In another post, we provide a detailed explanation of what plugins are about and how you can use plugins to easily add new features to your site with no technical skills required.
To view the article, go here:
In this tutorial you will learn why WordPress plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to automatically update and remove your WordPress plugins, and discover some plugin management tools if you run multiple WordPress sites or blogs.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Many Plugins Need To Be Upgraded
The WordPress software is regularly updated (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in previous versions, and to improve existing features or introduce new ones.
Depending on how many plugins you use on your site, you can expect to see at least some new new update notices for WordPress plugins every.
This is because most WordPress plugins are created by external developers, so sometimes features in the new WordPress version conflict with plugins that were developed for a previous version. Whenever this happens, issues can sometimes develop.
Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are fairly proactive when it comes to making sure that plugins get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if updating is needed). All you need to do as a website owner, is keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is very easy and simple to do.
Keeping your plugins up-to-date and deleting old plugins you no longer use is an essential aspect of good WordPress site management and helps to avoid any problems or errors.
The WordPress tutorial below explains how to automatically upgrade and delete plugins without requiring web coding knowledge.
Updating And Deleting Plugins – Tutorial
WordPress employs a few ways of letting users know 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For example, you can tell immediately how many plugins are out-of-date as soon as you log into your Site’s Dashboard simply by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
For example, in the screenshot below, you can see that nine WordPress plugins are out of date and need to be updated …
You can also check how many plugins need to be updated from your WordPress Admin Toolbar (the example below shows that a number of plugins need updating) …
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 page provides links to the plugin download sites and gives you the option to update the plugin with one-click …
Let’s start by showing you how to update WordPress plugins one at a time.
How To Update Individual WordPress Plugins
Always make a backup of your data and files before making any updates to your website.
From your WP admin menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” screen. The table of plugins can run down your page for a while, depending on how many plugins you have installed in your blog …
(Plugins Section)
Useful Info:
If you have too many plugins installed and would like to reduce the number of plugins displayed on the screen, then click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your Plugins area and type in a smaller number of items per page (all plugins show up on the screen by default, i.e. “999”), then click Apply …
Your Plugins area will now be reduced in size 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 information about plugins in different backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (inactive vs. active and up-to-date vs. outdated) …
Plugins that need upgrading show the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin Name] available” …
Select the plugin that needs updating and click on the update now link …
WordPress provides smoother plugin updates, so that updating your plugins takes place with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins area …
Repeat the above process for any other plugins on your site that need to be updated, or see the section below if you have many plugins that are out-of-date and would like to update them all at once.
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Now that you know how to upgrade one WP plugin at a time, the next step is to learn how to bulk-upgrade plugins.
Bulk-Upgrading WP Plugins
To update multiple WP plugins in one go using the automatic update feature, go to the “Plugins” page and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click the checkbox 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 pull-down menu above the plugin list, select Update …
Click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will begin to update automatically …
After all plugin upgrades are completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to the Plugins screen, or choose a different section of your dashboard …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, the update reminders 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 plugins on your site are all up-to-date, update alerts no longer display)
Now that you know how to upgrade WordPress inside the dashboard, it’s time to learn how to safely delete plugins from your WordPress blog or website.
Deleting WP Plugins
At times, you may want to delete plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This helps to conserve server resources and also will help you avoid problems.
In this section, you will learn 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 dashboard menu and click on Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins screen, locate the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins appear in a different colored background than active plugins and show an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, click on Deactivate before continuing …
Click on 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 …
The entire list of files associated with the plugin selected for removalwill display on your screen …
If you are sure that you would like to go ahead and delete the selected plugin, just click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugins and related files will be deleted …
How To Safely Bulk-Delete WP 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) …
Next, choose Deactivate from the Bulk Actions pull-down menu …
Click the Apply button …
The selected plugins will be deactivated …
To delete all or some of the inactive plugins on your site, go to the “Plugins” page and click on the Inactive link in the Plugins menu …
Tick 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, specify 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 absolutely certain that you would like to go ahead and remove all of the selected plugins …
The selected plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
Managing WordPress Plugins
In addition to the methods shown above, you can use a range of third-party tools 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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"If you're new to WordPress, this can stand on its own as a training course and will stay with you as you progress from beginner to advanced and even guru status." - Bruce (Columbus, Ohio)