In a previous blog post, we explain what plugins are and how you can use plugins to easily enhance your website’s capabilities.
You can view this article here:
In this tutorial you will learn why plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to upgrade and delete plugins from your site, and discover some tools to help you better manage your plugins.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Some Of Your Plugins Need Upgrading
New WordPress versions are constantly being released (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in earlier software 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 notices for plugins when WordPress distributes a new version.
This is because most WordPress plugins are created by third-party developers, so sometimes code in the newly-released WordPress version conflicts with plugins that were developed and tested with a previous version. When this happens, conflicts 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 this is required). All you need to do on your end, is just keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is very simple to do.
Keeping your plugins up-to-date and deleting old plugins you no longer need is part of good WordPress management and helps to avoid potential problems or errors.
The WordPress step-by-step tutorial below explains how to automatically update and delete plugins safely without requiring coding skills.
Upgrading And Deleting Plugins Safely In WordPress – Tutorial
WordPress uses a few methods of letting users know when plugins on their site need updating.
For example, you can immediately see how many plugins are out-of-date inside your WordPress Dashboard just by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
In the screenshot below, you can see that nine WP plugins have older versions that need updating …
You can also check how many plugins need updating from your WordPress Toolbar (as shown below, nine plugins need updating) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also tells you how many plugins need updating …
In addition to providing information about plugins that have available updates, the Plugins section provides links to the plugin developer sites and gives you the option to update your plugin individually or in bulk …
Let’s start by learning how to upgrade one WP plugin at a time.
How To Upgrade Individual WordPress Plugins
We recommend making a full backup of your site files and database before upgrading your blog or website.
From your main menu, select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” area. This list of plugins can be quite lengthy depending on the number of plugins you have added to your blog …
(Plugins Section)
Useful Tips:
If you have too many plugins and would like to reduce the number of plugins showing on the screen, then click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your Plugins screen and enter a smaller number of items per page (by default, all plugins display on the screen), then click Apply …
Your Plugins area will now be made more manageable with a page scrolling feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Search Plugins” feature …
You will see information about plugins in different backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (inactive vs. active and outdated vs up-to-date) …
Plugins that need upgrading show the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin] available” …
Find the plugin that you want to update 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 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 a number of plugins that are out-of-date and would like to upgrade them all at once.
***
Now that you know how to update plugins one at a time, the next step is to learn how to update a bunch of WP plugins simultaneously.
Bulk-Upgrading Plugins
To upgrade multiple plugins simultaneously directly inside your dashboard, go to the “Plugins” page and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click on the check box in 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 plugin list, select Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will all be updated at once …
After the update process has completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to your Plugins screen, or select another option from the dashboard menu …
Once your plugins are all up-to-date, the plugin notifications 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!
(When your site uses the latest version of all plugins, update icons no longer show)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade WP plugins, let’s take a look at how to safely delete plugins from your site.
Deleting WP Plugins
Occasionally, you may choose to delete plugins that you no longer need or are no longer using on your site. This helps to decrease resources on your server and also help to eliminate potential problems.
In this section, you will learn how to deactivate and delete unused plugins from your WordPress 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 choose Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins screen, locate the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is inactive.
Hint: Inactive plugins have a different background color than active plugins and display an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, click on Deactivate before continuing …
Click Delete …
If you want to review a list of 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 …
A complete list of files associated with the plugin selected for deletionwill display on your screen …
If you are certain about going ahead and deleting the plugin, then click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
Your plugins and related files will be deleted …
Deleting Several Plugins In Bulk
You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be uninstalled.
Note: To delete any plugins that are presently 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 Apply …
Your selected plugins will be deactivated …
To delete all or some of the inactive plugins, go to the “Plugins” page and click on the Inactive link on the main 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 deleted, specify Delete from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …
Click Apply …
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 delete all of the selected plugins …
Your plugins will be deleted …
Plugin Management – Useful WordPress Tools
In addition to the methods shown above, you can use a range 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.
***
"I am beyond impressed with what you have put together. I can tell that you put a ton of hard work into building what you have. You have the absolute best content on WordPress I have ever seen!" - Robert T. Jillie