Spice, this looks like progress — I don’t see MySQL errors in your logs now.
the process gets further than before but appears to hang (I watched it for more than 10 mins) on the screen shown below [screenshot showing Local frozen at “Downloading WordPress”]
You can try removing Local’s cached version of WordPress in case it was corrupted due to previous aborted or incomplete attempts. The steps are described here:
I suspected special characters in my WP.com password caused issues… twice
Local doesn’t require a wp.com password, so your wp.com password characters would have no impact on how Local runs. It downloads WordPress from the publicly available link if a new version is available.
First the good news, having deleted the Local WP cached file and disabled my firewall I finally got a successful install. Hurrah!
However, the Local UI showed 6.8.1 installed and prompted an upgrade to 6.8.2. When I clicked the ‘upgrade’ prompt shown the error message at the top of the screen appeared
Great to see a site running, @Old-Spice! Thanks for working through that with us.
It’s not clear why you’re seeing a WordPress update failure from your logs, though. You mentioned disabling a firewall — is there anything else on your system that could be blocking Local from reaching WP update servers? That’s the most common cause for update failure.
You can of course continue to use Local without this for now since it’s working with 6.8.1, but would be good to understand what might be blocking updates.
you say that “Local doesn’t require a wp.com password” but it does prompt for one during site creation…
This screen is just asking for a username and password to use for the local WordPress site you’re currently creating. It’s not asking for your wp.com password.
