Plugins and Themes

Plugin and Theme Management in MyKinsta

This feature allows you to manage your site’s themes and plugins directly from MyKinsta. From the Themes and Plugins page, you can:

• See a list of WordPress plugins installed on your site.
• See a list of WordPress themes installed on your site.
• See the version number of the latest update for each theme or plugin.
• Update each plugin or theme individually.
• Bulk update all themes at the same time.
• Bulk update all plugins at the same time.
• Bulk update selected themes at the same time.
• Bulk update selected plugins at the same time.

Viewing Your Installed Plugins and Themes

To see the plugins and themes installed on your site, log in to MyKinsta, select your site, and click on the Themes and Plugins tab.

The current version of the theme or plugin is shown in the Installed column, and if an update is available, the latest version will be shown in the Latest column.

Updating Plugins and Themes

To update a single plugin or theme, click the Update button on the right side for that item.

To update multiple plugins or themes, select the checkbox next to each item and click the Update button. The checkbox in the table header can be used to select all items in the list.

In the Update modal/pop-up that appears, click the Update… button to confirm the updates you want to perform and start the update process.

While the update process is underway, actions on the Themes and Plugins page will be disabled, and a notification will appear either above the Installed themes or Installed plugins sections, depending on what’s being updated.

Once the process completes, actions on the page will be available once again, and a success message will appear.

Errors and Troubleshooting

There may be situations where an update fails. If this happens, an error message will be shown on the Plugins and Themes page.

If an option to restore a backup appears on the page, click the Open Backups button to begin restoring a backup.

If a plugin or theme cannot be updated from MyKinsta, you can try updating from the WordPress dashboard or updating the plugin or theme manually.

If you see an error that WordPress is not available and you should reinstall WordPress and try again, this is usually due to a Bedrock or other non-Standard WordPress installation with a custom public web root (document root). Start a new chat with our Support team, and they can add a new wp-cli.yml file to the ~/public directory, with the path pointing to the site’s WordPress installation.

FAQ

Can I update plugins and themes on multiple sites at the same time?

No, the feature is only available at the environment level. You’ll need to go into each site and environment in MyKinsta to view and update plugins and themes.

Can I choose which version of a plugin or theme to update to?

No, you can only update to the latest version of a plugin or theme.

Can I use this feature to downgrade a plugin or theme?

No, you can only update to the latest version of a plugin or theme. You cannot go back to a previous version.

What if there’s an issue with an update? Can I undo the change?

While there isn’t a built-in way to undo an update, we make a snapshot of the environment just before the update, which you can restore. Note: Snapshots created before a plugin or theme update are only available for two hours.

Can I still manage my plugins and themes in my WordPress dashboard?

Yes, you can continue to handle plugins and themes through WordPress.

Can I use this feature on any site?

Not quite. While the feature will work just fine on most sites, there are some situations that will prevent this feature from working:

• Issues that prevent us from running WP-CLI.
• Premium (payment required) and custom (built by you or your developer) plugins or themes may not have a publicly available update endpoint, so they cannot be updated from MyKinsta. In some cases, we may detect that a new version is available, but the update process fails due to not being available via the standard WordPress endpoint.

Prohibited and Conflicting Plugins

Our platform at Kinsta is optimized for reliability, performance, and security. Unfortunately, some plugins either try to recreate some of our features or are otherwise not compatible with our environment.

Generally speaking, we don’t allow caching, backup, or related posts plugins. If our system administrators identify an issue with a plugin, we add it to the list of banned plugins because it could cause performance issues or interfere with functionality on your site.

For more details, including the complete list of plugins, please see our Banned and Incompatible Plugins article.

Disable WordPress Maintenance Mode

When you update plugins and/or themes on your site, WordPress displays a maintenance page that reads:

Briefly unavailable for scheduled maintenance. Check back in a minute.

This page is a built-in maintenance mode in WordPress and usually is cleared automatically once the updates are complete. Occasionally, an issue may arise and cause this maintenance page to get stuck, which requires a bit of manual intervention to fix.

Clear the WordPress Maintenance Page

To clear this maintenance message, you’ll need to connect to your site with SFTP or with SSH and delete the .maintenance file in your site’s public directory (aka root directory or document root).

Once you’re connected to your site and viewing the public directory, you’ll see a list of your site’s files and subdirectories. Look for and delete the file named .maintenance.

Prevent WordPress From Getting Stuck In Maintenance Mode

A few scenarios may cause the maintenance page to get stuck and not clear automatically. To prevent this, here are a few quick tips:

1. Make sure plugins/themes are compatible with your version of WordPress before updating.
2. Update plugins often so you don’t have to run a large number of updates at once. We’ve made this easier for you with our Plugin and Theme Management feature in MyKinsta.
3. Avoid updating a large number of plugins or themes at the same time. Depending on the plugins and the extent of the update needed, run 2-3 at a time, or even 1 at a time to avoid potential conflicts or connection issues.