In a separate article, we explain what plugins are and how you can use plugins to easily enhance your site’s capabilities.
To read the article, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn the importance of keeping your plugins up-to-date, how to safely update and delete plugins from your site, and discover practical plugin management tips if you run multiple WordPress sites.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Some WordPress Plugins Need To Be Regularly Upgraded
New versions of WordPress are regularly released (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in older versions, as well as to improve existing features or introduce new ones.
Depending on how many plugins you use on your site, you can expect to see at least some new updates for plugins when new versions of WordPress are announced.
This is because most WordPress plugins are created by third-party developers, so sometimes code in the newly-released WordPress version conflicts with plugins that were developed for a previous version. When this happens, there is a potential for issues to sometimes develop.
Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are quite proactive when it comes to making sure that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if updating is needed). All you need to do as a WordPress user, is maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is really simple and easy to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins up-to-date and removing old plugins you no longer use is an essential aspect of good WordPress site management and helps to avoid potential errors or problems.
The WordPress step-by-step tutorial below explains how to upgrade and delete plugins in the dashboard without coding knowledge needed.
Updating And Deleting Plugins Inside Your WP Admin Dashboard – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress utilizes a few methods to alert users when plugins need updating.
For example, you can see ‘at a glance’ how many plugins are out-of-date from your Administration site just by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, you can see that 9 plugins are out of date and need updating …
You can also check how many plugins need updating from your WP Admin Toolbar (in the example below, you can again see that nine plugins need to be updated) …
The Plugins screen (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also provides information about plugins that need to be updated …
In addition to providing information about which plugins have updates available, the Plugins section provides links to the plugin download sites and gives you the option to update the plugin instantly …
Let’s start by learning how to update one plugin at a time.
How To Update WordPress Plugins Individually
Always make a complete backup of your site files and database before making any upgrades to your blog or website.
From your WP admin menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” screen. The list of plugins can flow down your page for some length, depending on how many plugins you have added to your blog …
(The WordPress Plugins Page)
Additional Info:
If you have too many plugins installed and would like to make this section more manageable, then click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your Plugins screen and type in a smaller number of items per page (all plugins show on the page by default), then click Apply …
Your Plugins section will now be reduced in size with a page scrolling feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Search Installed Plugins” field …
You will see plugin information in different backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (inactive vs. active and outdated vs up-to-date) …
Plugins that require updating have a distinctive notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin Name] available” …
Select the plugin that you want to update and click on the update now link …
WordPress has done away with the loading screen when updating plugins and streamlined the process, so that updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins screen …
Repeat this process for any other plugins on your site that need to be updated, or see the section below if you have many plugins that are out-of-date and would like to upgrade all plugins at once.
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Now that you know how to update one plugin at a time, the next step is to learn how to update multiple WP plugins simultaneously.
How To Bulk-Upgrade Plugins
To update multiple WordPress plugins at the same time directly inside your dashboard, go to the “Plugins” area and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click the checkbox in the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to update by checking its box …
In the Bulk Actions drop down menu above the plugin table, select Update …
Click Apply …
Your selected plugins will begin the update process …
Once all plugin upgrades are finished, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to your Plugins section, or choose another option from the main menu …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, any plugin alerts disappear (i.e. the “at-a-glance” indicators and “There is a new version of XYZ plugin available” messages no longer display on your screen, toolbar and menus) …
All plugins are now up-to-date!
(When your plugins are all up-to-date, update messages disappear)
Now that you know how to upgrade your in your admin dashboard, it’s time to learn how to uninstall plugins from your site or blog.
Deleting Plugins
Occasionally, you may want to delete plugins that are no longer needed or being used on your site. This conserves resources on your server and also will help you avoid potential problems.
In this section, we show you how to remove unused plugins from your WordPress site.
We strongly recommend creating 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 restore your site.
To remove a plugin, go to your admin menu and click on Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins section, find the plugin you want to delete and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins are listed in a different colored background than active plugins and display an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, then click on Deactivate before going any further …
Next, click Delete …
If you would like to have a look at all the files that will be deleted before taking the next step, then click on the “Click to view entire list of files which will be deleted” link in the “Delete Plugin” page …
A complete list of files belonging to the plugin selected for removalwill be listed on your screen …
If you are sure that you want to proceed and delete these plugin files, click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugins and related files will be deleted …
How To Safely Bulk-Delete Plugins
You can delete all inactive plugins at once, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be uninstalled.
Note: To delete any plugins that are presently active, you must first 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 checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins (warning: this will deactivate all plugins) …
Once you have done this, select Deactivate from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …
Click the Apply button …
The 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 …
Click the check box in the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to delete by checking their individual boxes …
Once you have ticked all the checkboxes next to the plugins that you want to delete, select 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 screen. 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 plugins listed …
All plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
Practical Management Tools For Plugins
In addition to the methods shown above, you can use a number of 3rd-party tools to manage your WordPress 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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