In a separate article, we explain what plugins are and how you can use plugins to extend your site’s functionality.
To read the article, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn why plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to safely upgrade and uninstall plugins, and useful plugin management tips if you need to manage multiple WordPress sites or blogs.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Plugins Need To Be Regularly Upgraded
WordPress constantly updates its software (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in previous releases, and 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 when WordPress distributes a new version.
The reason for this, is because most plugins for WordPress are created by external developers, so sometimes code in the new WordPress version conflict with plugins that were created and tested to work with a previous version. Whenever this happens, there is a potential for problems to 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 this is required). All you need to do as a WordPress user, is just maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is really easy to do.
Keeping your plugins regularly updated and removing old plugins you no longer use is an essential aspect of good WordPress management and helps to avoid conflicts and errors.
The WordPress tutorial below explains how to update and delete plugins in WordPress without editing web code.
How To Automatically Update And Delete Plugins Safely In WordPress – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress provides a number of different methods to alert users when plugins need updating.
For example, you can immediately see how many plugins need updating as soon as you log into your Admin area simply by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, 9 WordPress plugins are out of date and need to be updated …
You can also tell how many plugins need updating from your WordPress Toolbar (in the screenshot below, you can see how many plugins need updating) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also lets you know which plugins need updating …
As well as providing information about plugins that have updates available, the Plugins screen provides links to the plugin download sites and gives you the option to update the plugin instantly …
Let’s start by showing you how to upgrade individual WordPress plugins.
How To Upgrade Single WordPress Plugins
Always make a backup of your site files and database before updating your blog or website.
From your main menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
The “Plugins” area will display in your browser. This list of plugins can be quite lengthy depending on the number of plugins you have added to your site …
(The WordPress Plugins Section)
Tips:
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 area and type in a smaller number of items per page (all plugins show up on the screen by default, i.e. “999”), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
Your Plugins section will now be reduced in size with a page scrolling feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Plugin Search” field …
WordPress displays information about plugins in different backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. outdated) …
Plugins in need of updating display the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Insert Plugin Name] available” …
Select 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 the process of updating your plugins happens “behind the scenes” without leaving your Plugins screen …
Repeat the above 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 at the same time.
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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-upgrade plugins.
How To Bulk-Update Plugins
To bulk-upgrade plugins 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 only the plugins you want to update by checking their individual boxes …
In the Bulk Actions drop-down menu above your plugin table, select Update …
Click Apply …
Your selected plugins will begin updating …
After your plugins have all been updated, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to your Plugins area, or choose another option from the WordPress admin menu …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, the update reminders 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!
(When your site uses the latest version of all plugins, update messages no longer show)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade WP plugins, let’s show you how to safely uninstall plugins safely from your blog or website.
Deleting WordPress Plugins
It’s a good idea to delete plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This can help to decrease server resources and will help you avoid causes of problems.
In this section, we show you how to safely uninstall 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 main menu and choose Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins screen, locate the plugin you want to delete and make sure it is inactive.
Hint: Inactive plugins appear 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 going any further …
Once you have deactivated the plugin, click Delete …
If you want 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” section …
The entire list of files belonging to the plugin selected for deletionwill be listed on your screen …
If you are absolutely sure that you want to proceed and delete these plugin files, click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugin(s) will be removed from your server …
Bulk-Deleting Plugins
You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins on your site, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be cleared.
Note: To delete any plugins that are currently active, you 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 check box, or selecting the checkbox next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins (warning: this will deactivate all plugins) …
Next, choose Deactivate from the Bulk Actions dropdown menu …
Click the Apply button …
Your selected plugins will be deactivated …
Once you have deactivated these plugins, click on the Inactive link on the menu at the top of the page …
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 ticked all the check boxes next to the plugins that you want deleted, select Delete from the Bulk Actions dropdown menu …
Click the Apply button …
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 absolutely certain that you would like to go ahead and delete all of the plugins listed …
The plugins will be deleted …
Useful Management Tools For Plugins
As well as the methods shown above, you can use Free and Paid WordPress plugins that let 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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