In another blog post, we provide an overview of what WP plugins are about and how you can use plugins to enhance your web site’s functionality.
You can view this article here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn the importance of keeping WordPress plugins up-to-date, how to automatically update and remove plugins, and practical tips to help you better manage your plugins if you currently manage multiple WordPress sites.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Plugins Need Upgrading
New versions of WordPress are regularly released (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in earlier software versions, and to improve existing features.
Depending on how many plugins you use on your site, there will typically be new updates for WordPress plugins whenever new versions of WordPress are released.
This is because most plugins for WordPress are created by third-party developers, so sometimes code in the new WordPress version conflict with plugins that were created and tested to work with a previous version. When this happens, problems can 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 needed). All you need to do as a WordPress user, is simply keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is very simple and easy to do.
Keeping your WordPress 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 potential problems and errors.
The WordPress step-by-step tutorial below explains how to upgrade and delete plugins in the dashboard with no coding knowledge required.
How To Upgrade And Delete Plugins – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress has a few methods to let you know when plugins on your blog need to be updated.
For example, you can see how many plugins need to be updated as soon as you log into your Site’s Dashboard simply by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
In the screenshot below, you can see that nine WP plugins need updating …
You can also view how many plugins need updating from your WP Notification Toolbar (as shown below, several plugins have to be updated) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also notifies you about plugins that need to be updated …
As well as providing information about plugins that have updates available, the Plugins page provides links to the plugin download sites and gives you the option to update your plugin individually or in bulk …
Let’s start by showing you how to upgrade individual plugins.
Upgrade Individual WordPress Plugins
We recommend performing a backup of your data and files before updating your website.
From your admin menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
The “Plugins” page will display in your browser. The list of plugins can go down your screen for a while, depending on the number of plugins you have added to your blog …
(Plugins Page)
Notes:
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 page and enter a smaller number of items per page (all plugins show on the page by default), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
Your Plugins area 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 Plugins” field …
WordPress displays information about plugins in different color backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (active vs. inactive and up-to-date vs. outdated) …
Plugins that need upgrading have a distinctive notification message: “There is a new version of [Insert Plugin Name] available” …
Find the plugin that needs updating and click on the update now link …
WordPress provides streamlined plugin updates, so that the process of updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins screen …
Repeat the above process for all plugins on your site that need to be updated, or refer to the section below if you have many plugins that are out-of-date and would like to upgrade all plugins at the same time.
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Now that you know how to upgrade individual plugins, it’s time to learn how to bulk-update plugins.
How To Update Many Plugins
To bulk-update plugins using the automatic update feature, go to the “Plugins” screen and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click the check box next to 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 dropdown menu above the list of plugins, choose Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will automatically begin updating …
Once all plugin updates are done, 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 all plugins are 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” notices no longer display on your screen, toolbar and menus) …
You have updated all plugins on your site to their latest version!
(When your site uses the latest version of all plugins, notification icons no longer appear)
Now that you know how to update WP inside the admin dashboard, it’s time to learn how to uninstall plugins from your WordPress blog or website.
How To Remove WordPress Plugins
At times, you may decide to remove WordPress plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This can conserve resource usage and helps to eliminate potential problems.
In this section, you will learn how to uninstall unused plugins from your site or blog.
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 restore your site.
To delete a plugin, go to your admin menu and choose Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins area, find the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins use a different background color than active plugins and show an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, click on Deactivate before proceeding with your plugin deletion …
Next, click Delete …
If you need 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” screen …
All files belonging to the plugin selected for deletionwill display on your screen …
If you are positively certain that you would like to go ahead and delete the selected plugin files, just click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugin(s) will be removed from your server …
Deleting Several Plugins Simultaneously
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 first need to 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 check box next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins (warning: this will deactivate all plugins) …
Next, specify Deactivate from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …
Click the Apply button …
All 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 checkbox, 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 to delete, specify Delete from the Bulk Actions dropdown menu …
Click the Apply button …
A list of all selected plugins will be displayed in the Delete Plugins area. 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 remove all of the plugins listed …
The plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
Tools For Managing Plugins
As well as the methods shown above, you can use a number of 3rd-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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