Title: Can't Deactivate Plugins Last modified: August 20, 2016 --- # Can't Deactivate Plugins * [thehappycactus](https://wordpress.org/support/users/thehappycactus/) * (@thehappycactus) * [13 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/) * When I click “Deactivate” under any of my plugins I receive the message saying“ Plugin deactivated”, but it still stays on my Active list, and I can tell that it’s still working. * I’m the blog’s admin, so permissions shouldn’t be a problem. * Any ideas as to why this might be happening? * Thanks! Viewing 8 replies - 1 through 8 (of 8 total) * [esmi](https://wordpress.org/support/users/esmi/) * (@esmi) * [13 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/#post-3222754) * Have you tried: * – deactivating **all** plugins to see if this resolves the problem. If this works, re-activate the plugins one by one until you find the problematic plugin(s). * – switching to the Twenty Eleven theme to rule out any theme-specific problems. * – [resetting the plugins folder](http://codex.wordpress.org/FAQ_Troubleshooting#How_to_deactivate_all_plugins_when_not_able_to_access_the_administrative_menus.3F) by FTP or PhpMyAdmin. Sometimes, an apparently inactive plugin can still cause problems. * – re-uploading all files & folders – **except** the wp-content folder – from a **fresh** download of WordPress. Make sure that you delete the old copies of files & folder before uploading the new ones. * Thread Starter [thehappycactus](https://wordpress.org/support/users/thehappycactus/) * (@thehappycactus) * [13 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/#post-3222785) * Thanks for all the suggestions! * Unfortunately, none of these worked. All the attempts yielded the same result, that being that anything I attempted to deactivate claimed to be “deactivated”, but in reality never actually was. Resetting the plugins folder did manually deactivated everything, but when I set the folder back the way it should be, the original problem returned. * Related, I’m similarly unable to switch themes (so unable to try your 2nd suggestion): when I click “Activate” under a specific theme, the page reloads and claims the new theme has been activated, but in reality the same theme is still activated. * [esmi](https://wordpress.org/support/users/esmi/) * (@esmi) * [13 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/#post-3222786) * Have you checked your site’s error logs for clues? * Thread Starter [thehappycactus](https://wordpress.org/support/users/thehappycactus/) * (@thehappycactus) * [13 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/#post-3222787) * I’ve actually never dealt with logging at all, but I followed the basic directions in Method 1 [here](http://digwp.com/2009/07/monitor-php-errors-wordpress/). * Unfortunately when I attempt to activate/deactivate anything that’s been having problems, no errors are getting logged. I’m not sure if that’s because the logging is somehow not working, or because no actual errors are occurring (nothing ever appears to throw an error on the blog admin pages). * What’s the best way to get a hold of the error logs for WP? * [esmi](https://wordpress.org/support/users/esmi/) * (@esmi) * [13 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/#post-3222788) * WordPress does not create error logs but your site/server should. Try asking your hosts for access to these logs. * [Archie Makuwa](https://wordpress.org/support/users/archie22is/) * (@archie22is) * [13 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/#post-3222789) * Or if you won’t require that plugin again – just logon to your serve and delete it. You might have to clean up your database structure if you are the neat type. * [allmyhoney](https://wordpress.org/support/users/allmyhoney/) * (@allmyhoney) * [12 years, 10 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/#post-3222841) * Can any shed some light on that the issue was here and how it was resolved in the end? I am having the same issue and have tried all of the above pretty much. * [esmi](https://wordpress.org/support/users/esmi/) * (@esmi) * [12 years, 10 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/#post-3222842) * **[@allmyhoney](https://wordpress.org/support/users/allmyhoney/)**: As per the [Forum Welcome](http://codex.wordpress.org/Forum_Welcome#Where_To_Post), please [post your own topic](http://wordpress.org/support/forum/how-to-and-troubleshooting#postform). Posting in an existing topic prevents us from being able to track issues by topic. Added to which, your problem – despite any similarity in symptoms – is likely to be completely different. Viewing 8 replies - 1 through 8 (of 8 total) The topic ‘Can't Deactivate Plugins’ is closed to new replies. ## Tags * [deactivate](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/deactivate/) * In: [Fixing WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/how-to-and-troubleshooting/) * 8 replies * 4 participants * Last reply from: [esmi](https://wordpress.org/support/users/esmi/) * Last activity: [12 years, 10 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cant-deactivate-plugins/#post-3222842) * Status: not resolved ## Topics ### Topics with no replies ### Non-support topics ### Resolved topics ### Unresolved topics ### All topics