In another post, we explain what plugins are and how you can use these to add new features or functionality to your website or blog with no software programming knowledge required.
You can view the article here:
In this tutorial you will learn the importance of keeping all plugins up-to-date, how to automatically upgrade and uninstall plugins, and some tips to help you better manage your plugins.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Plugins Need To Be Regularly Updated
WordPress constantly updates its software (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities found in earlier software versions, and to improve existing features or introduce new ones.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, you can expect to see at least some new new update notifications for WordPress plugins whenever new versions of WordPress are released.
The reason for this, is because most WordPress plugins are created by external developers, so sometimes the code in the new 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 quite proactive when it comes to ensuring that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if this is required). All you need to do as a WordPress user, is just keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is very easy to do.
Keeping your plugins up-to-date and deleting old plugins you no longer use is an essential aspect of good WordPress management and helps to avoid conflicts and errors.
The tutorial below explains how to update and delete WordPress plugins safely inside your WP dashboard without requiring web coding knowledge or skills.
How To Update And Delete Plugins Safely From Your WordPress Admin Dashboard – Tutorial
WordPress employs several methods to alert you when plugins need updating.
For example, you can see ‘at a glance’ how many plugins need to be updated as soon as you log into your Site’s Dashboard just by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, nine WordPress plugins need updating …
You can also see how many plugins need updating from your WP Notification Toolbar (the screenshot below shows how many plugins require updating) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also notifies you about plugins that need to be updated …
In addition to providing information about plugins that have available updates, the Plugins page provides links to the plugin download sites and gives you the option to update the plugins with one-click …
Let’s start by learning how to upgrade one plugin at a time.
Upgrade WordPress Plugins One At A Time
We recommend making a complete backup of your website before upgrading your website.
In your dashboard menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” screen. The table of plugins can go down your page for some length, depending on how many plugins you have installed in your site …
(Plugins Page)
Useful Tips:
If you have too many plugins installed and would like to reduce the number of plugins displaying on your screen, 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 up on the screen by default), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
Your Plugins area will now be made more manageable with a pagination feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Search Installed Plugins” feature …
You will see information about plugins in different backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. outdated) …
Plugins that require upgrading have a distinctive notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin] available” …
Find the plugin that needs to be updated and click on the update now link …
WordPress has done away with the loading screen when updating plugins and streamlined the plugin updating process, so that updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins area …
Repeat the above process for any other plugins on your site that need to be updated, or see the section below if you have a number of 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 WP plugins individually, it’s time to learn how to bulk-upgrade plugins.
Bulk-Upgrading WP Plugins
To bulk-upgrade WP plugins using the automatic upgrading feature, go to the “Plugins” page and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click the checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select only the plugins you want to upgrade by checking their individual boxes …
In the Bulk Actions drop down menu above the table of plugins, choose Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will begin updating …
Once all updates have completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to your Plugins screen, or choose another option from the WP 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) …
You have updated all plugins on your site!
(When your plugins are all up-to-date, the notification icons do not display)
Now that you know how to update plugins, let’s show you how to delete plugins from your blog or website.
How To Safely Delete Plugins
It’s a good idea to delete inactive plugins. This can help to conserve resource usage and also help to reduce potential problems.
In this section, we show you how to delete unused plugins from your WordPress site.
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 WP admin menu and choose Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins area, locate the plugin you want to delete and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins use a different colored background than active plugins and show an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, then click on Deactivate before proceeding with your plugin deletion …
Next, click on Delete …
If you need 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” section …
All files associated with the plugin that you are about to delete will display on your screen …
If you are sure about going ahead and deleting the selected plugin files, click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugin(s) will be deleted …
Bulk-Deleting WP Plugins
You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins on your site, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be cleared.
Note: To delete any plugins that are presently active, you 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) …
Next, choose Deactivate from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …
Click Apply …
Your selected plugins will be deactivated …
To delete all or some of the inactive plugins, go to the “Plugins” area and click on the Inactive link in the Plugins menu …
Click on the check box in 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 ticked all the check boxes 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 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 delete all of the plugins listed …
The plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
Management Tools For WordPress Plugins
In addition to 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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