Frequently Asked Questions

How do I rename an existing plugin?

Changing the plugin display name

At present, the plugin display name can only be changed via the administration interface, and it requires additional verification. To request a name change for an existing QGIS plugin, please contact the QGIS Plugin Administration team by emailing [email protected] and [email protected] from the plugin author's email address.

Renaming the directory (also known as `package_name`)

This functionality was previously requested but has since been discontinued. It is strongly recommended to keep the original plugin identifier (directory name) to avoid compatibility issues. Changing the package_name may cause QGIS to treat the plugin as uninstalled, which can result in errors during installation.

More details can be found in the discussion here.

Why is the wrong plugin version shown as "latest" in QGIS?

Version numbering convention

The plugins.xml feed — which is used by the QGIS Plugin Manager to determine the latest available version — selects the latest version by string comparison of the version name, not by the upload date.

This means that version strings must follow a strict numeric convention (e.g. 1.2.3) so that comparisons work as expected. If a version tag contains letters or non-numeric segments (e.g. 2.3.e9f6b2a), the string ordering may not match the intended release order. For example, 2.3.e9f6b2a would be sorted higher than 2.3.1.2bbe09c because e > 1 in string comparison, causing the wrong version to appear as the latest in the Plugin Manager.

Plugin authors are therefore strongly encouraged to use standard semantic versioning (e.g. MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH) for their plugin versions to ensure the correct version is identified as the latest.