In a separate post, we explain what plugins are and how you can use these to enhance your site’s functionality.

You can view the article here:

• Add New Features And Functionality To Your Site With Plugins

In this tutorial you will learn why WordPress plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to automatically update and uninstall your WordPress plugins, and discover some tools to help you better manage your plugins.

How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins

Why Many Of Your WordPress Plugins Need Upgrading

WordPress regularly updates its software (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in previous versions, and to improve existing features.

Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, you can expect to see at least some new new update notifications for plugins whenever WordPress releases an updated version.

This is because most WordPress plugins are created by external developers, so sometimes code in the newly-released WordPress version conflicts with plugins that were created and tested to work with a previous version. Whenever this happens, problems can sometimes develop.

Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are very proactive when it comes to making sure that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if required). All you need to do on your end, is just keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is really easy and simple to do.

Keeping your plugins regularly updated and removing old plugins you no longer need is an essential aspect of good WordPress site management and helps to avoid potential errors or problems.

The tutorial below explains how to upgrade and delete WordPress plugins safely inside the WordPress dashboard without editing web code.

Upgrading And Deleting WordPress Plugins Safely – Step-By-Step Tutorial

WordPress uses a few ways to let you know when plugins on your site need to be updated.

For example, you can immediately see how many plugins need to be updated from your Administration panel just by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.

In the example below, you can see that nine WP plugins need to be updated …

You can also tell how many plugins need to be updated from your WordPress Notification Toolbar (the screenshot below shows how many plugins require updating) …

The Plugins page (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also tells you which plugins need updating …

As well as providing information about which plugins have updates available, the Plugins page provides links to the plugin download sites and gives you the option to update the plugin with one-click …

Let’s start by showing you how to update WordPress plugins one at a time.

Upgrading Plugins Individually

Always make a complete backup of your site files and database before making any changes to your website or blog.

From your WP admin menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …

You will be taken to the “Plugins” screen. The list of plugins can be quite long depending on how many plugins you have added to your site …

(The WordPress Plugins Section)

Notes:

If you have too many plugins installed and would like to reduce the number of plugins displaying on the screen, then click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your Plugins screen and enter a smaller number of items per page (by default, all plugins display on the page), then click Apply …

Your Plugins section 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 Plugins” function …

WordPress displays information about plugins in different color backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (inactive vs. active and up-to-date vs. outdated) …

Plugins that need updating display the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Insert Plugin Name] available” …

Find the plugin that needs to be updated and click on the update now link …

WordPress provides smooth & simple plugin updates, so that the process of updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins screen …

Repeat this process for all plugins on your site that need to be updated, or refer to the section below if you have several plugins that are out-of-date and would like to upgrade all plugins in one simple operation.

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Now that you know how to update one plugin at a time, the next step is to learn how to bulk-update WP plugins.

How To Update Multiple WordPress Plugins

To upgrade multiple plugins simultaneously directly inside your dashboard, go to the “Plugins” section and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …

Tick the check box 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 pull-down menu above the plugin list, choose Update …

And then click Apply …

The plugins you have selected will begin to update automatically …

After all plugins have been updated, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to the Plugins screen, or choose another option from the admin menu …

Once all plugins are up-to-date, the update reminders will 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 notices no longer display)

Now that you know how to update WordPress plugins, let’s show you how to safely remove plugins safely from your WordPress site or blog.

Deleting Plugins

It’s a good idea to delete plugins that are no longer needed or being used on your site. This can help to conserve server resources and helps to eliminate causes of problems.

In this section, you will learn how to remove unused plugins from your site or blog.

We strongly recommend creating a full back up of your site before installing, upgrading or deleting plugins, in case something goes wrong and you need to recover data or restore your site.

To delete a plugin, go to your dashboard menu and select Plugins > Installed Plugins …

In the Plugins section, find the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is deactivated.

Hint: Inactive plugins are listed in a different background color than active plugins and display an “Activate” link below the plugin name …

If the plugin is active, click on Deactivate before continuing with your plugin deletion …

Next, click 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” page …

A complete list of files belonging to the plugin that you are about to delete will display on your screen …

If you are certain about going ahead and deleting the plugin files, click on the Yes, Delete these files button …

Your plugin(s) will be deleted …

How To Safely Delete Several Plugins At Once

You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins on your site, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be removed.

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 check box, 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, specify Deactivate from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …

Click the Apply button …

All selected plugins will be deactivated …

To delete all or some of the inactive plugins on your site, go to the “Plugins” page and click on the Inactive link on the main menu …

Tick the checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to delete by checking its box …

Once you have selected all of the plugins that you want deleted, specify Delete from the Bulk Actions pull-down menu …

Click Apply …

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 want to go ahead and remove all of the selected plugins …

All plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …

Useful Tools For Managing WP Plugins

As well as the methods shown above, you can use a number of 3rd-party tools to 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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