Install plugins or themes across sites in bulk

Bulk install lets you pick a plugin or theme from our catalog, pick the WordPress sites you want it installed on, and queue everything in one click — so you don't have to repeat the install flow site-by-site.

Where to find it

Open Plugins across sites (for plugins) or Themes across sites (for themes) from the main sidebar. The header has an Add plugin / Add theme button — click it to open the bulk install modal.

Picking what to install

The modal has two tabs:

• Premium Library — our 6,500+ catalog of GPL-redistributable premium plugins and themes. Searchable. Available on Developer and Agency plans only.
• WordPress.org — every plugin and theme in the wp.org directory. Free, available on every plan.

You can pick up to 10 items per submission (same cap as the per-site install modal). Switching tabs preserves your selection on each side, so you can pick a couple of premium plugins, then add a wp.org plugin, all from the same modal — but the submit fires one batch at a time per tab. Submit the Library tab, then re-open the modal and submit the WP.org tab if you need both sources.

Picking the target sites

The right rail shows every connected, top-level site you own. Use the search box to filter long fleets. Click Select all to pick all of them at once, or click each site's row to toggle. The footer counter shows how many install jobs the submission will create — for example, 3 plugins × 10 sites = 30 install jobs.

Multisite networks count as one entry — installing on the network parent puts the plugin in the shared filesystem and makes it available to every sub-blog. Sub-blogs aren't shown individually in the picker.

What happens after you click "Install"

• You're redirected back to the cross-site Plugins/Themes page with a progress strip at the top: queued / running / done / failed counts, refreshing every 30 seconds.
• Behind the scenes we create a parent BulkInstallBatch row, then asynchronously create individual install_jobs for every (site, plugin) combination. The HTTP request returns instantly; the row creation runs in a background worker.
• Each site's installs run through our normal per-site queue — the connector receives a chunk of three at a time, in parallel across sites. Installs from different sites parallelise; same-site installs serialise via a per-site lock.
• A 1000-site bulk takes roughly two hours end-to-end depending on plugin size and connector responsiveness.

Plan gating

• Free plan: can bulk-install WordPress.org plugins and themes across multiple sites. The Premium Library tab shows an upgrade nudge instead of the catalog.
• Developer / Agency: both tabs available, including the GPL Times catalog.

Notifications

One summary email per batch when every install in the batch reaches a terminal state — succeeded + failed counts. We do not send a per-install email; on a 1000-site batch that would mean 1000 inboxes worth of mail. The dashboard's batch progress strip shows per-site detail when you need it. Toggle the email on/off in Settings → Notifications.

What's NOT supported in bulk

• ZIP uploads — uploading a custom zip is per-site only. The single uploaded file would have to be replicated to every target site, which is a different infrastructure story (and not the common case). Use the per-site install modal for ZIP uploads.
• Mixed plugin + theme submissions — the modal is opened in plugin OR theme mode (the "Add plugin" button on /dashboard/plugins, "Add theme" on /dashboard/themes). To install both, submit two batches.

What if a site fails mid-batch?

The rest of the batch keeps going. Failed installs show up in the progress strip's failed count and in each affected site's history. Open a failing site to see the connector error message and retry from the per-site Install button.