Experience Perplexity and Burstiness with WordPress’s Automatic Plugin Updates

Why Updating WordPress Plugins is Important

As one of the most powerful and user-friendly content management systems on the market, WordPress offers thousands of plugins to extend its functionality and meet various website requirements. However, manually updating each plugin can be a cumbersome task and can even lead to security vulnerabilities if not updated regularly.

In addition, plugin updates are crucial for your website’s security and performance. While plugins offer additional functionality, they can also cause compatibility issues, slow down your site, and create security vulnerabilities if not updated regularly.

Updating your plugins regularly ensures they function at their best, improves performance, and boosts security. Updates not only fix bugs but also introduce new features to streamline your workflow.

Thankfully, WordPress provides an easy way to enable automatic plugin updates to save you time and focus on other important tasks.

How to Enable Automatic Plugin Updates in WordPress

By default, WordPress does not allow automatic updates for plugins as a security measure to prevent compatibility issues. However, you can easily enable automatic updates by following these two methods:

Method 1: Using the WordPress Dashboard

1. Login to your WordPress dashboard.
2. Go to Plugins » Installed Plugins.
3. Click on the “Enable auto-updates” link under any plugin.

That’s it! The plugin will now automatically update itself whenever a new version is released.

Method 2: Using Custom Code

Adding custom code to your WordPress site can allow all plugins to auto-update or enable auto-updates for specific plugins only.

1. Login to your WordPress dashboard.
2. Go to Appearance » Theme Editor.
3. Click on the “functions.php” file in the right-hand side column.
4. Add the following code at the end of the file:

“`
add_filter( ‘auto_update_plugin’, ‘__return_true’ );
“`

This code allows all plugins to auto-update. You can modify this code to allow auto-updates for specific plugins only.

For example, to enable auto-updates for the Jetpack plugin, add the following code:

“`
add_filter( ‘auto_update_plugin’, ‘enable_auto_update_for_jetpack’ );

function enable_auto_update_for_jetpack( $update, $item ) {

if ( $item->slug === ‘jetpack’ ) {

return true;

} else {

return $update;

}

}
“`

Click on the “Update File” button to save the changes.

Conclusion

Updating your WordPress plugins regularly is crucial for your website’s performance and security. Thankfully, WordPress provides an easy way to enable automatic plugin updates to save time and improve website performance.

We hope this article helped you enable automatic plugin updates on your WordPress site. If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to leave a comment below.