In another article, we explain what plugins are and how you can use plugins to easily enhance your site’s capabilities.
You can view this 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 remove plugins from your site, and some plugin management tools if you plan to run multiple WordPress sites.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why WordPress Plugins Need Upgrading
WordPress regularly updates its software (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities found in older software versions, as well as to improve existing features.
Depending on how many plugins you use on your site, you can expect to see at least some new updates for plugins whenever WordPress releases a new version.
The reason for this, is because most WordPress plugins are created by 3rd-party developers, so sometimes code in the new WordPress version conflicts with plugins that were developed and tested with a previous version. Whenever this happens, there is a potential for conflicts to sometimes occur.
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 this is required). All you need to do on your end, is simply maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is really quick, simple and easy to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins up-to-date and deleting old plugins you no longer need is an essential aspect of good WordPress site management and helps to avoid any potential errors or conflicts.
The tutorial below explains how to update and delete plugins in WordPress without web coding skills required.
How To Upgrade And Delete Plugins – Tutorial
WordPress employs a number of different methods of letting users know when plugins on their site need updating.
For example, you can see ‘at a glance’ how many plugins need updating as soon as you log into your Admin area by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, you can see that nine WordPress plugins need to be updated …
You can also view how many plugins need updating from your WP Admin Toolbar (in the example below, you can again see that nine plugins should be brought up to date) …
The Plugins screen (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also lets you know which plugins need to be updated …
As well as providing information about which plugins have updates available, the Plugins section provides links to the plugin developer 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 Single A Plugin
We strongly recommend making a complete backup of your site files and database before making any upgrades to your blog or website.
In your admin menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
The “Plugins” area will display in your browser. The list of plugins can go down your page for some length, depending on how many plugins you have added to your site …
(WordPress Plugins Screen)
Useful Information:
If you have too many plugins installed and would like to reduce the number of plugins displayed on the page, then click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your Plugins screen and type in 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 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” box …
WordPress displays information about plugins in different backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (inactive vs. active and outdated vs up-to-date) …
Plugins that require upgrading display the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin] available” …
Select the plugin that you want to update and click on the update now link …
WordPress has done away with the loading screen when updating plugins and streamlined the plugin update process, so that updating your plugins happens “behind the scenes” without leaving your Plugins area …
Repeat this process for all plugins on your site that need to be updated, or refer to the section below if you have many plugins that are out-of-date and would like to update 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-update WP plugins.
Bulk-Upgrading WordPress Plugins
To update multiple WP plugins in one go 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 …
Tick 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 table of plugins, select Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will begin the update process …
Once all plugins have been updated, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to your Plugins screen, or visit another section of your dashboard …
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 on your screen, toolbar and menus) …
You have updated all plugins on your site to their latest version!
(When your site uses the latest version of all plugins, the notification icons no longer display)
Now that you know how to update plugins, let’s take a look at how to uninstall plugins safely from your blog or website.
Deleting WordPress Plugins
It’s a good idea to remove plugins that you no longer need. This reduces resource usage and help to reduce causes of some problems.
In this section, we show you how to safely 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 reinstall your site.
To delete a plugin, go to your main menu and choose Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins page, locate the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins are listed in 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 going any further …
Click Delete …
If you would like 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” section …
The entire list of files associated with the plugin that you are about to remove will display on your screen …
If you are positively certain that you want to proceed and delete the plugin, click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugin(s) will be removed from your WordPress installation …
How To Safely Bulk-Delete WordPress Plugins
You can delete all inactive plugins at once, 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 check box, 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 dropdown menu …
Click Apply …
All selected plugins will be deactivated …
To delete all or some of the inactive plugins, go to the “Plugins” screen 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 selected all the plugins that you want deleted, choose Delete from the Bulk Actions pull-down menu …
Click Apply …
A list of all selected plugins will display 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 sure that you want to go ahead and delete all of the selected plugins …
The selected plugins will be deleted …
Managing WP Plugins – Useful Tools
As well as the methods shown above, you can install 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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"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group