How to deactivate WordPress plugins for troubleshooting

• Applies to: Grid
  • Difficulty: Easy
  • Time Needed: 10-20
  • Tools Required: Account Center access, FTP access, SSH access, or wp-admin access
• Applies to: Legacy DV & VPS Hosting
  • Difficulty: Easy
  • Time Needed: 10-20
  • Tools Required: Account Center access, FTP access, SSH access, or wp-admin access
• Applies to: VPS Hosting
  • Difficulty: Easy
  • Time Needed: 10-20
  • Tools Required: Account Center access, FTP access, SSH access, or wp-admin access
• Applies to: Managed WordPress
  • Difficulty: Easy
  • Time Needed: 10-20
  • Tools Required: Account Center access, FTP access, SSH access, or wp-admin access

Overview

One of the most useful aspects of building a site with WordPress are the thousands of third party plugins. There's a plugin for just about everything you might need to do. Unfortunately, this massive ecosystem of plugins also creates a lot of variation across items like versions and security. By far, the most commonly reported WordPress specific issues are plugin related.

Some common issues caused by plugins can include:

• Site showing up as a blank page
• Site is running slowly
• Site pages are showing error messages
• As well as other varying issues

The following article will provide information on how you can disable plugins as a means of troubleshooting WordPress issues.

Please keep in mind that troubleshooting the configuration/functionality of third-party applications is not covered by our statement of support. These resources were provided as a courtesy to assist you to the extent of our abilities. For more information on our statement of support, feel free to click here.

Instructions

wp-admin

1. Log into your wp-admin dashboard.Log into your wp-admin dashboard.Log into your wp-admin dashboard.Log into your wp-admin dashboard.
2. Click on Plugins.
   
   
   
   
3. Click on the top box to select all your plugins.
   
   
   
   
4. Click on the Bulk Action drop-down menu and select Deactivate. Then click Apply.
   
   
   
   
5. The page will refresh, and all your plugins will be disabled.

Alternatively you can select the plugins individually and deactivate them one at a time.

File Manager

1. Open your File Manager.Open your File Manager.
2. Navigate to your websites root folder.Navigate to your websites root folder.
3. Navigate to the /wp-content folder.
4. Select the /plugins folder. Then rename it to something like plugins.disable.
5. All your plugins will now be disabled.

Alternatively you navigate inside of the /plugins folder and rename the plugins individually to disable them one at a time.

FTP

1. Connect to your server via FTP.Connect to your server via FTP.Connect to your server via FTP.Connect to your server via FTP.
   In this example we are using FileZilla.
2. Navigate to your websites root folder.Navigate to your websites root folder.Navigate to your websites root folder.Navigate to your websites root folder.
3. Navigate to the /wp-content folder.
   
   
   
   
4. Select the /plugins folder. Then rename it to something like plugins.disable.
   
   
   
   
5. All your plugins will now be disabled.

Alternatively you navigate inside of the /plugins folder and rename the plugins individually to disable them one at a time.

SSH

1. Connect to your server via SSH.Connect to your server via SSH.Connect to your server via SSH.Connect to your server via SSH.
2. Navigate to your websites root folder.Navigate to your websites root folder.Navigate to your websites root folder.Navigate to your websites root folder.
3. Navigate to the /wp-content folder using the cd command.
   

   cd wp-content

4. Rename the /plugin folder using the mv command.
   

   mv plugin plugin.disable

5. All your plugins will now be disabled.

Alternatively you navigate inside of the /plugins folder and rename the plugins individually to disable them one at a time.