In another article, we provide an overview of what plugins are about and how you can use these to easily add new features and functionality to your blog with no coding skills required.
You can view this article here:
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn why plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to safely upgrade and uninstall plugins from your site, and discover practical tools to help you better manage your plugins if you need to manage multiple WordPress sites.
How To Update And Delete WordPress Plugins
Why Some Of Your Plugins Need To Be Frequently Upgraded
New versions of WordPress are frequently being released (about every 3-4 months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities found in older releases, and to improve existing features or introduce new functionality to users.
Depending on how many plugins you use on your site, you can expect to see at least some 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 conflicts with plugins that were developed and tested with a previous version. Whenever this happens, there is a potential for conflicts to sometimes develop.
Fortunately, most WordPress plugin developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are fairly proactive when it comes to ensuring 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 keep your plugins up-to-date, which, as you will soon learn, is very simple and easy to do.
Keeping your plugins regularly updated and deleting old plugins you no longer use is an essential aspect of good WordPress management and helps to avoid potential problems or errors.
The step-by-step tutorial below explains how to automatically upgrade and delete plugins safely without requiring web programming skills or knowledge.
Updating And Deleting Plugins – Step-By-Step Tutorial
WordPress uses several methods to notify users when plugins need updating.
For example, you can instantly see how many plugins need updating inside your WP Dashboard just by looking at the “Plugins” menu.
In the example below, nine WP plugins have older versions that need to be updated …
You can also view how many plugins need updating from your WP Admin Toolbar (the screenshot below shows that nine plugins need updating) …
The Plugins section (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also provides information about plugins that need to be updated …
As well as providing information about plugins that have updates available, the Plugins section provides links to the plugin download sites and gives you the option to update your plugins individually or in bulk …
Let’s start by learning how to update individual plugins.
Updating Single A Plugin
Always make a backup of your website before upgrading your website or blog.
From your WP admin menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” section. The table of plugins can be quite lengthy depending on the number of plugins you have installed in your site …
(Plugins Section)
Additional Information:
If you have too many plugins 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 type in a smaller number of items per page (by default, all plugins display on the screen), then click Apply …
Your Plugins section will now be reduced in size with a ’numbered pages’ feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Search” field …
You will see information about plugins in different backgrounds depending on the status of the plugins (inactive vs. active and up-to-date vs. out-of-date) …
Plugins in need of updating 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 has done away with the loading screen when updating plugins and streamlined the process, so that updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins screen …
Repeat this process for any other plugins on your site that need updating, or see the section below if you have many 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 WP plugins individually, the next step is to learn how to update several WP plugins simultaneously.
Bulk-Upgrading Plugins
To bulk-update WP plugins from your admin area, go to the “Plugins” section and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Tick the check box in the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to update by checking their individual boxes …
In the Bulk Actions drop down menu above your plugin table, choose Update …
And then click Apply …
Your selected plugins will begin the update process …
After all updates have completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to return to your Plugins area, or go to another section of your dashboard …
Once all plugins are up-to-date, the update reminders will disappear (i.e. the “at-a-glance” indicators and “There is a new version of XYZ plugin available” messages no longer display) …
All plugins are now up-to-date!
(When your plugins are up-to-date, the notification icons do not display)
Now that you know how to upgrade your inside the dashboard, let’s show you how to remove plugins safely from your site.
How To Remove Plugins
At times, you may decide to remove WP plugins that are no longer needed or being used on your site. This can reduce server resources and also help you avoid causes of problems.
In this section, we show you how to uninstall unused plugins from your WordPress site.
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 reinstall your site.
To delete a plugin, go to your admin 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 appear in 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 proceeding with your plugin deletion …
Next, click on Delete …
If you need 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 positively sure 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 WordPress installation …
How To Bulk-Delete WordPress Plugins
You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins on your site, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be cleared.
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 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 …
The selected plugins will be deactivated …
To delete all or some of the inactive plugins on your site, go to the “Plugins” area and click on the Inactive link on the main menu …
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 to delete, 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 absolutely certain that you want to proceed to the next step and delete all of the plugins listed …
The selected plugins will be deleted …
Practical Management Tools For WP Plugins
In addition to the methods shown above, you can install a number 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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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum