According to Patchstack's 2026 report, 91% of the 11,334 new vulnerabilities found in the WordPress ecosystem in 2025 were in plugins, and 46% had no fix by the time they were made public. That makes WordPress plugin updates the part of maintenance you can't skip. A careful round usually takes 2-3 hours, or around £200 if you pay someone to do it. The rest of the cost is licence renewals, a fix when an update breaks something, and clean-up when one is missed.
This article covers why plugin updates matter, how to run them safely, whether auto-updates are worth enabling, what the realistic cost looks like for a small business, and how to bring it down.
Why WordPress Plugin Updates Matter
Plugin updates matter because most security vulnerabilities in WordPress live in plugins. The Patchstack report covering 2025 found 11,334 new vulnerabilities across the WordPress ecosystem, up 42% on 2024: 91% in plugins, 9% in themes, and just six low-priority issues in WordPress core. Of those, 46% had no fix in time for public disclosure, so attackers can know about a flaw before a patch is available.
Speed matters too. Patchstack reports that about half of high-impact vulnerabilities are exploited within 24 hours, and its 2026 outlook warns that attackers are being equipped with AI "increasingly capable of autonomously finding and exploiting security vulnerabilities". WordPress core isn't immune either, as our guide to the WordPress 7.1.4 security flaw explains.
WordPress's own guidance is direct: "To keep your WordPress site secure, you should always update your plugins and themes to the latest version." Bug fixes and website performance improvements come with updates too. Security issues are the reason it cannot be deferred. Automated tools scan large numbers of sites for known vulnerabilities, so a WordPress site running outdated plugins doesn't stay unnoticed for long.
How to Update Plugins Safely
The safe way to handle WordPress plugin updates is to back up your site first, then update plugins one at a time and check the site after each one. WordPress itself says: "Before you get started, it's a good idea to back up your website."
In WP Admin, go to the plugins page and click "update now" under each plugin, or use the bulk actions menu to update several at once. Before running any update, read the changelog the plugin developer published - it flags breaking changes and compatibility notes. For important sites, test through a staging environment first, so that any plugin compatibility problem shows up before your visitors do.
Manual updates take longer but make it easy to identify which plugin caused a problem. Use a staging copy for anything that touches contact forms, checkout pages or core templates. Note what ran and when, so there is a clear trail if something goes wrong later.
Should You Turn On Auto-Updates?
Auto-updates are worth enabling if you have a tested backup and recovery process in place. Without that precondition, an update can break the site while nobody is watching. Plugin and theme auto-updates arrived in WordPress 5.5 and are opt-in, plugin by plugin. When enabled, WordPress runs automatic updates twice a day without any input from you.
The case for them is straightforward. Security fixes get applied quickly, and the window during which a known flaw can be exploited stays short. The WordPress documentation on plugin and theme auto-updates explains how to enable auto-updates for each plugin separately using the auto-update feature on the plugins list.
The auto-update drawbacks are real. An update can break site functionality while nobody is watching. If monitoring is not set up to flag a broken page, a customer may find it before you do. The WordPress documentation is clear on this point: make sure you can restore your backup before switching on automatic updates. A staging environment helps here too - testing before you enable auto-updates tells you quickly whether a given plugin handles them without a compatibility issue.
What Plugin Updates Cost a Small Business
Your Time
A careful round of updates on a reasonably up-to-date WordPress site - reading the changelogs, updating one plugin at a time, testing key pages after each - usually takes 2-3 hours, or around £200 if you pay someone to do it. We'd plan on at least one round a month, given how often vulnerabilities and updates now appear, which makes it around £2,400 a year. The more plugins you run, the longer each round takes, and the higher the chance of a compatibility issue that needs tracing.
Premium Plugin Licences
Many premium plugins deliver plugin updates through a paid licence that has to be kept active. Let that lapse and the plugin stops receiving new releases - including security patches. Licence renewals are a real part of the update cost, separate from the time spent running them.
When an Update Breaks Something
Plugin compatibility can break the site after an update. A plugin developer ships a release that conflicts with another plugin or the current WordPress version, and something stops working - a gallery, a form or a key page. Diagnosing what changed, rolling back and finding a resolution takes unplanned time.
