In a separate blog post, we explain what plugins are and how you can use these to increase your site’s capabilities.
You can read the article here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn the importance of keeping all plugins up-to-date, how to automatically update and uninstall your WordPress plugins, and useful tools to help you better manage your plugins if you run multiple WordPress sites.
Why Some WordPress Plugins Need Updating
New WordPress versions are regularly released (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities found in older software versions, and to improve existing features or introduce new ones.
Depending on how many plugins you use on your site, there will typically be new new update notifications for WordPress plugins every.
This is because most WordPress plugins are created by third-party developers, so sometimes the code in the new WordPress version conflicts with plugins that were created and tested to work with a previous version. When this happens, there is a potential for problems to 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 updating is required). All you need to do on your end, is just keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is very easy and simple to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins regularly updated and removing old plugins you no longer use is part of good WordPress management and helps to avoid any potential errors and problems.
The WordPress tutorial below explains how to update and delete plugins safely from your dashboard without requiring coding skills or knowledge.
Updating And Deleting Plugins Safely In The WordPress Admin Dashboard – Tutorial
WordPress uses a few methods to notify users 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For example, you can see how many plugins are out-of-date as soon as you log into your Admin area just by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, you can see that 9 WP plugins need to be updated …
You can also tell how many plugins need updating from your WP Notification Toolbar (the screenshot below shows that several plugins have to be updated) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also tells you what plugins need updating …
In addition to providing information about plugins that have available updates, the Plugins screen provides links to the plugin developer pages and gives you the option to update the plugins instantly …
Let’s start by learning how to update one plugin at a time.
How To Upgrade Plugins Individually
We strongly recommend making a complete backup of your data and files before making any upgrades to your website.
From your dashboard menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” area. The list of plugins can run down your page for a while, depending on the number of plugins you have added to your site …
(The WordPress Plugins Page)
Additional 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 screen and enter a smaller number of items per page (all plugins show on the screen by default, i.e. “999”), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
Your Plugins page 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” field …
You will see information about plugins in different backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. out-of-date) …
Plugins that require upgrading display 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 provides smooth & simpler plugin updates, so that the process of updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins area …
Repeat this process for any other plugins on your site that need updating, or refer to the section below if you have many plugins that are out-of-date and would like to upgrade all plugins in bulk.
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Now that you know how to upgrade one plugin at a time, the next step is to learn how to bulk-upgrade plugins.
Bulk-Upgrading WordPress Plugins
To upgrade multiple plugins in a single operation from your admin area, go to the “Plugins” area and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click the checkbox in 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 dropdown menu above the table of plugins, select Update …
And then click Apply …
Your selected plugins will automatically begin updating …
Once your plugins have been updated, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to your Plugins screen, or choose a different section of your dashboard …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, the plugin notifications disappear (i.e. the “at-a-glance” indicators and “There is a new version of XYZ plugin available” notices no longer display) …
You have updated all plugins on your site!
(When plugins on your site are up-to-date, notification icons do not display)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade plugins, let’s take a look at how to safely remove plugins safely from your site.
How To Delete WordPress Plugins
It’s a good idea to uninstall plugins that you no longer plan to use. This decreases resource usage and also help to eliminate causes of some problems.
In this section, we show you how to safely deactivate and delete 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 delete a plugin, go to your WP admin menu and select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins area, find the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins have a different colored background than active plugins and display an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, then click on Deactivate before continuing with your plugin deletion …
Next, click Delete …
If you want 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 …
A complete list of files associated with the plugin selected for deletionwill be listed on your screen …
If you are sure about going ahead and deleting these plugin files, then click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugin(s) will be deleted from your WordPress installation …
Bulk-Deleting WordPress Plugins
You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be deleted.
Note: To delete any plugins that are presently 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 checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins (warning: this will deactivate all plugins) …
Next, specify Deactivate from the Bulk Actions pull-down menu …
Click Apply …
The selected plugins will be deactivated …
To delete all or some of the inactive plugins on your site, go to the “Plugins” page 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 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 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 want to proceed to the next step and delete all of the plugins listed …
Your plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
Practical Management Tools For WP Plugins
As well as the methods shown above, you can install Free and Premium 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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