In another post, we explain what plugins are and how you can use these to easily expand your web site’s functionality.
To view this article, go here:
In this tutorial you will learn why WordPress plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to automatically upgrade and remove plugins from your site, and some tools to help you better manage your plugins.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Many Of Your Plugins Need To Be Frequently Updated
The WordPress software is regularly updated (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.
Depending on how many plugins you use on your site, there will typically be new new update notifications for plugins every.
The reason for this, is because most plugins for WordPress are created by 3rd-party 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, issues can sometimes occur.
Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are quite proactive when it comes to making sure that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if needed). All you need to do as a WordPress user, is simply maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is very simple, quick and easy to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins regularly updated and deleting old plugins you no longer need is part of good WordPress management and helps to avoid any conflicts and errors.
The tutorial below explains how to automatically upgrade and delete WordPress plugins safely in the dashboard with no coding knowledge necessary.
How To Upgrade And Delete Plugins Safely – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress has a number of different ways to inform you when plugins need to be updated.
For example, you can immediately see how many plugins are out-of-date as soon as you log into your Administration panel just by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, you can see that 9 WP plugins need updating …
You can also view how many plugins need updating from your WP Notification Toolbar (the example below shows that nine plugins should be updated) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also notifies you about plugins that need updating …
As well as providing information about which plugins have updates available, the Plugins screen provides links to the plugin developer sites and gives you the option to update the plugins individually or in bulk …
Let’s start by showing you how to upgrade one WordPress plugin at a time.
How To Upgrade Plugins Individually
Always make a backup of your site files and database before making any changes to your website or blog.
In your WP admin menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
The “Plugins” area will display in your browser. The list of plugins can flow down your screen for a while, depending on the number of plugins you have added to your site …
(WordPress Plugins Screen)
Notes:
If you have too many plugins installed and would like to reduce the number of plugins displayed on your page, 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 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 “Plugin Search” box …
You will see plugin information in different color backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. outdated) …
Plugins that require upgrading 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 fast plugin updates, so that updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins screen …
Repeat this process for any other plugins on your site that need updating, or see the section below if you have several 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 update individual WP plugins, it’s time to learn how to bulk-update plugins.
Bulk-Upgrading Plugins
To upgrade multiple plugins in a single operation 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 checkbox next to 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 pull-down menu above your plugin table, select Update …
And then click Apply …
Your selected plugins will automatically begin updating …
Once all updates have been completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to your Plugins area, or select another option from the dashboard menu …
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 on your screen, toolbar and menus) …
All plugins have now been updated!
(When your site uses the latest version of all plugins, update messages disappear)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade your inside your admin dashboard, it’s time to learn how to safely remove plugins from your WordPress site.
Deleting WordPress Plugins
Occasionally, you may decide to remove plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This helps to conserve server resources and also help to eliminate potential problems.
In this section, we show you how to delete unused plugins from your blog or site.
Always create a full back up of your 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 select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins area, locate the plugin you want to delete and make sure it is inactive.
Hint: Inactive plugins are listed in a different background color than active plugins and display an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, click on Deactivate before continuing with your plugin deletion …
Click Delete …
If you need to browse all the files that will be deleted before going ahead, 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 removalwill be listed on your screen …
If you are certain about going ahead and deleting the plugin files, then click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugin(s) will be deleted …
Bulk-Deleting WP Plugins
You can delete all inactive plugins at once, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be cleared.
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) …
Next, choose 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, go to the “Plugins” page and click on the Inactive link in the Plugins menu …
Tick the check box 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 ticked all the checkboxes next to the plugins that you want deleted, choose Delete from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …
Click the Apply button …
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 sure that you would like to go ahead and remove all of the plugins listed …
All plugins will be deleted …
Practical Management Tools For Plugins
As well as the methods shown above, you can use a range of 3rd-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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"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)