In another blog post, we provide an overview of what WordPress plugins are all about and how you can use plugins to add new features to your website or blog without editing code.
You can view the article here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn why WordPress plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to automatically update and uninstall plugins from your site, and discover useful tips to help you better manage your plugins if you own or manage multiple WordPress sites or blogs.
Why Many Of Your WordPress Plugins Need To Be Updated
The WordPress software is constantly updated (about every 3-4 months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities found in earlier versions, as well as to improve existing features.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, there will typically be new new update notifications for WordPress plugins every.
The reason for this, is because most WordPress plugins are created by 3rd-party developers, so sometimes code in the new WordPress version conflict with plugins that were developed and tested with a previous version. Whenever this happens, there is a potential for issues to sometimes develop.
Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are fairly proactive when it comes to making sure that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if needed). All you have to do as a website owner, is simply keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is really simple, quick and easy to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins up-to-date and removing old plugins you no longer use is an essential aspect of good WordPress site management and helps to avoid any potential problems or errors.
The WordPress step-by-step tutorial below explains how to update and delete plugins from your WP dashboard without touching web code.
Upgrading And Deleting Plugins Safely Inside Your Dashboard – Tutorial
WordPress employs a number of different methods of letting you know when your plugins need updating.
For example, you can tell immediately how many plugins are out-of-date inside your Administration area by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, nine WordPress plugins have older versions that need to be updated …
You can also tell how many plugins need updating from your WordPress Admin Toolbar (in the screenshot below, you can see how many 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 page provides links to the plugin developer sites and gives you the option to update the plugins instantly …
Let’s start by showing you how to upgrade WP plugins individually.
Upgrading Single WordPress Plugins
We recommend making a full backup of your data and files before making any upgrades to your website.
In your admin menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
The “Plugins” section will display in your browser. This page can be quite long depending on how many plugins you have added to your blog …
(Plugins Page)
Additional Information:
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 (by default, all plugins display on the page), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
Your Plugins section 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 “Search Plugins” function …
You will see plugin information in different color backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (active vs. inactive and outdated vs up-to-date) …
Plugins that need updating have a distinctive notification message: “There is a new version of [Insert Plugin Name] available” …
Select the plugin that you want to update and click on the update now link …
WordPress provides streamlined plugin updates, so that updating your plugins happens “behind the scenes” 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 several 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 update WordPress plugins individually, it’s time to learn how to bulk-upgrade WP plugins.
How To Upgrade Multiple Plugins Simultaneously
To update multiple plugins at the same time using the automatic updating feature, go to the “Plugins” screen and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click the checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to update 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 automatically begin to update …
Once all plugin updates are finished, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to the Plugins section, or select another option from the WP admin menu …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, the update reminders will disappear (i.e. the “at-a-glance” indicators and “There is a new version of XYZ plugin available” notices no longer display) …
All plugins are now up-to-date!
(When your site uses the latest version of all plugins, update icons do not display)
Now that you know how to automatically update WP plugins, let’s show you how to remove plugins safely from your site.
How To Remove Plugins
Occasionally, you may want to remove WordPress plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This conserves server resources and will help you avoid potential problems.
In this section, we show you how to deactivate and delete unused plugins from your WordPress blog or 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 remove a plugin, go to your main menu and select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins screen, find the plugin you want to delete and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins appear in a different colored background than active plugins and show an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, click on Deactivate before proceeding with your plugin deletion …
Next, click on Delete …
If you would like to have a look at all the files that will be deleted before proceeding any further, then click on the “Click to view entire list of files which will be deleted” link in the “Delete Plugin” page …
All files belonging to the plugin selected for removalwill display on your screen …
If you are certain about going ahead and deleting the selected plugin files, just click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugins and related files will be deleted from your server …
How To Safely Bulk-Delete Plugins
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 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) …
Once you have done this, select Deactivate from the Bulk Actions dropdown menu …
Click Apply …
The selected plugins will be deactivated …
Once you have deactivated your plugins, click on the Inactive 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 delete by checking its box …
Once you have selected all the plugins that you want to delete, specify Delete from the Bulk Actions drop-down menu …
Click Apply …
A list of all selected plugins will be displayed 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 absolutely certain that you would like to proceed to the next step and delete all of the plugins listed …
All selected plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
Managing WordPress Plugins – Tools
In addition to the methods shown above, you can install a number of 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.
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"If you're new to WordPress, this can stand on its own as a training course and will stay with you as you progress from beginner to advanced and even guru status." - Bruce (Columbus, Ohio)