In another post, we explain what plugins are and how you can use plugins to add new features or functionality to your website without editing code.
To read the article, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn why plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to easily update and remove your WordPress plugins, and discover practical tools to help you better manage your plugins if you plan to run multiple WordPress sites or blogs.
Why Some Of Your WordPress Plugins Need Upgrading
WordPress regularly updates its software (about every 3-4 months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities found in older software versions, as well as to improve existing features.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, you can expect to see at least some new updates for WordPress plugins every.
This is because most plugins for WordPress are created by external developers, so sometimes code in the newly-released WordPress version conflict with plugins that were developed and tested with a previous version. When this happens, there is a potential for conflicts to sometimes occur.
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 needed). All you have to do on your end, is simply maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is very quick, 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 any potential problems or errors.
The step-by-step tutorial below explains how to update and delete plugins in the dashboard without coding skills or knowledge needed.
Updating And Deleting WordPress Plugins In Your Dashboard – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress has a number of different methods to let users know when plugins on their blog need to be updated.
For example, you can tell immediately how many plugins need to be updated from your WordPress Dashboard just by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, 9 WordPress plugins are out of date and need updating …
You can also see how many plugins need updating from your WordPress Administration Toolbar (as shown below, several plugins should be updated) …
The Plugins page (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also tells you which plugins need to be updated …
In addition to providing information about which plugins have available updates, the Plugins section provides links to the plugin developer pages and gives you the option to update the plugins individually or in bulk …
Let’s start by learning how to upgrade WordPress plugins individually.
Update Plugins Individually
Always make a full backup of your website before updating your website.
In your admin menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
The “Plugins” page will display in your browser. This table of plugins can be quite lengthy depending on how many plugins you have installed in your site …
(Plugins Page)
Tips:
If you have too many plugins and would like to reduce the number of plugins displayed on your page, then click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your Plugins area and enter a smaller number of items per page (by default, all plugins display on the page), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
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” box …
WordPress displays information about plugins in different color backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. out-of-date) …
Plugins that need upgrading have a distinctive notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin] available” …
Locate the plugin that you want to update and click on the update now link …
WordPress provides smoother plugin updating, so that updating your plugins takes place with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins screen …
Repeat the above process for all plugins on your site that need to be updated, or see the section below if you have several plugins that are out-of-date and would like to update all plugins at once.
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Now that you know how to update one WordPress plugin at a time, let’s show you how to bulk-upgrade WordPress plugins.
How To Update Multiple WordPress Plugins Simultaneously
To bulk-upgrade plugins simultaneously using the automatic updating feature, go to the “Plugins” section and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Tick the checkbox in the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select only the plugins you want to update by checking its box …
In the Bulk Actions dropdown menu at the top of the page, select Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will begin updating …
After all plugins have been updated, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to the Plugins area, or select another option from the main 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” notices no longer display) …
You have updated all plugins on your site to their latest version!
(When your site or blog uses the latest version of all plugins, notification icons do not display)
Now that you know how to upgrade WordPress in the admin dashboard, it’s time to learn how to uninstall plugins safely from your WordPress site.
How To Delete Plugins
At times, you may decide to remove plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This decreases resources on your server and will help you avoid causes of some problems.
In this section, you will learn how to safely remove unused plugins from your blog or site.
Always create 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 choose Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins screen, find the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins use 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 on Delete …
If you want to browse all the files that will be deleted before going ahead with the next step, 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 selected for removalwill display on your screen …
If you are positively sure about going ahead and deleting the plugin, then click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugin(s) will be deleted from your WordPress installation …
How To Safely Bulk-Delete 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 presently 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, select Deactivate from the Bulk Actions dropdown menu …
Click the Apply button …
The selected plugins will be deactivated …
To delete all or some of the inactive plugins on your site, go to the “Plugins” area and click on the Inactive link in the Plugins menu …
Tick the check box next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select only the plugins you want to delete by checking its box …
Once you have ticked all the check boxes next to the plugins that you want to delete, select Delete from the Bulk Actions dropdown 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 absolutely sure that you would like to proceed to the next step and remove all of the selected plugins …
The plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
WordPress Plugin Management – Tools
In addition to the methods shown above, you can use a number of tools 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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