Making sure to use the latest version of WordPress is crucial enough if you have a WordPress-based website since a new version commonly comes with bug fixes and security updates. WordPress will notify you every time a new version is available. You can see the notification on the top side of the WordPress dashboard. If you log in as an administrator, you can normally upgrade to the last version by clicking the Please update now link. What if this link is not available?

Instead of Please update now link, you might see the following notification when a new version of WordPress is available. Whereas, you are logging in as an administrator.

The notification above is caused by the configuration on your WordPress. To fix the problem above, you can open the wp-config.php file to check the configuration of your WordPress and find the following line (usually on the bottom section).

define('DISALLOW_FILE_MODS', true);

Change the true value on the line above to false and save the change. Try to re-login to the WordPress dashboard (or simply reload if you have logged in) and you should see the notification back to normal (with a Please update now link).

If the value of the line above is set to true, not only you can’t upgrade WordPress via the dashboard. You won’t also be able to delete a plugin, install a new theme, install a new plugin and other administrative actions. You can use this configuration if you have a WordPress site with multiple users with administrator levels and want to disallow them to make administrative actions.