The strongest Easy Updates Manager alternative for most sites is Companion Auto Update, which automates core, theme, and plugin updates with email digests in a lighter package than Easy Updates Manager. To simply freeze everything, Disable All WordPress Updates is the cleanest switch, while WP Updates Notifier just alerts you when updates are due without applying them. We ranked these from our index of 55,000+ WordPress plugins.

Why people switch from Easy Updates Manager

• Easy Updates Manager is broad, so people wanting simple hands-off automation move to Companion Auto Update.
• Sites that just want to stop all updates move to Disable All WordPress Updates.
• Those who only want to be notified of updates, not manage them, move to WP Updates Notifier.
• Some prefer a minimal auto-update toggle like Advanced Automatic Updates.

Companion Auto Update – Overall replacement

Companion Auto Update focuses on automating core, plugin, and theme updates on a schedule and emailing you a summary of what changed. Against Easy Updates Manager, it is lighter and simpler when your goal is hands-off automatic updating. Its drawback is that it offers less granular per-item enable and disable control than Easy Updates Manager, and there is no premium support behind it.

Choose Companion Auto Update if you want simple automatic updates with email summaries.

Disable All WordPress Updates – Freeze all updates

Disable All WordPress Updates cleanly switches off update checks and notifications for core, plugins, and themes, which also cuts the background requests they generate. Against Easy Updates Manager, it is the most direct way to fully freeze a site. Its drawback is that it only disables updates, with no way to selectively allow or schedule them, so you take on all updating manually.

Choose Disable All WordPress Updates if you want to fully stop automatic updates and update manually.

Advanced Automatic Updates – Legacy auto-updates

Advanced Automatic Updates enables automatic updates for core, plugins, and themes with basic email control. Against Easy Updates Manager, it is a minimal toggle for turning automation on. Its drawback is that it has not been actively maintained in a long time and now overlaps heavily with the automatic-update features WordPress core added itself, making it largely redundant.

Choose Advanced Automatic Updates if you want a simple auto-update toggle and accept an older plugin.

WP Updates Notifier – Update notifications

WP Updates Notifier emails or messages you whenever core, plugins, or themes have updates available, without changing anything on the site. Against Easy Updates Manager, it is ideal if you want to review updates before applying them. Its drawback is that it only notifies; it neither applies nor blocks updates, so every update is still a manual action you take yourself.

Choose WP Updates Notifier if you want to be told about updates but apply them yourself.

When to stay on Easy Updates Manager

Stay on Easy Updates Manager if you use its granular control to enable, disable, or schedule updates for individual plugins and themes, since few alternatives match that breadth in one place. It also logs update activity and supports multisite. If you rely on that fine-grained control, none of the lighter tools here fully replace it.

How we ranked these

Every plugin here is scored by the WPS Score, a single 0 to 10 rating built from 21 signals covering maintenance, support responsiveness, compatibility, performance, and ratings quality across our index of 55,000+ plugins. Rankings are derived from that data, not editorial preference, and no plugin author can pay to change a score. How the WPS Score works.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best free alternative to Easy Updates Manager?

Companion Auto Update is the best free alternative for most sites because it automates core, plugin, and theme updates on a schedule and emails you a summary. For sites that instead want to stop updates entirely, Disable All WordPress Updates is a clean free option.

How is Easy Updates Manager different from WordPress core auto-updates?

WordPress now includes basic automatic updates for core, plugins, and themes, but Easy Updates Manager adds a central dashboard to control them individually, schedule them, and log activity across single or multisite installs. Companion Auto Update sits between the two with simpler automation and email summaries.

Can I get notified about updates without installing them automatically?

Yes. WP Updates Notifier emails or messages you whenever core, plugins, or themes have updates available, without applying anything, so you can review and update manually. This suits sites that prefer to test updates before rolling them out.

The verdict

The best all-round Easy Updates Manager alternative is Companion Auto Update for straightforward automated updates, while Disable All WordPress Updates suits sites that want everything frozen and WP Updates Notifier those who only want alerts. If you depend on Easy Updates Manager’s per-item control and scheduling, staying on Easy Updates Manager remains the right call.