In another post, we provide an overview of what WP plugins are about and how you can use these to expand your blog’s capabilities.
You can read the article here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn why WordPress plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to easily update and delete plugins, and some great tools to help you better manage your plugins.
Why WordPress Plugins Need To Be Upgraded
New WordPress versions are constantly being released (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in older software versions, 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 when new versions of WordPress are announced.
The reason for this, is because most WordPress plugins are created by 3rd-party 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, conflicts can sometimes develop.
Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are very proactive when it comes to making sure that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if required). All you need to do on your end, is simply maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is very quick, simple and easy to do.
Keeping your plugins regularly updated and removing old plugins you no longer use is an essential aspect of good WordPress site management and helps to avoid potential problems and errors.
The tutorial below explains how to automatically upgrade and delete plugins in your WP dashboard with no web programming skills necessary.
How To Upgrade And Delete WordPress Plugins – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress provides a number of different ways to alert you when plugins need to be updated.
For example, you can see how many plugins are out-of-date inside your WP Dashboard simply by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, nine WordPress plugins have older versions that need updating …
You can also tell how many plugins need to be updated from your WordPress Notification Toolbar (in the screenshot below, you can again see that 9 plugins should be brought up to date) …
The Plugins page (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also provides information about plugins that need updating …
As well as providing information about plugins that have updates available, the Plugins screen provides links to the plugin download pages and gives you the option to update the plugin with one-click …
Let’s start by learning how to upgrade one WP plugin at a time.
Upgrade Plugins One At A Time
We recommend making a full backup of your website before making any upgrades to your website or blog.
From your admin menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” screen. The table of plugins can be quite lengthy depending on how many plugins you have added to your blog …
(The WordPress Plugins Page)
Useful Info:
If you have too many plugins installed 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 (by default, all plugins display on the screen), then click Apply …
Your Plugins page will now be reduced in size with a ’numbered pages’ feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Search” box …
WordPress displays plugin information in different backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (inactive vs. active and outdated vs up-to-date) …
Plugins that require updating have a distinctive notification message: “There is a new version of [Insert Plugin Name] available” …
Locate 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 refer to the section below if you have several 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 one WordPress plugin at a time, it’s time to learn how to bulk-update plugins.
How To Update Various WordPress Plugins Simultaneously
To upgrade multiple WordPress plugins simultaneously directly inside your dashboard, go to the “Plugins” area 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 only the plugins you want to update by checking its box …
In the Bulk Actions drop down menu at the top of the page, choose Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will automatically begin to update …
After all updates are completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to your Plugins area, or go to 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” messages no longer display) …
You have updated all plugins on your site to their latest version!
(When your plugins are up-to-date, update alerts disappear)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade WP plugins, let’s show you how to safely delete plugins from your WordPress site.
How To Safely Delete WordPress Plugins
It’s a good idea to uninstall inactive plugins. This decreases resource usage and help to eliminate potential problems.
In this section, we show you how to safely remove unused plugins from your WordPress 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 reinstall your site.
To remove a plugin, go to your dashboard menu and choose Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins page, find the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins have 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 proceeding with your plugin deletion …
Once you have deactivated the plugin, click Delete …
If you need to browse 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” section …
The entire list of files belonging to the plugin selected for deletionwill be listed on your screen …
If you are sure that you would like to proceed and delete these plugin files, just click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugin(s) will be deleted …
Deleting Several WordPress Plugins Simultaneously
You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be uninstalled.
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 checkbox 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 dropdown menu …
Click the Apply button …
Your 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 in the Plugins menu …
Select all of the plugins you want to delete by either placing a tick next to their check box, or click on the checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select and delete all inactive plugins …
Once you have selected all the plugins that you want deleted, 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 want to proceed to the next step and remove all of the plugins listed …
Your plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
Practical Management Tools For WordPress Plugins
In addition to the methods shown above, you can install a number of third-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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"Wow! I never knew there's so much to learn about WordPress! I bought one of the WordPress for Dummies three years ago, such authors need to be on this course!" - Rich Law, Create A Blog Now