Without a staging environment, that diagnosis happens on the live site. Up-to-date software generally means fewer security breaches, but compatibility issues are part of the trade-off. The more plugins are active, the more often you will encounter them.
When an Update Is Missed
A hacked site is the worst-case cost of a missed update. Known vulnerabilities are public, automated tools look for sites that haven't patched them, and the clean-up cost depends heavily on whether usable backups exist. For sites not on our platform, hacked website recovery generally costs around £300 when usable backups are available - it can cost more without them.
Our guide to signs your website has been hacked covers what to look for. Our hacked website recovery service covers what to do if you find something.
How to Cut the Cost of Plugin Updates
There are four practical steps that reduce the cost of WordPress plugin updates without increasing your security risk.
Remove Plugins You Don't Use
Deactivated plugins still carry security vulnerabilities if they are out of date. Go through the plugins page in your WP Admin area and delete anything you no longer need - deactivated does not mean safe. Fewer plugins means fewer updates, fewer licence renewals and fewer points where a compatibility issue can appear.
Keep Fewer, Well-Maintained Plugins
Not every plugin justifies its ongoing maintenance cost. Before adding one, check when the plugin developer last released an update and how many active installs it has. A plugin that has not shipped a release in two years is a risk worth replacing.
Test on a Staging Copy
A staging environment removes the risk of a compatibility issue hitting your live site. Run plugin updates there first, confirm the site functions correctly, then apply the same updates to production. The time cost of maintaining a staging copy is usually lower than diagnosing a broken live site.
Put Updates in Someone's Job Description
Plugin updates get skipped when they sit in nobody's job description. A WordPress maintenance plan - whether handled in-house or through a web company - puts the task in specific hands and keeps it on a regular schedule. Our guide to website maintenance costs covers what a maintenance plan typically includes.
How to Stop Paying for Plugin Updates
The only way to stop paying for plugin updates altogether is to run the site on a platform without third-party extensions. Whether that is the right call depends on your situation - staying on WordPress with a good update routine is a reasonable choice for many sites.
Our sites run on our own platform, which we built and maintain, so there are no third-party plugins to patch. We still apply security patches and updates to the platform itself, and that work is included in every plan. Moving to our platform is a rebuild, typically 4-6 weeks depending on how quickly you can give feedback. A brochure site is £2,500 + VAT. You keep ownership of your content, data and domain, and leave with a free static export if you want it.
Our managed websites page covers what each plan includes. Our website redesign service sets out what the rebuild process involves.
WordPress Plugin Update FAQs
If you want a managed website where security patches and updates are handled for you, see our managed websites plans or get in touch.
How often should I update WordPress plugins?
Run a full round of updates at least once a month, and apply anything marked as a security fix as soon as it lands. Patchstack reports that about half of high-impact vulnerabilities are exploited within 24 hours, so a security fix shouldn't wait for the monthly round.
Are WordPress auto-updates safe?
Auto-updates work well on many sites, but they can cause compatibility issues if an update conflicts with another plugin or the current WordPress version. The precondition is a working backup and restore process. Enable auto-updates only once you have confirmed you can roll back quickly if something breaks.
What happens if I never update plugins?
An unpatched plugin becomes a target once its vulnerability is made public. Patchstack found that 46% of WordPress vulnerabilities in 2025 had no fix by the time they were made public, so attackers can know about a flaw before a patch exists. A WordPress site running outdated plugins is exposed to security breaches for as long as updates are delayed.
Do plugin updates affect SEO?
Plugin updates aren't something to run for SEO in themselves. The risk runs the other way: a hacked or broken site can lose visitors and search visibility, so keeping plugin updates current is part of keeping the site in working order.
Callum Robley
Founder & Lead Developer, Tea Powered Projects
Callum is a full-stack developer and the founder of Tea Powered Projects, a web design, development, and hosting company based in Nottingham, UK. With over 15 years of industry experience, he specialises in building reliable, scalable digital solutions for businesses of all sizes.
