You finally update the plugin WordPress has been reminding you about for three weeks. The update completes successfully and your website immediately stops working.
Naturally, the first conclusion is that updating WordPress is a terrible idea and nothing should ever be touched again.
Unfortunately, ignoring updates creates a completely different set of problems. The better approach is to understand what changed, restore stability and then work out why the update caused trouble.
Should I roll back a WordPress plugin update?
Usually, yes, if you’ve confirmed the plugin update caused the problem and you have a known-good version to return to. Rolling the plugin back can be a sensible way to restore your website, but it should normally be treated as a temporary recovery step rather than the final solution.
Once the website is stable again, the next step is to work out why the update caused a problem and whether there is a newer version or another fix available.
Confirm that the plugin update caused the problem
If the website was working immediately before the update and failed immediately afterwards, the connection is fairly convincing.
Make a note of which plugin was updated, the version you updated from, the version you updated to and what part of the website stopped working.
If you updated several plugins at the same time, things are naturally a little harder to isolate.
It is also useful to understand what kind of problem the update created. The whole website might be offline, WordPress may show a critical error, the styling might look wrong or one particular feature may have stopped working.
Those symptoms can point towards different causes.
If the problem is visual rather than a complete outage, clear the relevant caches before doing anything more significant. A plugin may have changed CSS or JavaScript while an old cached version is still being served.
Why can a plugin update break a WordPress website?
A plugin does not operate in isolation. It has to work alongside WordPress, your theme, other plugins, your PHP version and any custom code running on the site.
An update can expose a compatibility problem that was not obvious before.
The updated plugin could be conflicting with your theme, another plugin, your PHP version, custom code, a WooCommerce extension or an outdated template.
That does not necessarily mean the plugin update itself is bad. Sometimes an update changes how something works or removes support for something that has been outdated for some time.
This is one reason why regular, controlled maintenance tends to be safer than leaving dozens of plugins untouched for a year and then updating everything at once.
When does rolling back make sense?
If you’ve established that the latest plugin version caused the problem, temporarily reverting to the previous stable version can be a sensible way to get the website working again.
It is particularly useful when the website worked before the update, the problem appeared immediately afterwards and you have a known-good previous version available.
However, rolling back does not necessarily fix the underlying problem.
If the newer version contains an important security or compatibility fix, leaving the older version installed indefinitely is not a good solution. The aim should be to understand what caused the conflict and find a way to update safely.
A rollback should normally be a temporary recovery step rather than the final fix.
Don’t immediately restore the entire website
If one plugin update has caused a problem, you do not necessarily need to restore the entire website from a backup.
Restoring everything could also undo changes made since the backup was taken. Depending on the website, that could include new content, form submissions, customer registrations, WooCommerce orders or other database changes.
If the problem is isolated to one plugin, it is often better to deal with that plugin rather than roll the entire website backwards.
A recent backup is still extremely important. Ideally, you should have a reliable backup before making significant changes to a live WordPress website.
What if WordPress is showing a critical error?
If you see a message such as:
There has been a critical error on this website.
The plugin update may have caused a PHP error that is preventing WordPress from running normally.
If you still have access to the WordPress dashboard, you may be able to deactivate the plugin that caused the problem.
If you cannot access the dashboard, the plugin can sometimes be disabled through your hosting control panel, file manager or FTP by temporarily renaming its plugin folder.
If you are not comfortable working with your site’s files, this is a good point to stop and get help rather than making further changes to a live website.
What should you check before rolling a plugin back?
Before reverting the plugin, it is worth checking whether the problem is already known.
Look at the plugin changelog and see what changed in the version you installed. There may already be a newer release that fixes the problem.
It is also worth checking the plugin developer’s support information. If it is a plugin from the WordPress.org directory, there may be recent reports from other users experiencing the same issue.
You should also check your WordPress and PHP versions. The new plugin version may have introduced different requirements, or the update may have exposed an existing compatibility problem.
Finally, consider what else changed. If WordPress, your theme and several plugins were all updated at the same time, do not automatically assume the first plugin you noticed is responsible.
How do you roll back a WordPress plugin?
The safest approach depends on the plugin, your hosting setup and what access you have.
Some plugins provide their own rollback functionality, while previous versions of WordPress.org plugins may be available through the plugin repository. There are also tools that can help restore an earlier version of a plugin.
If you have a staging website, rolling the plugin back there first is preferable. You can investigate the problem without experimenting directly on the live website.
If you do not have staging, make sure you have a reliable backup before making further changes.
What should you do after rolling the plugin back?
Once the previous version is installed, check that the important parts of the website are working again.
That might include your homepage, contact forms, login area, WooCommerce checkout, payment process, search and any important integrations.
If everything is working again, you have a good indication that the newer plugin version was involved.
The next step is to investigate why.
Check whether a newer version of the plugin has been released, look at the developer’s support information and check for compatibility problems with your theme, other plugins, PHP version or custom code.
If you have a staging environment, this is a good place to test the newer version again.
What if the plugin update wasn’t actually the problem?
Sometimes the timing can be misleading.
A website can break immediately after a plugin update even though the update was not the underlying cause.
For example, the update might have caused a particular piece of code to run that exposed an existing problem elsewhere on the website.
This is particularly common on larger WordPress websites where plugins, themes and custom functionality interact with each other.
If you are troubleshooting a conflict, it is usually better to make one change at a time and test the result rather than deactivating or updating several things at once.
That makes it much easier to identify what is actually causing the problem.
How can you avoid plugin updates breaking your website?
You cannot guarantee that an update will never cause a problem, but there are sensible ways to reduce the risk.
Keep regular backups and make sure they can actually be restored.
Avoid updating a large number of plugins at the same time where possible. Updating smaller groups makes it easier to identify the cause if something goes wrong.
For important websites, use a staging environment to test updates before applying them to the live site.
It is also important to keep WordPress, plugins, themes and PHP reasonably up to date. Leaving everything untouched for years does not make future updates safer. It usually makes them harder.
If the website handles payments, bookings or other important transactions, check the actual customer journey after an update rather than simply checking whether the homepage loads.
For a WooCommerce website, that means checking the product page, basket, checkout, payment process and confirmation.
Should you stop updating WordPress if an update breaks your site?
No.
A broken update can be frustrating, but it is not a good reason to stop maintaining the website.
Plugin updates can include important security fixes as well as bug fixes and new functionality. Leaving an outdated plugin in place indefinitely can create a different set of problems.
The answer is managed updates rather than no updates.
Keep backups, make changes in a controlled way, investigate conflicts when they happen and do not leave known problems unresolved.
Need help with a broken WordPress website?
If a plugin update has broken your WordPress website and you are not sure whether to roll it back, fix a conflict or restore a backup, avoid making lots of changes at once.
The more things you change, the harder it becomes to work out what actually caused the problem.
At Upkeep, we help businesses troubleshoot WordPress websites, deal with broken updates and keep existing websites maintained.
If something has gone wrong after a plugin update, tell us what changed and what you are seeing. We can help work out the safest route back to a working website and, where possible, identify what needs fixing so the same problem does not happen again.
