Plugins are one of the main reasons why WordPress is so popular these days. Both premium and free plugins have introduced superior features related to security, backups, appearance and performance. They have also allowed website owners to take advantage of important third-party services such as Google Analytics, Mailchimp, translation, lead capture, and so on.

While we cannot deny the value added by plugins to WordPress sites, we should also not ignore the possible dangers of having too many of them on your site. Read further to learn why installing too many plugins might be bad for your WordPress website.

Security

Some plugins, especially the free ones, may be insecure and prone to hacking. Premium plugins are not completely immune either but they are usually better. Plugin authors are advised to update their plugins regularly in order to patch any security vulnerabilities.

Even then, the updates may take time or you may simply forget to update to a new release. In such cases, hackers can exploit the loopholes and compromise your website. Having too many plugins, and failure to update them regularly can put your WordPress site at risk.

Conflicting Plugins

Cases of plugin incompatibly are common with WordPress sites. This is possible if, for instance, two different plugins use the same generic variable names. Plugin development is governed by coding standards, but not every developer observes them strictly.

In worst case scenarios, a website may lose all its content when two or more incompatible plugins are installed. One way of avoiding such a devastating eventuality is to limit the number of plugins on your WordPress site and install only the ones that are necessary.

Memory and Site Load Speed

Every time a person visits your website, some background code executes in order render the webpage in the visitor’s browser. This code includes that of all the plugins installed. Imagine the amount of code that runs in a site containing tens of plugins and receiving over 100,000 viewers a month. Such a setup is bound to consume a lot of your server’s memory, and it gets worse as the plugin count increases. The result is a site the loads slowly and many visitors are easily turned off by this. Therefore, it’s wise to limit the number of plugins on your WordPress site.

Plugin Management

While plugins are generally easy to operate even for users with no prior programming knowledge, challenges may emerge when updating them because some are not as straightforward as others. A plugin update can contain bugs in the code. Your site could easily break because of these bugs or as a result of conflicting plugins.

Fewer plugins means fewer updates and a lower risk of site failure, code bugs, or conflicts. This emphasizes the need to have as few plugins on your WordPress website as possible.