Anyone else had a sudden and massive rise in visitors and views?
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So, a few days ago, I had a sudden and massive increase in both views and visitors.
My normal traffic is around 20-40 on days I don’t post, and 50-60 when I have a new post. Occasionally, if I post something with wide interest, I might hit 100.
On November 6th, I had 895 views, which I assumed was some bot . . . but, no. I had 843 visitors. The next day, 1,625 visitors and 1,688 views. Today, 490 visitors, 511 views so far.
“What did you post?” you might ask?
Nothing. I’ve been sick, and my last post was on Monday. Plus, they are hitting posts going back years.
Now, it could be that the excellence of my offerings is finally being recognized, and, given my 4,000+ posts, the large number of views makes sense, however it works out to about 1.06 page views per visitor. So, it’s them damn bots after all!
Except . . .
The vast majority of visits came from China. Specifically, eastern China. Not just one location, but over a wide area. Many, many different locations.
I don’t know what’s going on, and don’t know if I should be worried, but is anyone else experiencing anything like it?
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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I can completely understand why this sudden jump in traffic feels confusing, especially when it’s coming from older posts and concentrated in one region. The good news is that this type of spike isn’t unusual and doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with your site.
What you’re likely seeing is automated traffic from bots or web crawlers. These programs often scan public websites to collect information or index pages, and sometimes they’ll focus on older posts. While it can inflate your stats temporarily, it’s generally harmless and doesn’t affect your site’s performance or security.
Here are a few ways to review and manage this:
- Understand how your traffic is counted: https://wordpress.com/support/stats/understand-your-sites-traffic/#how-traffic-is-counted
- Identify where the visits are coming from: Check your Referrers in Stats to see what websites or sources are driving the views. https://wordpress.com/support/stats/understand-traffic-sources/#identify-referrers
- Mark suspicious sources as spam: If you find referrers that look automated or unrelated to your content, you can mark them as spam so they don’t affect your future stats. https://wordpress.com/support/stats/understand-traffic-sources/#mark-a-referrer-as-spam
Since you have over 4,000 posts and growing readership, you might also want to monetize your traffic through the WordAds program — WordPress.com’s built-in advertising network. Once you’re approved, ads can automatically display on your posts and generate income based on your traffic levels. You can learn more and apply here: https://wordpress.com/support/monetize-your-site-with-wordads/
Keep monitoring your stats for the next few days. These spikes usually subside once the crawlers finish scanning.
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I can completely understand why this sudden jump in traffic feels confusing, especially when it’s coming from older posts and concentrated in one region. The good news is that this type of spike isn’t unusual and doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with your site.
What you’re likely seeing is automated traffic from bots or web crawlers. These programs often scan public websites to collect information or index pages, and sometimes they’ll focus on older posts. While it can inflate your stats temporarily, it’s generally harmless and doesn’t affect your site’s performance or security.
Here are a few ways to review and manage this:
- Understand how your traffic is counted: https://wordpress.com/support/stats/understand-your-sites-traffic/#how-traffic-is-counted
- Identify where the visits are coming from: Check your Referrers in Stats to see what websites or sources are driving the views. https://wordpress.com/support/stats/understand-traffic-sources/#identify-referrers
- Mark suspicious sources as spam: If you find referrers that look automated or unrelated to your content, you can mark them as spam so they don’t affect your future stats. https://wordpress.com/support/stats/understand-traffic-sources/#mark-a-referrer-as-spam
Since you have over 4,000 posts and growing readership, you might also want to monetize your traffic through the WordAds program — WordPress.com’s built-in advertising network. Once you’re approved, ads can automatically display on your posts and generate income based on your traffic levels. You can learn more and apply here: https://wordpress.com/support/wordads-and-earn/#applying-for-word-ads
Keep monitoring your stats for the next few days. These spikes usually subside once the crawlers finish scanning.
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I wouldn’t go as far as saying “growing readership”.
Traffic on my site is small and restricted to a few “regulars”.
Plus, the whole point of paying WP’s inflated fees is to keep ads from my blog. The amount of money I would generate by monetizing it wouldn’t even pay for one of COSTCO’s samples, which, aside from the membership cost, are free.And, to be clear, I’m not worried, just curious.
That said, I find the explanation of bots or web crawlers only marginally satisfactory. I can monitor real-time locations, and they really are spread out. Now, it could be a network of infected PCs, but it still seems strange.
I’ve had these kinds of spikes before, but only in views, not visitors. The numbers here have nearly a 1:1 relationship, something I’ve not seen before.
