As a WordPress blog owner, you’ll eventually need to deal with updates—especially those important security updates. It might seem like automating these updates is the easiest and most convenient choice, but is it really the best option?
In reality, it’s not as straightforward as it seems. Your blog’s security should be a top priority, and keeping it safe isn’t a one-time task. It requires constant monitoring for vulnerabilities and fixing issues before hackers can take advantage of them.
So, let’s break down the pros and cons of automatic WordPress updates to help you figure out if it’s the right move for your online business.
Understanding Automatic Updates in WordPress
Automatic updates in WordPress are a handy feature that takes care of installing new versions of essential files to keep your website safe and running smoothly.
With WordPress constantly evolving, updates are a key part of ongoing maintenance. They provide security patches, bug fixes, and performance improvements. Without them, your site could start slowing down and, worse, become vulnerable to hackers looking to exploit outdated software.
While you can always manage updates manually, enabling automatic updates gives you a “set-it-and-forget-it” solution, ensuring your site stays secure and optimized without you needing to lift a finger.
Different Types of WordPress Updates
WordPress updates are essential for keeping your site secure, optimized, and running smoothly. There are several types of updates you’ll encounter, each serving a different purpose:
Core Updates
These are the main updates to the WordPress software itself. Core updates come in two forms: major and minor. Major updates introduce new features and significant improvements, while minor updates typically focus on security patches and bug fixes.
Theme Updates
If you’re using a WordPress theme, it will occasionally require updates to stay compatible with the latest version of WordPress. These updates can also bring new design features, fix bugs, and enhance performance.
Plugin Updates
Plugins add extra functionality to your WordPress site, but they also need updates. Plugin updates often address security vulnerabilities, improve compatibility with the latest WordPress version, and provide new features or enhancements.
Translation File Updates
For websites using multiple languages, translation file updates ensure that any newly added features or sections are properly translated, keeping the user experience seamless for visitors across different languages.
Library Updates
WordPress relies on external libraries like jQuery to function. These libraries may receive updates for performance improvements, bug fixes, or security patches, which WordPress integrates to ensure your site functions as expected.
Cons of Automatic WordPress Updates
While automatic WordPress updates might seem convenient, there are some serious downsides you should consider:
Potential Loss of Traffic
When you automate your updates, everything happens in the background—this means you, as the website admin, may lose track of the changes being made. You might think, “So what?” but here’s the issue: if an update introduces a feature or plugin that isn’t compatible with the rest of your site, you could face problems.
For example, imagine an update that requires certain prerequisites that your website hasn’t met. This can lead to dreaded “ERROR” screens on some of your pages, causing you to lose traffic. And, as we all know, losing traffic means losing potential customers or readers.
Risk of Your Site Crashing
Crashes aren’t always caused by bad hosting. A common myth is that a dedicated server will solve everything, but that’s not always the case. Automatic updates can trigger a crash, especially if an older plugin or add-on conflicts with a new WordPress core update.
Just one incompatible plugin could bring your entire site down, leaving you scrambling to get it back up. This is why many WordPress experts caution against relying on automatic updates.
Possible Data Loss
Now, if your site does crash, the first thing you’ll be hoping for is a recent backup. Fixing a WordPress crash isn’t always quick—you’ll need to figure out exactly what caused it, which can take time. Without a backup, you could lose not only your content but also critical customer data.
During this downtime, your website will be inaccessible, and all your traffic will grind to a halt. Plus, restoring everything to its previous state will depend entirely on how recent your last backup was. No backup? Big problem.
Pros of Automatic WordPress Updates
Enhanced Security
If there’s one key reason to enable automatic updates on your WordPress site, it’s to keep your website secure. Being the most widely used CMS, powering over 43% of all websites, WordPress is a popular target for hackers.
Sites running outdated versions of WordPress, themes, or plugins are prime targets because security flaws in older versions are easier to exploit. Hackers can take advantage of these vulnerabilities to gain unauthorized access, steal data, or even damage your website.
While security plugins are useful, they’re not foolproof. By enabling automatic updates, you ensure that the latest security patches are applied to your site as soon as they’re available, effectively closing off potential backdoors to hackers.
Bug Fixes and Performance Improvements
When it comes to website performance, speed is crucial—both for user experience and search engine rankings. According to Google, 61% of users will leave a site if they can’t find what they’re looking for quickly. Even if your site is fast, a small bug in your theme, plugin, or core files can impact functionality, resulting in a frustrating experience that drives visitors away.
This is another reason why automatic updates are so valuable. Whenever a performance improvement or bug fix is released, it’s instantly applied to your site. This ensures your website is always running smoothly without you having to worry about missing a crucial update.
Convenience
Let’s face it—managing a website takes a lot of time and effort. Between keeping the design fresh, producing content, optimizing for SEO, and converting visitors into customers, the last thing you want to do is spend hours checking for updates.
When you automate the process, you don’t need to worry about missing an update. Your site stays up to date with minimal effort, allowing you to focus on growing your website in other ways. It’s like having a personal assistant for your site maintenance, freeing up your time and energy for more important tasks.
Wrapping Up
After learning the pros and cons, it’s clear that automatic WordPress updates have both advantages and drawbacks.
On the upside, automatic updates save you time and ensure your website stays secure and up-to-date, even when you’re not actively monitoring it. However, the approach discussed in the above blog can sometimes lead to problems like compatibility issues, bugs, or even the risk of overwriting custom code without you realizing it.
That said, regularly updating your WordPress site is one of the most basic and essential security practices. Ignoring updates can leave your site vulnerable to attacks. If you’re concerned about spending too much time managing updates, using a single dashboard to update all your websites in one place can be a great solution to simplify the process.
