In a separate blog post, we explain what plugins are and how you can use these to add new features and functionality to your site with no software programming skills required.
You can view this article here:
In this tutorial you will learn why plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to automatically upgrade and delete your WordPress plugins, and some tools to help you better manage your plugins if you need to manage multiple WordPress sites or blogs.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Many Of Your WordPress Plugins Need Upgrading
New WordPress versions are regularly released (about every 3-4 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 WordPress plugins whenever new WordPress versions are announced.
The reason for this, is because most WordPress plugins are created by external developers, so sometimes the code in the newly-released WordPress version conflicts with plugins that were built for a previous version. Whenever this happens, problems 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 website owner, is maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is really easy to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins regularly updated and deleting old plugins you no longer use is an essential aspect of good WordPress management and helps to avoid potential conflicts or errors.
The step-by-step tutorial below explains how to update and delete plugins safely without touching web code.
How To Upgrade And Delete WordPress Plugins – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress provides a few ways to let users know when plugins need updating.
For example, you can instantly see how many plugins need to be updated as soon as you log into your Administration area simply by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
In the example below, nine WP plugins have older versions that need updating …
You can also view how many plugins need to be updated from your WP Toolbar (the example below shows how many plugins should be brought up to date) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also notifies you 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 developer sites and gives you the option to update the plugins individually or in bulk …
Let’s start by showing you how to upgrade WP plugins one at a time.
How To Upgrade Single A Plugin
Always make a complete backup of your site files and database before upgrading your website.
In your main menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” page. The table of plugins can run down your page for some length, depending on how many plugins you have installed in your site …
(Plugins Section)
Additional Info:
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 page and enter a smaller number of items per page (all plugins show up on the page by default), then click Apply …
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” function …
You will see information about plugins in different color backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (inactive vs. active and up-to-date vs. out-of-date) …
Plugins that need upgrading show the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Insert Plugin Name] available” …
Locate the plugin that needs updating 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 takes place with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins area …
Repeat the above process for all 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 the same time.
***
Now that you know how to upgrade individual plugins, the next step is to learn how to bulk-upgrade plugins.
How To Update Many WordPress Plugins Simultaneously
To bulk-upgrade plugins using the automatic update feature, go to the “Plugins” screen and click on the Update Available 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 upgrade by checking its box …
In the Bulk Actions pull-down menu above the table of plugins, select Update …
Click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will update all at once …
Once the update process has completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to the Plugins screen, or choose another option from the WordPress dashboard menu …
Once your plugins are all 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) …
You have updated all plugins on your site to their latest version!
(When your site or blog uses the latest version of all plugins, the notification icons disappear)
Now that you know how to automatically update WP plugins, let’s take a look at how to safely remove plugins from your blog or website.
How To Remove WP Plugins
Occasionally, you may choose to remove plugins that are no longer needed or being used on your site. This can help to decrease resources on your server and helps to eliminate causes of problems.
In this section, we show you how to remove unused plugins from your 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 delete a plugin, go to your WP admin menu and choose Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins area, find the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is inactive.
Hint: Inactive plugins appear 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 …
Next, click Delete …
If you need to have a look at 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 …
All files belonging to the plugin selected for removalwill be listed on your screen …
If you are absolutely sure that you want to go ahead and delete the selected plugin files, then click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugins and related files will be deleted …
Bulk-Deleting Plugins
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, 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 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 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” section and click on the Inactive link on the main menu …
Click 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 checkboxes next to the plugins that you want to delete, choose Delete from the Bulk Actions dropdown 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 would like to proceed to the next step and delete all of the selected plugins …
The selected plugins will be deleted …
Useful WordPress Tools For Managing WordPress Plugins
In addition to the methods shown above, you can install a number of third-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.
***
"I love the way your email series "Infinite Web Content Creation Training Series" is documented and presented. It is very absorbing and captivating. The links and tutorials are interesting and educational. This has motivated me to rewrite my content following the concepts I am learning from the email series." - Mani Raju, www.fortuneinewaste.com