How to Properly Update WordPress Plugins (Step by Step)

Updating WordPress plugins can be as easy as clicking a button – but did you know that if you’re not careful, you can risk breaking your entire website? It’s true. At WPBeginner, we’re extra cautious about plugin updates because our site helps thousands of WordPress users daily.

Over the years, we’ve learned (sometimes the hard way) that even minor plugin updates can cause unexpected issues. We’ve seen everything from broken layouts to missing block editor functions that disrupt our content workflow. 

That’s why in this guide, we’ll share our tried-and-tested process for safely updating WordPress plugins. This way, you won’t experience the difficulties we had to go through.

Why Update WordPress Plugins?

This is a question we get asked a lot, especially from busy WordPress website owners who worry about updates breaking their sites.

From our experience managing WPBeginner and helping thousands of WordPress users, the answer is absolutely yes – but it needs to be done the right way.

Think of WordPress plugins like apps on your phone. You wouldn’t want to run outdated versions of your banking or social media apps, right?

The same goes for plugins. These mini-software packages that add features like contact forms, SEO tools, memberships, and more to your site are constantly being improved by their developers.

We’ve seen how outdated plugins can leave websites vulnerable to security issues or missing out on important new features.

Think of plugins as apps for your WordPress website. You can install them to add new features and functionality to your website, such as and more.

For example, our partner companies like AIOSEO are constantly releasing new updates that answer our users’ SEO needs. But more importantly, we’ve handled numerous cases where outdated plugins became WordPress security liabilities.

That said, while updates are crucial, they don’t have to be stressful. So, let’s take a look at how to properly update WordPress plugins. You can use the quick links below to skip to a specific topic:

Our Go-To Checklist Before Updating a WordPress Plugin

Here’s something we’ve learned the hard way: never update a plugin without taking a few crucial precautions first. At WPBeginner, we follow a simple pre-update checklist that has saved us countless headaches.

First, we recommend creating a backup beforehand. We’ve seen too many cases where a simple update went wrong and the WordPress blog owner had no backup to restore from. It’s like having insurance for your website.

We suggest using the Duplicator plugin as it makes the backup process super easy.

Next, you want to go to Dashboard » Updates in your WordPress admin. Then, click that ‘View version details’ link on the list of plugins that need updating.

Here, you can check what changes the plugin developers have made.

Sometimes what looks like a minor update can actually include major changes that might affect how your site works.

Here’s a rule of thumb: look for the magic words ‘security update.’ If you see this in the changelog, you may want to update the plugin immediately. Security fixes aren’t something you want to delay.

For regular updates, we wait a week. This might sound overcautious, but we’ve found that most major bugs get caught and fixed within the first week of a release.

If your website generates significant traffic or leads (like ours does), this waiting period can save you from being the guinea pig for new updates.

How to Update a WordPress Plugin

WordPress comes with a built-in automatic update system. It automatically checks for updates and shows you notifications when there are updates available for your WordPress plugins, themes, and WordPress core software.

To update your WordPress plugins, simply visit the Dashboard » Updates page in the admin area.

You will then see a list of plugins that need updating.

You can install these updates by clicking ‘Update Plugins.’ Or, visit the Plugins » Installed Plugins page. Below each plugin is a notification with updates available to install.

You can click the ‘Update Now’ link to install each update. Make sure that you install them one at a time, and wait until the plugin finishes updating before you click the next link.

How to Update WordPress Plugins in Bulk

While WordPress does offer a bulk update feature, we should mention something important: sometimes, updating multiple plugins at once isn’t always the safest approach. Here’s why.

When you update several plugins simultaneously, it becomes nearly impossible to identify which update caused an issue if something goes wrong.

A site may break after a bulk update, and the owner has to spend hours figuring out which plugin caused the problem.

That said, if you still want to use the bulk update feature (we get it, sometimes you’re in a hurry), here’s how to do it.

First, visit the Plugins » Installed Plugins page and click on the ‘Update Available’ link. This will show you the list of all plugins that have updates available.

You can select them all by clicking the ‘Plugin’ checkbox at the top of the list and then choose ‘Update’ from the Bulk Actions dropdown menu.

After that, you need to click the ‘Apply’ button to update the selected plugins.

How to Undo a WordPress Plugin Update

Sometimes a plugin update can produce unexpected results. For example, you may find that some plugin features do not work properly.

In that case, the first thing you should do is deactivate that plugin.

If you can access the Plugins page in the WordPress admin area, then simply click on the ‘Deactivate’ link below the misbehaving plugin.

After that, you can install the WP Rollback plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, go back to the Plugins page, and you will be able to see a ‘Rollback’ option below each plugin. Clicking on it will allow you to roll back the plugin to any previous version.

For detailed instructions, check out our guide on how to rollback WordPress plugins.

What if the problem with the plugin update has left you unable to access the WordPress admin area?

In that case, you should follow the steps in our guide on how to deactivate all plugins when not able to access the WordPress admin area.

How to Manage WordPress Plugin Updates

If you manage multiple WordPress sites, you will soon realize that you must update plugins quite often. This means that manual updates can become time-consuming. Here are some tips to help you manage updating WordPress more efficiently.

If you’re confident about the plugins that you are using, then you can enable automatic updates for all your WordPress plugins.

However, a better approach would be to automatically update only a few select plugins that you trust. We give instructions on how to do this in our guide on how to better manage WordPress updates.

If you don’t manage multiple WordPress sites, then you can set up email notifications for WordPress plugin updates. This will alert you when there’s an update available without having to log in to your WordPress site.

Always make sure that you have set up an automatic backup plugin on your site. This will allow you to restore your WordPress site in case something goes wrong.

Finally, some WordPress hosting providers come with a staging website feature. This allows you to test the new plugin updates on a staging environment before going live.

Bluehost, for instance, has a one-click staging environment feature that lets you create a duplicate of your website for testing.

If you want to use managed WordPress hosting, we recommend using WP Engine and checking out their staging tool.

Alternatively, you can also hire experts to handle plugin updates for you. At WPBeginner Pro Services, we offer affordable WordPress Maintenance plans to free you from the worries of managing a website.

We’ll take care of WordPress core, plugin, and theme updates, as well as uptime monitoring, security monitoring, cloud backups, and more. Simply pick a maintenance package that suits your needs and our team will handle the rest.

We hope this article helped you learn how to update WordPress plugins. You may also want to see our ultimate WordPress security guide or our list of the best WordPress backup plugins.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.