Additionally, certain posts get multiple views (hundreds) over multiple days. In previous instances, a given post would get one view. Now, even posts with low numbers still show the number of views in multiples of tens, each with a corresponding number of visitors. That does not sound like bots or webcrawlers.
One hopes that a large number of Chinese formed a Disperser Fan Club, but I seriously doubt it.
Finally, in those previous instances, it was one or, at most, two days. Now, it’s been four days, and it shows no sign of decreasing (more today, so far, than yesterday).
But, if this continues, WordAd might actually begin to make sense . . . 400K visitors a year would surely earn me enough to at least pay for a coffee . . . except that I would then be annoyed WP made the bulk of the profits, so, probably not even then.
Thanks for the response.
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A couple of updates . . . First, numbers are still going up, only now about 40% of the traffic is from the US, with the other 60% still China. I expect Russia to get involved any minute now.
Second, I’ve received — via my blog’s contact form — a few offers to secure my servers, optimize my WordPress site, etc.
This is my reply to them:
“I’m not sure you can do all that on my site since it’s managed by WP. If I were self-hosted, maybe. But, to be clear, I only have a passing curiosity to the sudden spike. I don’t see it as a threat, although I don’t discount the possibility of an effort to copy/steal my content. However, since all the AI companies have already done that — including Anthropic — and considering my blog is public and I want it to remain so, and considering I have no financial consideration connected to my blog, I must decline your offer.”
Honestly, while I appreciate entrepreneurial spirit, I’m not looking — nor do I think it would work — for an outside company to address issues with my blog.
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My big disappointment here is that no one connected with WP has contributed anything, even if to only say, “Boh! We don’t know!”.
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Thank you for sharing your detailed observations and concerns about the unusual traffic patterns on your site. It’s completely understandable to feel disappointed when a direct and clear explanation isn’t readily available, especially with such an atypical spike.
Looking at your site stats, it appears that most of your visits are coming from Google Search. To better understand what’s driving this increase in traffic, I recommend connecting your WordPress.com site to Google Search Console.
Exploring that might also help uncover what is driving these unusual visits.
We’re genuinely interested in understanding your site’s unique activity and would be happy to assist if any new questions arise.
Let us know if you noticed anything suspicious. -
Well, I am dealing with WP support. After giving me the standard answer about bots and stuff, I supplied them with a few screenshots from the Google Search Console… and from ClusterMaps.
Unlike the Jetpack stats, those two provide locations. All three sources track pretty closely (except WP Stats has far less data). There are, oh, I don’t know, dozens of cities involved? And now, I’m getting a similar spike based on the US (not quite as many visits/views, but way more than usual).All three sources (WP, Google Console, and ClusterMaps) apparently filter for bots. Either these are legitimate visits, or all three sources — WP, Google Search Console, and ClusterMaps — are suddenly very bad at their filtering jobs, and have been so for five days (5.6K views / 5.4K visitors).
Additionally, I’m not hearing from other users having a similar experience (maybe they are thrilled by the traffic bump and don’t want to jinx it).
Now, I’m kind of curious about this statement of yours: “most of your visits are coming from Google Search”.
I’m curious because I don’t see that in my stats . . . what are you looking at that I can’t see? And where are you looking?
I can see referrers, and yes Google Search accounts of the majority of referrers . . . 110 views at last count. The thing is, today, so far, 836 visitors, 923 views.
So, again, I would love to be pointed to what data you are looking at. I don’t mean to be snarky; I have no idea anymore what the JetPack Stats are telling me, so I genuinely want to be enlightened.Plus, you know, at this point, I have no idea what the point of having stats is. They appear to be pretty much worthless data.
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I am glad you posted this, I too have had a ridiculous spike in pageviews from China on my blog. it started Oct 16. I got the same pat answers “it will probably go away in a couple day” etc. It’s been going on for weeks and lately it’s over 1,000 per day vs my usual total of 175 on average. So far this year 8,700 pageviews from China, second only to the US. My experience with WordPress help was no help and it seems the only possible fixes, if they even work will cost me money. I have blogger friends who are experiencing the same issues, again no help from WP unless you upgrade. Sending us to Google is a cop-out. This is not legitimate traffic, China has a highly restricted internet, we all know this? So this is not harmless and it’s destroyed my stats and rendered them useless.
Has WP heard of Denial of Service attacks or is it just denying service to it’s members. WP needs to make fixes available for everyone, at no charge. or you will start to lose customers. If you don’t think China would crash WP just for a test, they you are not keeping your eye on the ball.
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Something to read (shameless self-promotion) about it:
https://dispersertracks.com/2025/11/12/the-dreaded-your-stats-are-booming-text/The thing is, support people have little to no say about anything. Often, they are in the dark as much as users when it comes to anything but the basics. This, despite most of them genuinely caring about users.
