You can manage your WordPress website by using the WordPress Dashboard. The Dashboard allows you to install plugins and themes, but also also allows you to automatically update your WordPress website.
If for some reason your WordPress Dashboard is unavailable, you can manually your WordPress website using sFTP. This article shows you how.
First you need to download the latest version of WordPress. The latest version is always available from the Download page on the WordPress website.
Download and unzip the latest version of WordPress to a folder on your computer. Next, use sFTP software to view your website's files.
For Windows users we recommend using Filezilla; for macOS users Cyberduck is a great choice.
In this article we will be using Filezilla. The steps are similar when using Cyberduck.
Once you're connected to Filezilla, you will find your local files on the left hand side and the files of your current WordPress website on the right hand side.
On the left hand side, navigate to the folder where you unzipped the folders and files from the WordPress Download page. On the right hand side, click on the 'www' folder. Your Filezilla window should look like the image below.
In order to update your WordPress website, you will need to transfer your local WordPress folders and files on the left to the current WordPress website on the right.
You can do this by selecting the folders and files on the left hand side and dragging them to the folders and files to the right. Filezilla will show a prompt telling you that these files already exist. Now check the box next to 'Always use this action' and click on 'OK'.
You might have noticed that the local folder contains less files than the folder of your website. The wp-config.php file is not present in your local files, as it contains specific information for your website. For this reason you will not have to overwrite this file.
Take note that following these steps will only overwrite the WordPress-installation with the latest version of WordPress. Existing plugins and themes will not be affected this way.
Filezilla will notify you once the upload is finished. Once the upload is complete, you WordPress website will be updated to the latest version.
Should you have any questions left regarding this article, do not hesitate to contact our support department. You can reach them via the 'Contact us' button at the bottom of this page.
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