In another blog post, we provide an overview of what WP plugins are all about and how you can use plugins to easily add new features or functionality to your website or blog with no coding skills required.
You can view this article here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn why WordPress plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to safely upgrade and uninstall your WordPress plugins, and some great tips to help you better manage your plugins if you run or manage multiple WordPress sites or blogs.
Why Some WordPress Plugins Need Updating
The WordPress software is constantly updated (about every 3-4 months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in older software releases, 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 new update notifications for WordPress plugins every.
The reason for this, is because most plugins for WordPress are created by third-party developers, so sometimes code in the new WordPress version conflicts with plugins that were developed and tested with a previous version. Whenever this happens, conflicts can sometimes occur.
Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are fairly proactive when it comes to ensuring that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if needed). All you have to do as a website owner, is keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is really quick, simple and easy to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins regularly updated and deleting old plugins you no longer need is part of good WordPress management and helps to avoid errors or problems.
The WordPress step-by-step tutorial below explains how to update and delete plugins safely in your WP admin dashboard without requiring coding knowledge or skills.
How To Upgrade And Delete Plugins – Tutorial
WordPress provides a few methods to notify users when plugins need updating.
For example, you can tell immediately how many plugins need updating inside your Admin area by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
In the example below, nine WordPress plugins have older versions that need to be updated …
You can also check how many plugins need updating from your WordPress Admin Toolbar (in the screenshot below, you can again see that nine plugins should be updated) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also tells you what plugins need to be updated …
As well as providing information about plugins that have available updates, the Plugins section provides links to the plugin developer sites and gives you the option to update your plugin with one-click …
Let’s start by learning how to upgrade individual WP plugins.
Upgrade Individual A Plugin
Always make a complete backup of your site files and database before updating your website or blog.
From your WP admin menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” section. The list of plugins can be quite lengthy depending on the number of plugins you have installed in your site …
(Plugins Page)
Useful Info:
If you have too many plugins and would like to make this section more manageable, 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, i.e. “999”), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
Your Plugins area 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 Installed Plugins” function …
WordPress displays plugin information in different backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (inactive vs. active and outdated vs up-to-date) …
Plugins that need updating display the following 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 streamlined plugin updates, so that updating your plugins takes place with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins area …
Repeat the above process for any other plugins on your site that need updating, or see the section below if you have many plugins that are out-of-date and would like to upgrade them all at the same time.
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Now that you know how to upgrade individual WP plugins, the next step is to learn how to update many plugins simultaneously.
How To Bulk-Update WP Plugins
To update multiple WP plugins in one go from your admin area, go to the “Plugins” screen and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click on the check box in the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to upgrade by checking their individual boxes …
In the Bulk Actions pull-down menu at the top of the page, choose Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will begin to update automatically …
After the update process has completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to the Plugins area, or choose a different section of your dashboard …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, any plugin alerts disappear (i.e. the “at-a-glance” indicators and “There is a new version of XYZ plugin available” notices no longer display on your screen, toolbar and menus) …
You have updated all plugins on your site to their latest version!
(When your plugins are all up-to-date, the notification icons no longer display)
Now that you know how to update WP inside the WP dashboard, let’s show you how to safely remove plugins from your WordPress blog or website.
Deleting WP Plugins
At times, you may choose to delete plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This decreases server resources and eliminates potential 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 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 main menu and click on Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins section, locate 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 show an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, then click on Deactivate before continuing …
Once you have deactivated the plugin, click Delete …
If you need 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” screen …
A complete list of files belonging to the plugin selected for deletionwill display on your screen …
If you are sure that you would like to proceed and delete the selected plugin, then click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugins and related files will be deleted from your WordPress installation …
Bulk-Deleting Plugins
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 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 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, specify Deactivate from the Bulk Actions pull-down menu …
Click Apply …
Your 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 …
Select all of the plugins you want to delete by either placing a tick next to their checkbox, or click on the check box next to the Plugin column header to select and delete all inactive plugins …
Once you have selected all the plugins that you want deleted, select Delete from the Bulk Actions pull-down menu …
Click Apply …
A list of all selected plugins will be displayed in the Delete Plugins screen. 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 …
The selected plugins will be deleted …
Managing WordPress Plugins
In addition to the methods shown above, you can install other WordPress plugins that help 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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