There are many plugins in the WordPress repository that help to add extra features to your website or blog. But sometimes the plugin can arise a problem in your site like 500 Internal Server Error and you may need to deactivate them.
If you are able to login to your WordPress site, you can easily deactivate the plugin. But if you are not able to login into your site, you can deactivate your WordPress plugin in diffrent ways.
This article will tell you different and easiest ways to deactivate the plugin from your WordPress site.
So let’s start …
Brief Descriptions of The Content
Disable Plugin from WordPress Dashboard
This is the easiest way to deactivate WordPress plugin. Just visit the Plugin page. Then click on Deactivate link that appears below the plugin name.

The plugin has been disabled. If you want to completely remove the plugin from your site, click on the Delete option. I will tell you below – how to uninstall the plugin from WordPress.
Disable all plugins from the WordPress Dashboard
If you want to disable multiple plugin or all installed plugin from your WordPress site at the same time, you can. Tick the checkbox that appears in front of the plugin. After this, select Deactivate from the drop-down menu and click Apply button.

After clicking on Apply button your selected plugin will be disabled.
Disable all WordPress Plugin by FTP
If you are unable to login to your site, you can disable the plugin by connecting your site to FTP.
First, connect your site to FTP. After connecting to FTP, click on the wp-content folder.

Inside the wp-content folder, you will see a Plugins folder. Right-click on this folder and rename it to plugins_old.

All the plugins installed on your WordPress site will be disabled. Now log in to your site. After successful login to your site, rename the plugin_old folder in the plugins again.

Go to your WordPress dashboard and manually activate the plugin that you need.
Disable a Single WordPress Plugin by FTP
If you want to deactivate a single plugin on your site, follow the process below.
First, click on wp-content >> plugins.

Find the folder of the plugin that you want to deactivate. Then right-click on the folder and rename it to something like plugins-name_old.

The individual plugin will be disabled on your WordPress site.
Disable all the plugins by cPanel
If you can not connect your site to FTP, you can also disable the plugin by visiting your hosting cPanel. This method is exactly like the above method (FTP Method).
- Login to the cPanel.
- Then click on the root directory (public_html or www) >> wp-content folder.
- Right-click on the Plugins folder and rename it to plugins_old.

All the plugins installed on your WordPress site will be disabled. After successfully, login to your site, rename the plugin_old folder in the plugins again.
Go to your WordPress dashboard and manually activate the plugin one by one that you need.
Disable Single WordPress Plugin by cPanel
If you want to deactivate an individual plugin, follow the process below.
- Click on wp-content >> plugins.
- Find the folder of the plugin that you want to deactivate.
- Right-click on the folder and rename the plugin’s folder to plugins-name_old.

The plugin will be disabled on your WordPress site.
What is the difference between Deactivating and Uninstalling
When you deactivate a plugin, it just disabled on your site. But remains installed on your site. You can activate it again later. You can check the Deactivate plugin by visiting Plugins >> Installed Plugin >> Inactive plugin page.

But when you uninstall a plugin, it is completely removed from your site. If you want to use that uninstall plugin again on your site, you have to install it again.
Should I keep deactivate plugins on my site
The short answer will be – NO
If you are not using a plugin, then you should not keep inactive or deactivated WordPress plugins installed on your website. Because they can weaken your site security. Hackers can install malware on your site or create a backdoor. Apart from this, they also increase your backup size.
That’s why I’ll recommend you to delete the inactive plugin from your site that you are not using.
How To Uninstall WordPress Plugin
Uninstalling a plugin from WordPress is very easy. Login to your WordPress site and go to the plugin page. Here you will see a list of installed plugins.
To uninstall a plugin, first, deactivate the plugin. After deactivating the plugin, click the Delete link. As you can see in the screenshot,

WordPress will confirm that you want to delete the plugin. Just, click on OK button. WordPress will uninstall the plugin from your website.
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