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Hi all,
I am new to working on WordPress sites. My employer hired out a web development company to build our website years before I even worked here. I am now working as their web developer, and need to make changes to the site. The only issue I am having is Elementor is 2 years out of date and I’d really like to use some of the newer features to add what I’ve been tasked with.
Is it stepping on their toes too much to ask for them to either update the plugin, or give me a role that has permissions to do it myself? I am also concerned that since it’s so out of date, updating it may mess with the current design. I’d love some advice! Is there any common curtesy for wordpress sites built by other people?
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>*Is it stepping on their toes too much to ask for them to either update the plugin, or give me a role that has permissions to do it myself?*
Depends – are they still being paid to maintain the site? If so, then they are being negligent by not keeping up with updates. Elementor frequently announces vulnerabilities, so your site is likely open to hacking (if it hasn’t been already). If maintaining the site wasn’t part of their remit, then you should get yourself added as an admin.
Ask whoever is responsible what the situation is, and get everything updated ASAP. If you’re concerned about issues occuring, then take a backup of the site and restore it to a test environment eg Local from [localwp.com](https://localwp.com). TBH though, Elementor is pretty solid when it comes to updates, I wouldn’t worry about it. Just take a backup before doing anything.
Chances are the previous developer isn’t being paid to maintain the site since you’re taking over for your workplace. It’ll be on you to regain administrator access (easily done via the database) and purchase a license for Elementor.
Having worked on 100’s of sites, Elementor isn’t reliable at all when updating so definitely make that backup because something will certainly break.
if you’re the company’s web developer you should have admin access to the site. if you don’t have admin access you can either suss out who does and ask them to give it to you, or [do it via the database](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-add-an-admin-user-to-the-wordpress-database-via-mysql/). then purchase an elementor license, back up the site, and update the plugin.
If they haven’t updated a plugin in over two years I don’t think it’s a problem at all. At all!
If you’ve got the pro version to see if the version you have is licensed. If not then your company should pay.
But in general, once a site is handed off to the owner it’s *their website.* they can make any changes they like. Including hiring you.
For this case, nope. Because Elementor 2 years out of date is a pretty big security issue, there are numerous exposures reported for it. My opinion would be to clone the site to a staging environment, run the upgrade to see if anything breaks, and if it doesn’t then go for it on the live site.
Generally speaking though, I’m of the opinion that you should be able to upgrade ANY plugin without issues if the site was well built. Elementor is kind of a different beast in that regard, so testing it out on staging first is best.