How to disable automatic updates in WordPress? You already know that WordPress, as a platform, offers us many facilities. For example, one of the most useful is that the updates, both the core of the CMS and plugins, are performed automatically, without any intervention on our part. This avoids entering the back office to update WordPress with a few clicks. A task that, on the other hand, can become tedious. But some administrators don’t like the idea of WordPress updating “on its own” because it can cause their site to go down the drain. This article tells you how to disable automatic updates in WordPress. It’s very simple.
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Why disable automatic WordPress updates?
Many people will ask, why do it if it’s all so easy? Well, not quite.
Many plugins depend on a specific version of WordPress, so if the core is updated and the plugin is not compatible, there will likely be errors. Let’s imagine the typical plugin based on shortcodes, whose version only works with WordPress 5.1. When the core of the platform is updated, it is possible that some of the plugin’s functions stop working and even create security flaws. I’m sure you’ve seen this when visiting a website that has become obsolete, showing unused shortcodes.
And the same goes for themes that depend on specific versions of plugins and WordPress. It is good to update the platform, but you must be careful. That’s why when we talked about it, we told you that the safest thing to do is to back up the website before updating. You will avoid possible errors.
The easiest option is to install the Easy Updates Manager plugin. To do this, go to the Plugins section of your WordPress back office and select the Add New option. Search for the plugin you want to install on the Add New Plugin page using the search field at the top right.
Type in the name of the plugin (as we have indicated, “Easy Updates Manager”) and press ENTER to start the search. If you have followed the steps to the letter, this plugin should appear as the first search result. Please install and activate it to be able to use it.
Once activated, go to Desktop> Update Options.
You can click the Disable all updates button, but I don’t recommend this as it will prevent you from getting alerts to update the core, plugin, or theme. In other words, you won’t know you need to update any website element.
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How to disable automatic updates in WordPress
The most sensible thing to do is to choose the options that suit you. For example, you can disable plugins and themes from updating themselves but let the core update with minor versions. Be careful; if you choose “Disable plugin updates” and “Disable theme updates,” you won’t see notifications when there is an update, as I said before.
The best thing about it? The plugin has a log so you can check what has been updated. And if there has been any error during the process, you can return and stay as you were. What you call rollback, come on.
But if you are tired of installing plugins on your website and you prefer to chop code, I also have the solution. Just add this line in the wp-config.php file of your website. You will find it in the root directory.
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define( ‘WP_AUTO_UPDATE_CORE,’ false )
This will prevent the WordPress core from updating automatically.
If you want to do the same for plugins, you’ll need to add this line to your theme’s functions.php file:
add_filter( ‘auto_update_plugin’, ‘__return_false’ );
If you prefer themes not to update themselves, add this one:
add_filter( ‘auto_update_theme’, ‘__return_false’ );
And so much for our article on turning off automatic updates in WordPress. I hope you liked it, and if you found it useful, don’t hesitate to share it on social networks; see you soon!
