What plug-ins are used for
In the frontend
What visitors see, such as a contact form, a newsletter signup, an online shop or an event calendar.
In the backend
What helps behind the scenes, such as backups, SEO, folders in the media library, faster loading times with caching and image compression, or a firewall.
How to switch on automatic updates
After the update to WordPress 5.5, the plug-in overview in the backend has a new column on the far right. There you enable automatic updates for each plug-in individually.
WordPress then looks for updates twice a day and applies them as soon as one is available. It uses its cron jobs for this, which run all of its scheduled tasks.
What speaks for it and what against
For
Developers close security gaps as quickly as possible. With automatic updates the fix is in place right away, even during longer absences such as holidays, illness or after an accident. Nothing gets forgotten, and you save time.
Against
An update can damage the website, and nobody checks whether it ran without errors. In the worst case you only hear about it days or weeks later, when attentive visitors report it.
- Major version jumps Major updates, for example from 1.4 to 2.0, sometimes still have teething problems.
- Dependencies Some plug-ins can only be updated once the theme or the PHP version of the server is up to date as well.
- The rest of the system WordPress itself, the theme and the server (PHP) need updates too. Up-to-date plug-ins alone do not make a website secure.
For small websites without special functions and with few visitors the new feature is useful. Medium-sized and larger websites need a plan for updates.
Our approach with the maintenance package
For our clients we work with a WordPress management platform. It lets us apply updates in a controlled and efficient way, each one on a test environment first. The package also includes:
- Google ranking history and competitor analysis
- Detection of broken links
- Uptime monitoring, meaning how often the website is offline
- Security checks
- External backups for 3 months
- Automatic reports by email
More on this in the post The advantages of a WordPress maintenance package.
