In another blog post, we provide a detailed explanation of what plugins are all about and how you can use plugins to easily expand your blog’s functionality.
To view this article, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn the importance of keeping your WordPress plugins up-to-date, how to easily update and uninstall your WordPress plugins, and useful tools to help you better manage your plugins if you run or manage multiple WordPress sites or blogs.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Many WordPress Plugins Need Frequent Updating
WordPress constantly updates its software (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in previous software releases, and to improve existing features.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, there will typically be new new update notices for plugins each time a new version of WordPress is released.
The reason for this, is because most plugins for WordPress are created by third-party developers, so sometimes code in the new WordPress version conflicts with plugins that were developed for a previous version. Whenever this happens, problems can sometimes develop.
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 have to do as a website owner, is simply keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is very quick, simple and easy to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins up-to-date and removing old plugins you no longer need is part of good WordPress site management and helps to avoid any potential conflicts or errors.
The WordPress tutorial below explains how to upgrade and delete plugins inside the WordPress admin dashboard without requiring coding knowledge or skills.
How To Automatically Update And Delete Plugins Inside Your WP Dashboard – Tutorial
WordPress uses a number of different ways to alert you when plugins need to be updated.
For example, you can tell immediately how many plugins are out-of-date as soon as you log into your Admin area simply by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, you can see that 9 WordPress plugins are out of date and need to be updated …
You can also see how many plugins need updating from your WP Toolbar (as shown below, several plugins have to be updated) …
The Plugins page (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also tells you what plugins need updating …
As well as providing information about plugins that have updates available, the Plugins page 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 update WP plugins individually.
Upgrade Individual WordPress Plugins
Always make a full backup of your data and files before making any changes to your website.
From your admin menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” area. The list of plugins can run down your page for some length, depending on how many plugins you have added to your site …
(WordPress Plugins Page)
Useful Tips:
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 area and type in a smaller number of items per page (by default, all plugins display on the screen), 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” feature …
WordPress displays information about plugins in different backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. out-of-date) …
Plugins in need of upgrading have a distinctive 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 provides smooth & fast plugin updates, 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 updating, or refer to the section below if you have several plugins that are out-of-date and would like to upgrade all plugins in one simple operation.
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Now that you know how to update one plugin at a time, it’s time to learn how to bulk-upgrade plugins.
How To Upgrade Multiple Plugins Simultaneously
To bulk-upgrade plugins simultaneously using the automatic upgrading feature, go to the “Plugins” section 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 update by checking their individual boxes …
In the Bulk Actions dropdown menu at the top of the page, choose Update …
Click Apply …
Your selected plugins will update all at once …
Once all updates are completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to your Plugins area, or choose another option from the main menu …
Once your plugins are all up-to-date, the plugin notifications will 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) …
You have updated all plugins on your site!
(When plugins on your site are up-to-date, update notices do not display)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade WP in your WP dashboard, let’s take a look at how to safely uninstall plugins safely from your WordPress site.
How To Remove Plugins
At times, you may decide to remove WordPress plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This decreases resources on your server and help to reduce problems.
In this section, we show you how to delete unused plugins from your WordPress site.
Always create 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 delete a plugin, go to your main menu and choose 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 display an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, then click on Deactivate before going any further …
Next, click Delete …
If you would like to have a look at 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 belonging to the plugin that you are about to remove will display on your screen …
If you are absolutely certain that you want to go ahead and delete the selected plugin files, click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugins and related files will be deleted from your WordPress installation …
How To Bulk-Delete Plugins
You can delete all inactive plugins at once, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be deleted.
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) …
Once you have done this, select Deactivate from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …
Click Apply …
All selected plugins will be deactivated …
To delete all or some of the inactive plugins, go to the “Plugins” area 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 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 to delete, choose Delete from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …
Click Apply …
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 sure that you would like to proceed to the next step and delete all of the plugins listed …
The plugins will be deleted …
Useful Tools For Managing WordPress Plugins
As well as the methods shown above, you can use a number of third-party tools 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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