It's pretty common to throw a layer of HTTP Basic auth on a WordPress site: a staging environment before launch, an internal test instance only employees should see, or any environment that wants an extra gate before the WordPress login screen itself.
From a maintenance-tool point of view, this setup creates a peculiar "half-working, half-broken" asymmetry. The SSH/WP-CLI side runs fine. But everything HTTP-based — visual checks, thumbnail generation, browser-based fallback updates — hits 401 and dies. This post walks through how we resolved that asymmetry.
What was breaking — two parallel paths, both blocked
A maintenance tool actually touches a Basic-auth-protected site through two distinct paths:
Playwright path: visual checks, thumbnail capture, browser fallback updates when SSH isn't available. browser.new_context() → navigation → screenshot
