In a previous article, we explain what plugins are and how you can use plugins to easily extend your blog’s capabilities.
You can view this article here:
In this tutorial you will learn why WordPress plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to upgrade and delete plugins, and useful tools to help you better manage your plugins.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Some Plugins Need Updating
The WordPress software is regularly updated (about every 3-4 months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities found in previous versions, as well as to improve existing features or introduce new functionality to WordPress users.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, you can expect to see at least some new new update notices for plugins every.
The reason for this, is because most plugins for WordPress are created by external developers, so sometimes features in the newly-released WordPress version conflict with plugins that were built for 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 updating is required). All you have to do on your end, is just maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is really easy and simple to do.
Keeping your WordPress plugins up-to-date and removing old plugins you no longer need is part of good WordPress management and helps to avoid any errors and problems.
The WordPress tutorial below explains how to automatically upgrade and delete plugins safely without touching web code.
How To Update And Delete Plugins Safely – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress has a few ways to notify you when plugins need to be updated.
For example, you can tell immediately how many plugins are out-of-date from your WP Dashboard just by looking at the main “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, 9 plugins need updating …
You can also check how many plugins need updating from your WP Admin Toolbar (as shown below, a number of plugins should be brought up to date) …
The Plugins screen (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 pages and gives you the option to update your plugins with one-click …
Let’s start by learning how to upgrade plugins one at a time.
Update WordPress Plugins Individually
Always make a complete backup of your site files and database before making any changes to your blog or website.
From your WP admin menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
The “Plugins” screen will display in your browser. The screen can be quite lengthy depending on the number of plugins you have installed on your site …
(WordPress Plugins Section)
Useful Tips:
If you have too many plugins installed and would like to reduce the number of plugins displaying on the screen, then click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your Plugins area and enter a smaller number of items per page (by default, all plugins display on the page), then click Apply …
Your Plugins section will now be made more manageable with a ’numbered pages’ feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Search Installed Plugins” function …
You will see information about plugins in different color backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. out-of-date) …
Plugins that need updating display the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin Name] available” …
Find 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 takes place “behind the scenes” without leaving your Plugins screen …
Repeat this process for all 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 update all plugins in bulk.
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Now that you know how to update one plugin at a time, let’s show you how to upgrade several WordPress plugins simultaneously.
How To Bulk-Upgrade Plugins
To upgrade multiple plugins at the same time 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 …
Click 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 at the top of the page, choose Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will automatically begin updating …
After all plugins have 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 dashboard menu …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, any plugin alerts 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) …
All plugins have now been upgraded!
(When plugins on your site are up-to-date, update alerts do not display)
Now that you know how to update your plugins, let’s show you how to remove plugins from your site or blog.
How To Safely Delete WordPress Plugins
Occasionally, you may choose to remove WordPress plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This can help conserve resource usage and also help you avoid problems.
In this section, we show you how to safely deactivate and delete unused plugins from your WordPress blog or 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 reinstall your site.
To remove a plugin, go to your admin menu and select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins page, find the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is inactive.
Hint: Inactive plugins use a different colored background 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 …
Next, click Delete …
If you would like to browse 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 associated with the plugin that you are about to remove will be listed on your screen …
If you are sure that you would like to go ahead and delete these plugin files, then click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugins and related files will be removed from your WordPress installation …
Deleting Multiple WP Plugins Simultaneously
You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins on your site, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be removed.
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, specify 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 check box 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, specify Delete from the Bulk Actions drop-down menu …
Click the Apply button …
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 would like to go ahead and remove all of the plugins listed …
All selected plugins will be deleted …
Managing WordPress Plugins – WordPress Tools
In addition to the methods shown above, you can use WordPress plugins 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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"This is AMAZING! I had learnt about how to use WordPress previously, but this covers absolutely everything and more!! Incredible value! Thank you!" - Monique, Warrior Forum