In another post, we explain what plugins are and how you can use these to enhance your site’s capabilities.
You can view the article here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn the importance of keeping plugins up-to-date, how to automatically upgrade and remove your WordPress plugins, and some tools to help you better manage your plugins.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Many Of Your Plugins Need To Be Upgraded
New WordPress versions are regularly released (about every 3-4 months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities found in earlier software releases, as well as to improve existing features or introduce new ones.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, there will typically be new updates for plugins each time a new version of WordPress is released.
The reason for this, is because most WordPress plugins are created by third-party developers, so sometimes the code in the new WordPress version conflicts with plugins that were developed and tested with a previous version. When this happens, there is a potential for problems to sometimes develop.
Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are fairly proactive when it comes to making sure that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if this is required). All you have to do as a WordPress user, is simply maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is really simple and easy to do.
Keeping your plugins regularly updated and removing old plugins you no longer use is part of good WordPress management and helps to avoid problems or errors.
The tutorial below explains how to automatically upgrade and delete plugins without requiring web coding skills.
Updating And Deleting Plugins Safely – Tutorial
WordPress provides a number of different ways to inform users when plugins need to be updated.
For example, you can immediately see how many plugins need to be updated as soon as you log into your Admin area just by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, nine WordPress plugins are out of date and need to be updated …
You can also tell how many plugins need updating from your WP Administration Toolbar (as shown below, nine plugins should be updated) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also notifies you about plugins that need updating …
As well as providing information about which plugins have available updates, the Plugins screen provides links to the plugin developer sites and gives you the option to update your plugins individually or in bulk …
Let’s start by showing you how to upgrade individual WP plugins.
Upgrading Individual Plugins
Always make a backup of your data and files before making any changes to your website or blog.
From your main menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
The “Plugins” section will display in your browser. The table of plugins can flow down your page for a while, depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site …
(The WordPress Plugins Section)
Notes:
If you have too many plugins and would like to reduce the number of plugins displaying on your page, then click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your Plugins page and type in a smaller number of items per page (all plugins show up on the page by default), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
Your Plugins page will now be reduced in size with a ’numbered pages’ feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Search” function …
WordPress displays information about plugins in different color backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (active vs. inactive and outdated vs up-to-date) …
Plugins that need upgrading display the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Insert Plugin Name] available” …
Find the plugin that you want to update and click on the update now link …
WordPress provides smooth and fast plugin updates, so that updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins area …
Repeat this process for all plugins on your site that need to be updated, or refer to the section below if you have many plugins that are out-of-date and would like to update all plugins in one simple operation.
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Now that you know how to update individual plugins, the next step is to learn how to upgrade a bunch of WP plugins simultaneously.
Bulk-Updating WordPress Plugins
To update multiple plugins in a single operation using the automatic update feature, go to the “Plugins” screen and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click on the checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to upgrade by checking its box …
In the Bulk Actions drop down menu above your plugin table, select Update …
Click Apply …
Your selected plugins will begin to update automatically …
After all plugin upgrades are finished, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to your Plugins section, or choose another section of your dashboard …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, any plugin alerts will disappear (i.e. the “at-a-glance” indicators and “There is a new version of XYZ plugin available” messages no longer display) …
You have updated all plugins on your site!
(When your plugins are all up-to-date, notification icons no longer display)
Now that you know how to update your plugins, let’s show you how to safely remove plugins safely from your WordPress site or blog.
Deleting Plugins
As part of good WordPress site management practice, it’s a good idea to remove plugins that are no longer needed or being used on your site. This can help reduce resources on your server and eliminate causes of problems.
In this section, we show you how to safely remove unused plugins from your site or blog.
Always create a full back up of your WordPress site before installing, upgrading or deleting plugins, in case something goes wrong and you need to recover data or reinstall your site.
To remove a plugin, go to your dashboard menu and choose Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins area, locate the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins are listed in a different colored background than active plugins and show an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, click on Deactivate before going any further …
Next, click on Delete …
If you would like to have a look at all the files that will be deleted before going ahead, then click on the “Click to view entire list of files which will be deleted” link in the “Delete Plugin” section …
The entire list of files associated with the plugin that you are about to remove will be listed on your screen …
If you are certain about going ahead and deleting the selected plugin files, just click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugins and related files will be deleted …
Bulk-Deleting WordPress Plugins
You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins on your site, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be deleted.
Note: To delete any plugins that are currently active, your will first need to deactivate them.
Go to the “Plugins” section and select all of the active plugins that you want to delete by either placing a tick next to their checkbox, or selecting the check box next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins (warning: this will deactivate all plugins) …
Once you have done this, specify Deactivate from the Bulk Actions pull-down menu …
Click Apply …
Your selected plugins will be deactivated …
Once you have deactivated these plugins, click on the Inactive link on the menu at the top of the page …
Select all of the plugins you want to delete by either placing a tick next to their checkbox, or click on the checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select and delete all inactive plugins …
Once you have ticked all the checkboxes next to the plugins that you want to delete, choose Delete from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …
Click the Apply button …
A list of all selected plugins will show up in the Delete Plugins area. Click on “click to view entire list of files which will be deleted” to review all the plugin files that you are about to delete, or click on the Yes, Delete these files button if you are sure that you would like to go ahead and remove all of the selected plugins …
Your plugins will be deleted …
Managing WordPress Plugins – WordPress Tools
In addition to the methods shown above, you can use WordPress plugins that let you manage your plugins.
Health Check & troubleshooting
This plugin provides comprehensive checks for your WordPress installation to detect common configuration errors and known issues. It also enables plugins and themes to add their own custom checks.
The debug section allows you to easily gather information about your WordPress and server configuration, which can be shared with support representatives for themes, plugins, or on the official WordPress.org support forums.
The troubleshooting feature allows you to initiate a clean WordPress session, where all plugins are disabled and a default theme is used, but only for your user account until you choose to disable it or log out.
The Tools section offers the ability to check for file tampering in WordPress, test email-sending functionality, and verify plugin compatibility with future PHP version updates.
For more details, go here: Health Check And Troubleshooting
Managing WordPress Plugins On Multiple Sites
As discussed earlier, when plugin updates are released, the best practice is to update the plugin as soon as possible to its latest version.
What if you run multiple WordPress sites using the same plugin?
Typically, you would need to log in to every site individually and update the plugin manually from the site’s admin dashboard.
If you manage or plan to manage multiple sites, this process can become very time-consuming, especially as plugins get updated quite often.
If you manage multiple WordPress sites, you can install, update, and delete multiple plugins on all your sites automatically and simultaneously using WordPress site management tools, like the one below:
WPMU DEV’s The Hub
The Hub lets you manage unlimited WordPress sites easily and effectively from one central command center.
The Updates section of The Hub shows you exactly what needs updating on each of your managed site(s), including plugins, themes, and core software updates.
The Hub’s Updates features display how many outdated components need updating on your site(s).
You can choose to either update all your plugins at once or update them individually with just a few clicks. Best of all, you don’t need to log into every site separately to perform your plugin updates.
Update everything at once or perform individual updates directly in The Hub with a few clicks.
This can be a real time-saver when managing multiple WordPress sites, especially when WordPress releases a new version and you have to update many plugins and themes to prevent potential issues from happening.
You can read our comprehensive article on managing multiple sites effectively using the Hub or visit WPMU DEV to learn more and try The Hub for free.
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum