Feature availability: Smart Updates is a Deluxe feature on cPanel and a premium feature in Plesk. It must be licensed and enabled for the installation.
Smart Updates test proposed WordPress updates on a temporary clone before applying them to the production website.
What Smart Updates do
- Create a temporary copy of the WordPress installation.
- Analyze the clone and record the site's state.
- Apply the selected updates to the clone.
- Analyze the clone again.
- Compare the results and report potential problems such as PHP errors, HTTP errors, or other detected changes.
For manual updates, review the comparison and decide whether to apply the update to production. With automatic updates, WP Toolkit can withhold the production update when the test detects an issue caused by the update.
Smart Updates require enough disk space for a full temporary copy of the website.
Smart Updates are not backups. Maintain normal backups even when Smart Updates are enabled.
Panel navigation and availability: cPanel WP Toolkit feature guidance; Plesk WP Toolkit guide.
