In another blog post, we provide an overview of what plugins are about and how you can use plugins to extend your blog’s capabilities.
To view this article, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn why plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to safely update and delete plugins, and discover some great plugin management tools if you manage multiple WordPress sites.
Why Your Plugins Need Upgrading
WordPress frequently updates its software (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in older software versions, and to improve existing features or introduce new ones.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, there will typically be new new update notifications for plugins each time a new version of WordPress is announced.
The reason for this, is because most WordPress plugins are created by external developers, so sometimes features in the newly-released WordPress version conflict 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 required). All you have to do on your end, is simply maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is really easy and simple to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins regularly updated and removing old plugins you no longer need is an essential aspect of good WordPress management and helps to avoid potential conflicts and errors.
The tutorial below explains how to automatically update and delete plugins safely in WordPress without coding knowledge necessary.
Upgrading And Deleting Plugins Safely In WordPress – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress utilizes several methods of letting users know when plugins need to be updated.
For example, you can see how many plugins are out-of-date as soon as you log into your Site’s Dashboard by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, you can see that nine WordPress plugins need to be updated …
You can also see how many plugins need updating from your WP Toolbar (as shown below, a number of plugins need to be updated) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also tells you what plugins need updating …
As well as providing information about which plugins have updates available, the Plugins page provides links to the plugin developer pages and gives you the option to update your plugins with one-click …
Let’s start by learning how to update plugins one at a time.
Upgrading Plugins One At A Time
Always make a backup of your data and files before upgrading your blog or website.
In your WP admin menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” section. The table of plugins can run down your screen for a while, depending on how many plugins you have added to your blog …
(WordPress Plugins Section)
Tips:
If you have too many plugins and would like to reduce the number of plugins showing on your screen, 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 page by default), then click Apply …
Your Plugins area will now be reduced in size with a pagination feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Plugin Search” function …
WordPress displays plugin information in different backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (inactive vs. active and up-to-date vs. out-of-date) …
Plugins in need of upgrading have a distinctive notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin Name] available” …
Locate 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 process, so that updating your plugins takes place “behind the scenes” without leaving your Plugins screen …
Repeat this process for any other 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 update all plugins in one simple operation.
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Now that you know how to upgrade one WP plugin at a time, let’s show you how to bulk-update WP plugins.
How To Bulk-Upgrade WP Plugins
To bulk-update WP plugins simultaneously directly inside your dashboard, 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 only the plugins you want to upgrade by checking its box …
In the Bulk Actions drop down menu above the list of plugins, select Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will begin the update process …
Once your plugins have been updated, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to the Plugins screen, or visit a different section of your dashboard …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, any plugin alerts will 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) …
All plugins have now been upgraded!
(When your plugins are up-to-date, update messages disappear)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade in your WP dashboard, let’s show you how to uninstall plugins from your WordPress site or blog.
Deleting Plugins
Occasionally, you may decide to delete plugins that are no longer needed or being used on your site. This can conserve resource usage and help to reduce problems.
In this section, we show you how to safely delete unused plugins from your WordPress 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 remove a plugin, go to your 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 have a different background color than active plugins and show an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, click on Deactivate before proceeding …
Next, click Delete …
If you want to review a list of all the files that will be deleted before proceeding, then click on the “Click to view entire list of files which will be deleted” link in the “Delete Plugin” page …
A complete list of files associated with the plugin that you are about to remove will be listed on your screen …
If you are absolutely sure about going ahead and deleting these plugin files, click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugin(s) will be removed from your WordPress installation …
How To Safely Bulk-Delete WordPress 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 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 check box, or selecting the check box next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins (warning: this will deactivate all plugins) …
Next, select Deactivate from the Bulk Actions pull-down menu …
Click Apply …
All 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 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 ticked all the checkboxes next to the plugins that you want to delete, select Delete from the Bulk Actions pull-down menu …
Click Apply …
A list of all selected plugins will show up 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 absolutely certain that you would like to go ahead and delete all of the selected plugins …
All plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
Managing WP Plugins – WordPress Tools
In addition to the methods shown above, you can install other WordPress plugins 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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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum