How to Disable WordPress Plugins in 2023 (3 Step-by-Step Methods)

WordPress plugins are a blessing and a curse. On one hand, the right plugins can add powerful features to your website with a few clicks. Great plugins let you easily create an online store, add forms, optimize your images, improve SEO, and much more.

On the flip side, too many plugins can cause issues with your WordPress site, such as:

  • Slowing down your site speed and increasing load times
  • Introducing bugs, glitches, and errors
  • Causing conflicts with your WordPress theme or other plugins
  • Creating privacy or security vulnerabilities if not properly updated

In fact, a study by WP Engine found that 44% of WordPress sites use outdated plugins with known vulnerabilities. And the average WordPress site uses 25 plugins, so the risk adds up quickly.

That‘s why it‘s important to be judicious about which plugins you install. Only choose ones you really need from reputable developers. It‘s also critical to keep your plugins up to date and regularly audit your site to remove any unnecessary ones.

👍 Pro tip: Use a tool like Plugin Detective to scan your WordPress site for old or vulnerable plugins.

But sometimes, even after careful curation, you may still need to temporarily disable one or more plugins. Here are some common reasons:

  • Troubleshooting errors or performance issues
  • Resolving conflicts between plugins
  • Preparing for a major WordPress version update
  • Checking if a specific plugin is causing a problem
  • Pausing plugin functionality that you don‘t currently need

Fortunately, deactivating WordPress plugins is fairly straightforward. There are three main methods, which we‘ll walk through step-by-step.

Method 1: Disable Plugins from the WordPress Dashboard

The easiest way to disable plugins is directly through your WordPress admin dashboard. This works if you‘re able to log in to the backend of your site. Follow these steps:

  1. Log in to your WordPress dashboard by going to yourdomain.com/wp-admin
  2. Hover over Plugins in the left sidebar and click Installed Plugins
  3. You‘ll now see a list of all plugins installed on your site. To deactivate a single plugin, click the Deactivate link beneath its name.
  4. To disable multiple plugins at once, tick the checkboxes next to each plugin you want to deactivate. Then choose Deactivate from the Bulk Actions dropdown and click Apply.

After deactivating plugins, you‘ll get a success message and the plugins will appear under a separate Inactive section on the page.

If you change your mind later, you can always reactivate the plugins by clicking the Activate links. No plugin settings or data will be lost.

📊 By the numbers: According to WordPress.org, the average WordPress site has 25 plugins installed. However, many of those are not actively used. Experts recommend keeping the number of plugins on your site under 20 to avoid performance and security issues.

When to Use the WordPress Dashboard Method

Deactivating plugins through your WordPress admin area is the go-to approach in most cases. It‘s quick, easy, and doesn‘t require any technical knowledge.

The only catch is that you need to be able to access your WordPress dashboard. If a plugin error or conflict is preventing you from logging in, you‘ll need to use one of the other methods below.

Method 2: Disable Plugins via FTP

If you can‘t access your WordPress dashboard, the next best way to disable plugins is via FTP (File Transfer Protocol). This involves connecting to your website‘s server and renaming the plugins folder so WordPress can‘t find and load it.

Here‘s how to deactivate plugins via FTP:

  1. Connect to your WordPress site using an FTP client like FileZilla. You‘ll need your FTP hostname, username, and password, which you can get from your web host.

  2. Once connected, navigate to your WordPress root directory. This is usually called public_html, www, or named after your site.

  3. Open the wp-content folder.

  4. Locate the plugins folder and right-click to rename it. You can use any name, but we recommend something obvious like plugins.deactivate or plugins.old.

  5. After renaming, refresh your FTP client to make sure the change was successfully made.

That‘s it! By changing the plugins folder name, WordPress will deactivate all plugins on your site. When you visit the Plugins area of your dashboard, you‘ll see error messages that the plugin files are missing – this is normal.

If you want to reactivate the plugins later, simply rename the folder back to plugins. Then head to your Plugins dashboard screen and reactivate the plugins you want to use again.

Selectively Disabling Plugins via FTP

What if you only want to disable one specific plugin instead of all of them? You can do this with FTP by changing the folder name of an individual plugin.

  1. After connecting to your server, navigate to /wp-content/plugins/

  2. Locate the folder for the plugin you want to deactivate. It will be named after the plugin.

  3. Right-click the plugin folder and rename it, appending .old or .deactivate like plugin-name.old

  4. Refresh FTP and you‘re all set. Only that single plugin will be deactivated.

Just remember to rename the plugin folder back to original to reactivate it later.

When to Use the FTP Method

The FTP approach is handy when you can‘t log in to WordPress admin. Common reasons for this include:

  • A plugin conflict causing the white screen of death (WSOD)
  • Accidentally activating a defective or incompatible plugin that breaks your dashboard access
  • Needing to deactivate a plugin on a client site you don‘t have login access for

In general, if the WordPress admin method doesn‘t work, FTP is the next best solution. However, it requires having FTP access to your server and feeling comfortable using FTP software.

Method 3: Disable Plugins via phpMyAdmin

The final way to disable WordPress plugins is by editing your WordPress database via phpMyAdmin. This method is the most technical and should only be used as a last resort.

⚠️ Warning: Making changes to your WordPress database can break your site if not done properly. Attempt this only if you‘re comfortable with MySQL and be sure to backup your database first.

With that caution out of the way, here‘s how to disable plugins with phpMyAdmin:

  1. Log in to your WordPress hosting control panel and open phpMyAdmin, or access it directly via phpMyAdmin URL provided by your host.

  2. Choose your WordPress database from the left-hand menu. If you only have one site, it will likely be called something like wp or wordpress.

  3. Click on the wpoptions table in the center panel, where wp may be replaced by your unique table prefix.

  4. In the options table, find the active_plugins field and click Edit.

  5. You‘ll see a list of activated plugin files in the option_value field, surrounded by brackets like ["plugin1/plugin1.php","plugin2/plugin2.php"].

  6. Delete the entire list of plugins, but leave the [] brackets intact. This tells WordPress there are no active plugins.

  7. Click Go to save your changes.

All plugins are now deactivated on your WordPress site. When you go back to your Plugins screen, you‘ll see error messages that the plugin files are missing. This is fine.

To reactivate plugins after using this method, go to the Plugins page and click to activate them individually. You don‘t need to re-add the plugin names to the database field. WordPress will automatically repopulate that list when you reactive via the dashboard.

When to Use the phpMyAdmin Method

Editing your WordPress database directly to disable plugins should be saved for emergencies. It‘s the most complicated and risky method.

Consider this approach only if:

  • The WordPress dashboard and FTP methods both fail
  • You‘re locked out of WordPress admin and don‘t have FTP access to the server
  • There‘s a severe plugin conflict and you need to deactivate plugins as quickly as possible

Even then, proceed with caution. One wrong move editing the database could corrupt your entire WordPress installation. When possible, hire an experienced WordPress developer to make the changes for you.

Tips for Disabling WordPress Plugins Safely

Whichever method you use, keep these best practices in mind to avoid issues:

  • ✅ Always make a full backup of your WordPress site before deactivating plugins, especially if using the FTP or phpMyAdmin methods.
  • ✅ If troubleshooting, deactivate plugins one at a time to isolate the problem. Reactivate plugins until you find the one causing the issue.
  • ✅ After deactivating a plugin, clear your browser and server caches to remove any lingering files. You may also want to run a database optimization to clean up plugin tables.
  • ✅ Test your site thoroughly after disabling plugins to make sure everything still works. Check your most important pages and test key functions like forms, shopping carts, etc.
  • ✅ If you run into trouble, don‘t panic. Breath, retrace your steps, and consult the plugin documentation or support. If needed, hire a WordPress pro to fix any lingering issues.

🔍 Case study: Kinsta, a leading WordPress hosting provider, had a client site that went down after deactivating a plugin via FTP. It turned out the plugin removed some custom database tables when deactivated, corrupting the site. Kinsta‘s support team was able to restore the site from a backup and reconfigure the plugin settings to avoid the issue.

Best Practices to Minimize the Need for Disabling Plugins

The need to abruptly deactivate plugins often stems from larger issues with how those plugins were chosen and managed. Some best practices to avoid this:

  • 🔎 Research plugins thoroughly before installing. Check the reviews, ratings, support threads, and update history. Avoid plugins that are abandoned or not actively maintained.
  • 🔄 Keep your plugins up to date. Old versions are more likely to have bugs or incompatibilities. Many quality plugins let you turn on auto-updates.
  • 🧹 Regularly audit your plugins and remove any that are no longer needed. There‘s no reason to keep unused plugins around.
  • 🧪 Test new plugins on a staging copy of your site before activating on your live site, if possible. If not, at least test after hours when traffic is low.
  • ⚙️ Adjust plugin settings to avoid conflicts. Some plugins can be limited to certain user roles, post types, etc. Configuring intentionally can prevent future issues.
  • 📈 Monitor your site performance before and after adding new plugins. Tools like Query Monitor and P3 Profiler can help pinpoint plugins that slow your site.

🏆 Level up: Once your site reaches a certain level of traffic and complexity, it‘s wise to hire a professional WordPress developer to audit and optimize your plugins. A pro can find issues and opportunities that you may miss.

Conclusion

WordPress plugins can add valuable features to your site, but they can also cause problems if not properly managed. Knowing how to safely deactivate plugins is an important skill for any WordPress user.

To recap, here are the three main methods to disable WordPress plugins:

  1. Via the WordPress dashboard (go to Plugins > Installed Plugins and click Deactivate links)
  2. Via FTP (connect to your server, navigate to the plugins folder, and rename it)
  3. Via phpMyAdmin (log into phpMyAdmin, edit the active_plugins field in the wp_options table)

Be sure to follow best practices like backing up your site and testing thoroughly after making changes. Whenever possible, use the WordPress dashboard method. Only attempt the FTP or phpMyAdmin approaches if absolutely necessary.

Ultimately, the best way to deal with problematic plugins is to avoid them in the first place. Be selective about which plugins you install. Look for ones with excellent reviews and active support. Regularly update them and remove any plugins you no longer need.

👋 Need help cleaning up your WordPress plugins or troubleshooting a plugin conflict? Our expert WordPress developers are here to help! Contact us today for a free consultation.

Similar Posts