Anything else, they have to run it by the mythical “developers” . . . who also are not the ones pulling the strings. Developers could probably do something about a lot of things, but, you know, it takes guts to do the right thing.Them who hold and pull the strings don’t care about users other than in the aggregate.
However, if you and your blogger friends are experiencing this as well, why don’t you and they all make posts about that, and also add entries about it here in the forum? The more voices there are, the better idea of how widespread it is, and what people can expect from it.
And yeah, stats are already blown. Despite their claims, they are now useless.
Finally, there are only two choices on this ride . . . either enjoy it and laugh about it, or get off and find another ride.The thing for me is that — despite what they say — moving 4,200+ posts would be a huge undertaking. I’m not sure I’ll live long enough to see it done properly.
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Some very good points there. I will encourage my blogging friends to post on this forum. I know they used WP help and well, the problem has gotten worse.
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As an update, and frustratingly so, Support just sent me an email stating that they have reviewed my stats and don’t see those kinds of numbers.
Annoyingly, they keep suggesting I use Google Analytics (which I already do) and the Google Search Console (which I also use) to (apparently) give me a “more detailed insight about my traffic”.
This, despite the fact that I provided screenshots of Analytics and the Console showing close to the same numbers and traffic and originating locations as what JetPack shows.
At this point, I think they are just trying to wear me down using the same tactic as the shop owner in the Monty Python Parrot sketch . . . namely, I don’t see what I can plainly see.
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Like I’m going to click on a link without any explanation, especially one with the words “Premium” in it.
Also, that says Spotify, but that’s not what the link looks like:
spotipremiumx.live looks suspicious as all heck (spoti premium x . . . really!?).Add to that the suspiciously bare info on your name, and I’m guessing nefarious intent.
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This site is promoting modified APK files of Spotify, which is a significant red flag. Here’s what you’re looking at:
It’s not a legitimate pay site – it’s offering “Spotify Premium APK” files that claim to unlock premium features for free. This is:
- Against Spotify’s terms of service – Using modified apps violates their user agreement and can get your account banned
- Potentially unsafe – Modified APKs can contain malware, spyware, or steal your login credentials
- Legally questionable – The site acknowledges this with the disclaimer “it is for educational purposes only”
- Not how legitimate services work – Real Spotify Premium is a paid subscription through Spotify’s official channels
The site itself even warns against modified files in its own text (ironically, while promoting them), stating they “can contain viruses or trackers” and “get your account banned.”
Bottom line: Avoid this site.
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Interesting. . . I tried posting a warning about the Spotify Premium link, and it gets blown away (never shows up).
It’s not a legitimate . . . well, anything, and it certainly doesn’t address the Booming stats issue.
Just someone trying to reel in suckers. -
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I’ve just added the “spammer” and “modlook” tags to your thread @disperser It’s possible your efforts to warn folk about that spam link got sucked into the forum spam filter. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
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Hi, justjennifer…. let me get this straight; to warn others about a spanner, you flagged me as one?
. . . that seems . . . I want to say, “a miscarriage of justice”.
Yes, I kid.
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This is now annoying: anything I post as an update gets blocked or blown away. If I was irritated before, I’m now thoroughly annoyed.
I’ll try again, but if it doesn’t work, I’ll try a new post.. -
As an update, I received a response from support that prompted the following response on my part:
My response:*****************
Thank you, NAME (or whoever reads this), but see, these kinds of answers: “…we do our best to only count legitimate visitors but bots will make it through from time to time.”
And: “…In terms of alternatives, we have an option on our Business plan that allows you to turn on defensive mode”
. . . is exactly what is souring me on WordPress. It does so in two ways:
One, it confirms what I already know . . . WP has a way of distinguishing between real traffic and bots, and, two, they can only do something about it if I upgrade (pay them more money).
I already get all manners of updates and emails tauting all the wonderful things — things that I don’t need or want — would be available to me if only I tripled the amount of money I pay WP.
Really, I only want two things . . . more strage (outrageusly expensive to buy on its own, and limited too), and for WP to do what it says it does, manage my blog.
In this case, it’s not just a “few” bots getting through from time to time; it’s on average over 1K a day for nine days now, with no sign of it abating.
As I mentioned, it’s not really affecting me other than confirming that stats are worthless (mine are trashed now even if things go back to normal).
The irony is that it’s a real possibility some of these bots are Anthropic’s own scouring for training material for Claude.
Anyway, thanks (sort of) for the response. While it’s frustrating in its content, it at least gives me a more solid basis for my general discontent.
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