Introduction

Keeping your web application updated is important because new versions usually introduce new and exciting features. Not only that, but new releases are also traditionally associated with new security & performance updates which can positively affect your business when applied on time.

WHMCS is no exception to the rules above, and in this guide, we will review how you can update your WHMCS installation with a few simple steps and get the best out of the newly available releases!

Without further ado, let's dive into it!

Getting Started

Before you even consider updating your WHMCS installation, we recommend performing a backup of both your database and your files. We have great tutorials on how you can create a backup using cPanel and how you can manually back up your website. Either way will work.

Once you have prepared a backup, please continue with this tutorial.

To begin the WHMCS upgrade process, please log inside your admin area. Once inside, point your attention to the top right corner. You will see an icon, which resembles an arrow, pointing down towards a disk drive.

When you hover your mouse cursor over it, you will see the "An update is available!" tooltip. Please click on it the mentioned icon.

Upon doing that, you will be redirected to the WHMCS update page, where two boxes are joined together - a grey one and a blue one. The grey one will display the current WHMCS version, while the blue one will showcase the new version. On top of these boxes, you will see a green sign, signifying that a new version is available. 

Beneath the boxes, you will see an "Update Now" button (which will be greyed out initially) and underneath links to the release notes and changelog pages.

To enable the "Update Now" button, you must define the WHMCS application Temporary Path. To do that, please point your attention to the top right corner. There, you will see a “Configure Update Settings” button. Please click on it.

Doing so will generate a popup window where you can configure the update settings:

• Update Channel - Please use the radio button under this setting to select the versions WHMCS will upgrade to when performing an upgrade process.
• Stable - Please use the radio button to select this option if your WHMCS is in production and currently serving customers. This selection is, by far, the safest choice. It should not result in any issues after the update unless it is a major release.
• Release Candidate - Please use the radio button to select this option if your WHMCS is a staging/testing environment of your production instance. Great choice if you want a preview of the release candidate for the next WHMCS update. We do not recommend this for production websites.
• Beta - Please use this radio button to select this option if you are running a development/testing version of WHMCS. We highly discourage you from using this for production environments.
• Current Version - Please use this radio button to select this option and only enable maintenance updates for the currently installed version.
• Temporary Path - Please use this text field to set the temporary path for staging files during updates. You cannot update WHMCS unless you set this up. It is also highly recommended to set this path outside WHMCS's root directory for security reasons. This field is mandatory.
• Maintenance Message - Please use this text field to set a maintenance message your clients will see while your WHMCS is being updated.

After typing in and choosing the settings above, please click the "Save Changes" button at the bottom right corner of the pop-up window.

Upon doing so, the pop-up window will disappear, and you will see the previous page again. You will also notice that the "Update Now" button is no longer greyed out and is now clickable. Please click on the "Update Now" button to proceed with the upgrade process.

Clicking the “Update Now” button will generate another pop-up window signifying the beginning of the upgrade process. 

After a brief loading time, you will see a warning saying that you should create a database backup. Additionally, it will recommend at least 250MB available disk space before you proceed with the update. 

As you can never have enough backups, and if you wish to be absolutely safe, you can click on the "Download Database Backup" button and generate an additional database backup before you proceed further with the update. Once you download the database backup, or if you prefer to continue without it, please click on the blue "Continue" button on the bottom right corner of the pop-up window.

After clicking the "Being Update" button, the update will start, and you will see a page with a turning hourglass animation showing the installation is in progress. 

Typically, this process will end in a successful update message. However, you will sometimes receive an error saying that the update failed. Do not be alarmed, as there is a minor bug in the WHMCS upgrade script.

In our case, this happened. Please continue ahead with this tutorial so we can reveal how you can fix it very quickly.

If you encounter the "Update Failed" pop-up window, please click on the "Finish" button at the bottom right corner. 

Doing so will close it, and you will see the initial "Upgrade" page we discussed earlier. 

Please navigate the WHMCS homepage. After doing so, you will see the "Down for Maintenance" page. 

To continue the upgrade process, click on the browser search bar and type in "/install" at the end of your domain name. For example, if WHMCS is installed at "hostarmadatutorials.com", you need to type in "hostarmadatutorials.com/install" to open the correct page. 

When you open the "/install" URL, you will be redirected to a familiar page from the how to install WHMCS tutorial. It will show you the end-user license agreement for WHMCS, and you need to click the green  "I Agree" button at the bottom of the page to proceed. 

Doing so will redirect you to the next page, which will notify you that the detected version is the previously used one (In our case, this is WHMCS 8.5), and by continuing forward, you will update WHMCS to version 8.6. 

Please click on the red "Continue" button at the bottom of the page. 

Clicking the red "Continue" button will generate a pop-up window asking for a backup confirmation before proceeding. 

As we have created a backup at the beginning of this tutorial, we can safely click on the blue "I have a backup. Start the upgrade" button at the bottom of the pop-up window. 

Upon clicking the, "I have a backup. Start the upgrade" button, the page will quickly reload, and you will see the "Upgrade Completed Successfully" page.

To proceed further, please click the "Go to the Admin Area Now >>" button in the middle of the page. 

Doing so will redirect you to the admin area. However, you will likely receive a warning saying that the "install" folder is still available on the server. 

To remove this warning and start using the latest WHMCS version, you must delete the "install" folder from WHMCS's root directory. If you are not sure how to locate your application’s root directory, we have a great article inside our knowledge base on how to find your domain’s root folder.

After deleting the folder, please refresh the page in your browser. This will immediately redirect you to the admin area. 

Upon doing so, you will be greeted with a pop-up window showing the new improvements and implementation in the latest WHMCS version.

Conclusion

This wraps up the WHMCS upgrade guide. Hopefully, it wasn't a huge hassle for you to follow, and despite the minor hiccup at the end, you could still perform it successfully. If you face any issues with the upgrade process for WHMCS, please do not hesitate to contact our support team over our ticketing system and request assistance. They are available 24/7 at your disposal and will be happy to assist you.