In a previous blog post, we provide a detailed explanation of what WP plugins are all about and how you can use these to easily expand your site’s functionality.
You can read the article here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn the importance of keeping WordPress plugins up-to-date, how to easily upgrade and delete your WordPress plugins, and discover some great tips to help you better manage your plugins.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Many Of Your Plugins Need Frequent Updating
The WordPress software is constantly updated (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in older versions, as well as to improve existing features.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, you can expect to see at least some new new update notifications for plugins whenever new WordPress versions are released.
This is because most plugins for WordPress are created by third-party developers, so sometimes features in the newly-released WordPress version conflict with plugins that were developed and tested 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 quite proactive when it comes to making sure that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if this is needed). All you need to do on your end, is simply maintain your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is very simple, quick and easy to do.
Keeping your plugins regularly updated and removing old plugins you no longer need is an essential aspect of good WordPress site management and helps to avoid any potential errors or problems.
The WordPress step-by-step tutorial below explains how to automatically upgrade and delete plugins in your WordPress dashboard without requiring web programming skills or knowledge.
How To Upgrade And Delete Plugins – Tutorial
WordPress employs several methods to alert users when plugins need to be updated.
For example, you can see ‘at a glance’ how many plugins need updating inside your Admin area simply by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
In the example below, you can see that 9 WP plugins have older versions that need to be updated …
You can also tell how many plugins need to be updated from your WordPress Admin Toolbar (as shown below, nine plugins have to be updated) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also tells you which plugins need updating …
As well as providing information about plugins that have available updates, the Plugins page provides links to the plugin download pages and gives you the option to update your plugin instantly …
Let’s start by showing you how to update individual plugins.
Upgrading Single Plugins
Always make a complete backup of your site files and database before making any updates to your blog or website.
From your main menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” screen. The list of plugins can flow down your screen for a while, depending on the number of plugins you have installed on your blog …
(The WordPress Plugins Page)
Additional Info:
If you have too many plugins 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 screen), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
Your Plugins area 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 “Search Plugins” function …
WordPress displays plugin information in different color backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. out-of-date) …
Plugins that require upgrading show the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin] available” …
Locate the plugin that needs updating and click on the update now link …
WordPress provides simple plugin updates, so that updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins area …
Repeat the above process for all plugins on your site that need to be updated, or see 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 upgrade individual WordPress plugins, it’s time to learn how to bulk-update WordPress plugins.
How To Bulk-Update Plugins
To upgrade multiple 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 …
Click on the check box next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to update by checking its box …
In the Bulk Actions drop-down menu above the list of plugins, choose Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will automatically begin updating …
Once all upgrades are finished, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to the Plugins screen, or choose a different section of your dashboard …
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) …
You have updated all plugins on your site to their latest version!
(When plugins on your site are up-to-date, update notices no longer appear)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade your in your dashboard, let’s take a look at how to uninstall plugins from your site or blog.
How To Safely Remove Plugins
At times, you may choose to remove WordPress plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This helps to reduce resource usage and also help to eliminate problems.
In this section, you will learn how to delete unused plugins from your site or blog.
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 main 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 background color than active plugins and display an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, then click on Deactivate before continuing with your plugin deletion …
Once you have deactivated the plugin, click Delete …
If you want to review a list of all the files that will be deleted before taking the next step, then click on the “Click to view entire list of files which will be deleted” link in the “Delete Plugin” screen …
All files associated with the plugin selected for deletionwill display on your screen …
If you are certain about going ahead and deleting these plugin, just click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugins and related files will be deleted from your WordPress installation …
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 check box, 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, choose Deactivate from the Bulk Actions dropdown menu …
Click Apply …
Your selected plugins will be deactivated …
To delete all or some of the inactive plugins, go to the “Plugins” section and click on the Inactive link in the Plugins menu …
Click the checkbox in the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to delete by checking their individual boxes …
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 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 proceed to the next step and delete all of the plugins listed …
All plugins will be deleted …
WordPress Management Tools For WP Plugins
In addition to the methods shown above, you can install a number of third-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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