Drazen

<p>Update Compass is a decision-first WordPress admin plugin that helps you evaluate plugin and theme updates before installing them.</p>
<p>Instead of only showing that an update is available, Update Compass adds a local analysis layer and recommends what to do next based on version changes, compatibility metadata, changelog signals, and release timing.</p>
<p>It keeps the native WordPress update workflow. Updates are still performed through standard WordPress update mechanisms.</p>
<h3>How It Works</h3>
<p>WordPress already detects updates. Update Compass reads that data and adds decision guidance such as:</p>
<ul>
<li>Update Ready</li>
<li>Stage & Test</li>
<li>Watch & Wait</li>
<li>Hold Off</li>
<li>Needs Review</li>
</ul>
<p>Each status includes a short explanation and next-step guidance. For higher-risk updates, users can open status details for deeper analysis and reminder scheduling.</p>
<h3>Key Features</h3>
<ul>
<li>Pre-update risk analysis for plugins and themes</li>
<li>Clear status badges with explanations and next steps</li>
<li>Version jump analysis (major, minor, patch deltas)</li>
<li>WordPress compatibility checks (<code>requires</code> / <code>tested</code>)</li>
<li>Changelog keyword detection (best effort)</li>
<li>Changelog links (WordPress.org modal/external links when available)</li>
<li>Reminder dates for monitoring and re-check workflows</li>
<li>Bulk update selection with caution confirmation for non-ready updates</li>
<li>Local-first workflow, no external account required</li>
</ul>
<h3>Who Is This For</h3>
<ul>
<li>WordPress developers</li>
<li>Agencies maintaining multiple sites</li>
<li>Site owners managing complex plugin/theme stacks</li>
<li>WooCommerce or multilingual sites where update risk is higher</li>
</ul>
<h3>Decision Logic (Summary)</h3>
<p>Update Compass uses local rules to assess update risk, including:</p>
<ul>
<li>Version delta analysis (major/minor/patch jumps)</li>
<li>WordPress compatibility metadata checks</li>
<li>Changelog keyword signals (when changelog text is available)</li>
<li>Release recency and stale-project checks</li>
<li>Changelog availability (flags manual review when missing)</li>
</ul>
<h3>External Services</h3>
<p>Update Compass is local-first and does not require an account.</p>
<p>To improve changelog-based reasoning, it may make server-side requests to publicly available changelog/metadata endpoints when available (for example WordPress.org plugin/theme metadata and changelog pages, or vendor-provided changelog URLs exposed in WordPress update data).</p>
<p>This is best-effort only and used to enrich analysis. Core update detection still relies on WordPress native update transients.</p>


Update Compass

Stop guessing when to update. Analyze plugin and theme updates before installing them with clear status guidance and next steps.

Nahid Ferdous Mohit

<p>Make sure your theme and plugins are tested before updating WordPress.</p>
<h3>Backstory</h3>
<p>Recently, WordPress 5.3 came out which included quite a good number of outstanding improvements. I was excited and updated few of my installations only to find out that some of them ran into fatal errors.  Upon investigation, I discovered some plugins which were conflicting simply because they were not tested and incompatible with the update. I wondered, only if there was a plugin which could warn me about plugins or themes that might have not been tested, just before I tried to run updates.</p>
<p>Thus, I decided to build <strong><em>Safe Updates</em></strong>, a small nifty WordPress plugin which lets you know if there are any plugin or theme on your installation that might have not been tested with the target WordPress version before you try to update.</p>
<h3>Use Cases</h3>
<p>The use case of this plugin is very straight-forward. It just gives you an idea about untested plugins or themes that may be untested with the updated WordPress versions and helps you be cautious for conflicts and errors.</p>
<h3>Core Features</h3>
<p>The core features of this plugin include:</p>
<ol>
<li>Display active plugin(s) that might have not been tested with the target WordPress version.</li>
<li>Show if the current theme has not been tested with the target WordPress version.</li>
</ol>
<h3>Notes</h3>
<p>Some notes to consider while using this plugin:</p>
<ol>
<li>The interface only shows up when a core update is available.</li>
<li>A plugin/theme author might choose <strong>not to</strong> disclose the WordPress version up to which it might have been tested up to. In such a case, a plugin/theme might still be incompatible with the targetted update, but <strong><em>Safe Updates</em></strong> might not show it if its author didn’t disclose its tested up to version.</li>
</ol>
<h3>Installation</h3>
<p>Installation of the <strong>Safe Updates</strong> plugin is very simple. Follow along with the installation procedure in the dedicated <a href="#installation" rel="nofollow ugc"><strong>Installation</strong> tab</a>.</p>
<h3>Usage</h3>
<ol>
<li><a href="#installation" rel="nofollow ugc">Install</a> and activate the plugin</li>
<li>Go to <em>WP Admin <span aria-hidden="true" class="wp-exclude-emoji">→</span> Dashboard <span aria-hidden="true" class="wp-exclude-emoji">→</span> Updates</em>.</li>
<li>If a WordPress update is available, this plugin will add an interface above the <strong>“Update”</strong> button which shows if any of your theme or plugins have not been tested with the target WordPress version.</li>
</ol>
<h3>Support</h3>
<p>If the above usage steps don’t answer your question(s), if you want to report an issue or if something is not working as expected, please create a topic in the <a href="https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/safe-updates/" rel="ugc">Support Forum</a> or <a href="https://github.com/nfmohit/safe-updates/issues/new/choose" rel="nofollow ugc">create an issue on GitHub</a>.</p>
<h3>Contribute</h3>
<p>If you want to contribute to the plugin by reporting issues, implementing new features and so on, <a href="https://github.com/nfmohit/safe-updates" rel="nofollow ugc">here’s its development repository on Github</a>.</p>
<h3>Credits</h3>
<p>The interface design of this plugin is heavily inspired by the <a href="https://github.com/wpmudev/shared-ui" rel="nofollow ugc">Shared UI</a> from <a href="https://premium.wpmudev.org/" rel="nofollow ugc">WPMU DEV</a> (Yes, you got that right! I currently work there, we’re a wonderful company and <a href="https://incsub.com/careers/" rel="nofollow ugc">we’re hiring</a>!)</p>
<h3>Sponsor</h3>
<p>You can sponsor this project and support my open-source development by <a href="https://www.patreon.com/nfmohit" rel="nofollow ugc">becoming a Patron</a>!</p>


Safe Updates

Make sure your theme and plugins are tested before updating WordPress.

Update Compass vs Safe Updates