In a separate article, we provide a detailed explanation of what plugins are all about and how you can use plugins to add new features to your site without editing code.
You can view this article here:
In this tutorial you will learn the importance of keeping WordPress plugins up-to-date, how to upgrade and delete plugins, and some great plugin management tools if you manage multiple WordPress sites.
Why Some WordPress Plugins Need Updating
The WordPress software is regularly updated (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in earlier releases, as well as to improve existing features.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, there will typically be new updates for WordPress plugins whenever WordPress releases a new version.
The reason for this, is because most plugins for WordPress are created by external developers, so sometimes code or features in the newly-released WordPress version conflict with plugins that were developed for a previous version. When this happens, issues can sometimes develop.
Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are very proactive when it comes to ensuring that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if updating is needed). All you have to do on your end, is just keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is really simple, quick and easy to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins up-to-date and removing old plugins you no longer need is an essential aspect of good WordPress management and helps to avoid any problems and errors.
The step-by-step tutorial below explains how to upgrade and delete plugins safely in your WP admin dashboard without requiring web coding knowledge or skills.
How To Automatically Update And Delete Plugins In Your WordPress Dashboard – Tutorial
WordPress has a number of different ways to let users know when plugins on their blog need to be updated.
For example, you can instantly see how many plugins need updating as soon as you log into your Admin area simply by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
In the example below, you can see that 9 plugins have older versions that need updating …
You can also check how many plugins need to be updated from your WordPress Admin Toolbar (the example below shows that nine plugins need updating) …
The Plugins page (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also provides information about plugins that need updating …
In addition to providing information about which plugins have updates available, the Plugins section provides links to the plugin developer sites and gives you the option to update the plugins individually or in bulk …
Let’s start by showing you how to upgrade plugins one at a time.
Updating Single Plugins
Always make a complete backup of your data and files before upgrading your website or blog.
In your admin menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” section. The table of plugins can flow down your screen for some length, depending on the number of plugins you have installed on your site …
(Plugins Section)
Useful Info:
If you have too many plugins installed 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 area and enter a smaller number of items per page (all plugins show up on the screen by default), then click Apply …
Your Plugins section will now be made more manageable with a page scrolling feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Search” function …
You will see plugin information in different color backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. outdated) …
Plugins in need of upgrading have a distinctive notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin] available” …
Select the plugin that needs to be updated and click on the update now link …
WordPress provides smooth and fast plugin updates, so that updating your plugins happens “behind the scenes” without leaving your Plugins area …
Repeat the above 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 them all at once.
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Now that you know how to update individual WP plugins, let’s show you how to upgrade multiple WP plugins simultaneously.
Bulk-Upgrading Plugins
To upgrade multiple plugins simultaneously from your admin area, 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 their individual boxes …
In the Bulk Actions drop down menu above the list of plugins, choose Update …
Click Apply …
Your selected plugins will begin updating …
After the update process has completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to the Plugins section, or choose another option from the dashboard 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!
(When your site or blog uses the latest version of all plugins, the notification icons disappear)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade WordPress plugins, let’s show you how to safely delete plugins safely from your site.
Deleting WP Plugins
As part of good WordPress management, it’s a good idea to uninstall plugins that you no longer require. This can decrease resources on your server and also help to minimize potential problems.
In this section, you will learn how to remove unused plugins from your WordPress site.
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 restore your site.
To remove a plugin, go to your WP admin menu and click on Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins screen, find the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is inactive.
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, then click on Deactivate before continuing with your plugin deletion …
Once you have deactivated the plugin, click Delete …
If you would like to review a list of 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 …
All files associated with the plugin selected for deletionwill be listed on your screen …
If you are positively certain about going ahead and deleting these plugin, click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugin(s) will be removed from your server …
Deleting Several WordPress Plugins In Bulk
You can delete all inactive plugins at once, 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 check box, 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 pull-down menu …
Click the Apply button …
The selected plugins will be deactivated …
Once you have deactivated your plugins, click on the Inactive link on the menu at the top of the page …
Tick the checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to remove by checking its box …
Once you have selected all of the plugins that you want deleted, select Delete from the Bulk Actions pull-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 proceed to the next step and remove all of the selected plugins …
Your plugins will be deleted …
Plugin Management – Useful WordPress Tools
In addition to the methods shown above, you can install a number of 3rd-party tools that let you 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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"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group