How to Add a Live Chat Widget to Your Maintenance Mode Page

Many WordPress site owners use the Maintenance plugin to display a 'Coming Soon' page while they work on their site. A common request is to add a third-party live chat widget, like Tawk.to, Tidio, or Zopim, to this page so potential visitors can still contact the business. Users often report that when they paste the chat script into the plugin's content area, it doesn't work.

Why This Happens

Based on analysis of community support threads, the Maintenance plugin is designed to prevent any third-party code, including scripts from other plugins, from loading on its maintenance page. This is a deliberate feature to prevent errors and ensure the page displays exactly as intended while the main site is under development. The plugin's standard content fields are for text and basic HTML, not for executing JavaScript, which is why pasting a <script> tag directly into them typically fails.

Common Solutions and Workarounds

Unfortunately, the official stance from the Maintenance team, as seen in numerous support responses, is that adding custom scripts or HTML is not a feature of the free version of the plugin. They have indicated it is a planned feature but have not provided a timeline for its release in the free version. Here are the most common approaches discussed by users:

1. Check for a Built-in Feature: First, thoroughly check all the plugin's settings tabs. Look for any option labeled 'Custom HTML', 'Header Scripts', 'Code Snippets', or something similar. If such an option exists in your version, that would be the intended place to add your chat code.
2. Alternative Plugin: If adding a chat widget is critical for your business during maintenance, the most straightforward solution may be to temporarily use a different 'coming soon' or maintenance mode plugin that explicitly supports adding custom code or scripts in its feature set.
3. Custom Code (Advanced): For developers comfortable with code, a potential workaround is to hook into the maintenance page template. This involves adding custom code to your theme's functions.php file or a custom functionality plugin. However, this requires knowledge of WordPress hooks and is not officially supported. The success of this method can vary and may break after plugin updates.
4. Contact Information in Content: Since the chat widget cannot be added, a simple and effective alternative is to ensure your contact email address or phone number is clearly visible on the maintenance page. This allows visitors to reach out to you directly while the site is down.

It's important to note that while the 'Pro' version of the plugin is mentioned in some threads as having a solution, this article focuses solely on the free version available in the WordPress repository. The information provided here is based on publicly available community support discussions to help users understand their options.