In this blog post, We will show you how to Deactivate WordPress Plugins using FTP and Database phpMyAdmin. It is important to know how to deactivate WordPress plugins because sometimes when a buggy plugin causes your website to crash and you want to deactivate WordPress plugins but have no access to WordPress admin dashboard or Cpanel wp-admin area to do that.
No need to worry about that because in this detailed how-to blog post, We will walk you through a step-by-step guidance on how to deactivate WordPress plugins using FTP and Database phpMyAdmin. There are two methods that mostly used to deactivate plugins, one is using FTP, and the second is the Database phpMyAdmin area and it’s up to you which one is the easiest for you.
How to Deactivate WordPress Plugins Using FPT
Deactivating plugins through FTP is the easiest way when you don’t have access to your WordPress admin dashboard, or cPanel WP-Admin area. In this method, you will need FTP login details to access the Plugins area and deactivate.
To Deactivate WordPress Plugins Using FTP, We use the FTP Desktop client that enables you to connect to your hosting account from the Windows desktop. There are too many FTP clients but for now, we will use FileZilla Application which is a popular free FTP client for Windows, Mac, and Linux. Follow the below step-by-step guide to do that.
First of all, Launch the FileZilla application
Enter your FPT login details i.e. Host link, user name, password, and port, and then click on the Connect button.
Now, you will see the application start connecting to your host account, and after successfully login in, you will see your website data file manager in cPanel
Go to the website data folder, open the WP-Content folder
Inside the WP-Content Folder, you will see another folder called Plugins
All you need to do is, right-click on the Plugins folder, select rename, or simply press the F2 button from your keyboard and enter any name like plugins_rename or plugins.deactivate
Now, all the plugins will be deactivated.
Important! If you want to deactivate a specific plugin then don’t rename the plugins folder, just open it and you will see all the installed plugins folders there. Simply rename the plugin that you want to deactivate and you are good to go.
After renaming the plugins folder, if you open the WordPress dashboard, you will see that all your installed plugins have disappeared but not to worry; they are all there, and you can easily restore them by going back to the FTP Application FileZilla and renaming the plugins folder to its default i.e. plugins
After changing the plugin’s name to its default, go back to the WordPress dashboard page, and refresh the page. Now, you will see all the plugins are there and can be activated by clicking on Activate button.
How to Deactivate WordPress Plugins Using Database phpMyAdmin
Important! Before deactivating plugins through the database phpMyAdmin, make sure you have created a backup of your database which means if anything goes wrong with the database you can restore it from that backup.
Deactivating WordPress plugins through Database phpMyAdmin is another easiest way when you don’t have access to your admin dashboard or WP-Admin. Follow the below-given step-by-step guide to deactivate plugins using Database phpMyAdmin.
First of all, log in to your hosting cPanel, and click on phpMyAdmin under databases
Locate the WordPress database you want to edit. If you don’t know which database name belongs to your website, go to the website root folder inside the file manager and locate the file “wp-config.php”. Open the file, and see your database name inside the “DB_Name”
Select your database name from the left side and then click on the wp_options table
Locate the active_plugins option, and then click the Edit link inside it
For deactivating the plugins, clear the option_value content and change it to a:0:{}
Click on the Go button to save the changes.
Successfully, you’ve disabled all WordPress plugins through phpMyAdmin. You can go back to your WordPress Dashboard page, and you will see all the plugins are deactivated.
You may also like
How to Backup Your WordPress Website
How to Check Your WordPress Website PHP Version
