WordPress Hacks: Bulk Installing Plugins

Whether you’re a WordPress Web Designer, or someone who builds WordPress sites for yourself, I’m sure you would agree that even using WordPress to build a site can be time consuming.

Wouldn’t it be great if there was a WordPress Hack that cut down time for setting things up, but didn’t cut the corners on quality? Well, good news fellas (gals too!), there is, and I’d love to share it with you.

Bulk Installing Plugins

Let’s face it – installing plugins can be a real pain! Even when you have in mind exactly which plugins you want to use, the fact that you have to install each one individually is a time consuming and tedious task that no one likes doing.

Thankfully, there is a way to save some time in this aspect of your designs. How? By bulk installing you favorite WordPress plugins of course!

The service I often use to do this is the WP Install Profiles Plugin (WPIP).

How To Bulk Install Plugins Using WP Installs Profiles

It may sound a little strange using a plugin to install other plugins, but trust me, this is golden. The only small downside to this is that it takes a little bit to set it up the first time. However, you only have to do this once and you can save the Profile, as they call it, to use again and again.

First, download and install the WP Install Profiles Plugin. After you activate it, go to the plugin’s Setting page. There you will find a screen like the one pictured below.

To choose the plugins that you would like to install on your site, you’ll need to go to the WordPress Plugin Directory. Next, look up the name of your desired plugins, and then copy ONLY the name (hyphens and all) of the plugin that you’ll find in its URL.

Paste the name you copied into the “Install These Plugins” area that is located in the Settings area of the WP Install Profiles plugin. Next,  just repeat this process until you have all the plugins that you’d like to install – be sure to put one name per line or things won’t work right.

Now, give your list a name and click the green button that says “Download Plugins And Save Profile”, and then wait for things to download. After that, all your desired plugins will be downloaded on to your site.

Just a couple notes on the WPIP plugin:

Even though the plugins you choose will all download rather quickly, you’ll still need to go to the plugins page to activate them. Also, you can only download plugins that are available from WordPress.org and not those from external sites. Even with these steps included, I’ve still found that this one trick still saves me a ton of time.

If you’d like to use the profile you just created on another site, simply go to the plugin’s website and set up a free account. Then, go back the to Bulk Install Settings area in your Dashboard, and go to Export Profiles. You will then need to click on the profile you’ve just created, which will start to download, and then you’ll upload that to your new account to just created on the site.

To use the profile in the future, you’ll just need to download the plugin on your new site and then enter your username in the settings area.

Have a favorite bulk installation method? Comment below.