# The GuardPress WordPress Dashboard Widget

> The GuardPress widget on the WordPress Dashboard shows every admin the security score, active threats, and vulnerabilities, color-coded by letter grade.

- Canonical: <https://royalplugins.com/support/guardpress/wordpress-dashboard-widget/>
- Last updated: 2026-09-27
- HTML version: <https://royalplugins.com/support/guardpress/wordpress-dashboard-widget/>

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GuardPress adds a widget to the main WordPress Dashboard (the page you land on when you sign in) so every administrator sees the current security posture without having to navigate to GuardPress → Dashboard. This article covers what the widget shows, what the color states mean, and how the score maps to the letter grade on the full dashboard.

### Score thresholds match the letter grade

The widget’s color is derived from the same score as GuardPress → Dashboard, and the thresholds match the A/B/C/D/F grade boundaries: **green** when the score is 80 or above (A and B), **orange** at 60 through 79 (C and D), **red** below 60 (F). See [Understanding the Security Dashboard](https://royalplugins.com/support/guardpress/understanding-the-security-dashboard/) for the score algorithm.

## What the widget shows

The Dashboard Widget renders four data points per administrator:

- **Security score** as a large number with letter grade and color-coded status label (Protected / Needs Attention / At Risk)
- **Active threats** count from the malware scanner. This is unresolved detections, not historical.
- **Critical vulnerabilities** count from the vulnerability scanner. Only findings with severity *critical* are surfaced in the widget; lower-severity findings live on the full Vulnerability Scanner page.
- **Last scan timestamp** in human-relative format (“2 hours ago”) so you can tell at a glance whether the scheduled cron is actually running.

A one-click link at the bottom takes you to **GuardPress → Dashboard** for the full view.

## Color-coded status

The widget’s status color is derived directly from the security score, using the same thresholds as the letter grade:

| Score | Grade | Color | Status label |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 80–100 | A / B | Green | Protected |
| 60–79 | C / D | Orange | Needs Attention |
| Below 60 | F | Red | At Risk |

These thresholds are hard-coded so the widget and the full **GuardPress → Dashboard** page can never disagree about your score’s severity.

## Who sees the widget

The widget renders for every user with the `manage_options` capability. In a standard WordPress install, that’s the Administrator role. Editors, Authors, and Subscribers do not see it. On multisite, network-admin users see it on the Network Admin Dashboard; subsite-level administrators see it on their own site’s Dashboard.

If the widget doesn’t appear for a user who should see it, check the **Screen Options** tab in the top-right of the Dashboard. WordPress remembers per-user widget visibility preferences, so a user may have previously hidden it.

## Troubleshooting

#### Widget shows “Never” for last scan

Either the scheduled scan hasn’t run yet (activate the plugin, wait 24 hours, or trigger a manual scan) or WP-Cron isn’t firing. WP-Cron requires HTTP traffic to fire by default. Sites with very low traffic can miss scheduled scans for long stretches; the fix is to run cron from the system-level scheduler and set `DISABLE_WP_CRON` to true. Your host’s documentation will describe the exact setup.

#### Widget color doesn’t match the full dashboard

Shouldn’t happen since both use the same score. If it does, refresh both pages. The widget renders server-side on page load, so a stale tab shows a stale value. If the mismatch persists across fresh loads, open **GuardPress → Audit Log** and look for repeated errors from the score-calculation function; that indicates a broken factor input.

Related

- [**Understanding the Security Dashboard**](https://royalplugins.com/support/guardpress/understanding-the-security-dashboard/): the full-page dashboard the widget links to, including score composition
- [**Quick Start**](https://royalplugins.com/support/guardpress/quick-start/): the 5-step walkthrough that gets the widget to green

[Back to GuardPress Support](https://royalplugins.com/support/guardpress/)
[GuardPress Plugin Page](https://royalplugins.com/guardpress/)