Upgrade Wizard

The Upgrade Wizard provides a guided, browser-based upgrade process accessible directly from the SuiteCRM Admin panel.

Before proceeding, ensure you have completed all steps on the Before You Upgrade page, including backing up your instance and configuring PHP limits.

When to use the Upgrade Wizard

The Upgrade Wizard is suitable for most standard upgrades. Consider using the CLI Upgrade instead if:

  • Any table in your database has more than ~10,000 records

  • The wizard has previously timed out on your server

  • Your hosting environment has restrictive PHP or web server timeout limits

Running the Upgrade Wizard

Step 1: Access the Upgrade Wizard

  1. Log in as an Administrator.

  2. Navigate to Admin  Upgrade Wizard.

Step 2: System Check

The wizard runs an automated check of your environment. It will report any issues with file permissions, database connectivity, or server settings.

  • If issues are reported, resolve them before continuing.

  • If all checks pass, click Next.

Step 3: Upload the Upgrade Pack

  1. Click Choose File and select the upgrade ZIP you downloaded from the SuiteCRM releases page.

  2. Click Upload Upgrade.

The system will upload and validate the package. If needed, use Delete Package to remove it and upload a different file.

Once the package appears in the list, click Next.

Step 4: Preflight Check

The wizard checks the upgrade pack against your current installation.

  • If the upgrade pack includes SQL schema changes, a Show Schema Change Script link and a Database Update Method dropdown will appear. These are only shown when there are schema queries to run — most standard upgrades will not display them.

    • If they are visible, leave the database update method set to Run SQL unless you intend to run the queries manually.

  • Click Recheck to re-run the preflight if needed.

  • Click Next to proceed.

Step 5: Commit Upgrade

The wizard applies the upgrade. SuiteCRM copies the new files and runs the necessary database updates.

You can click Show to review the list of files copied and any queries that were skipped.

Click Next to continue.

Step 6: Confirm Layouts (if applicable)

This step only appears if your installation has module layouts that were customised through Studio, and the upgrade includes changes to those layouts' default fields or positions.

The wizard performs a three-way merge: it compares your customised layout, the old default layout, and the new default layout, and merges the differences.

The Confirm Layouts page lists each affected module layout. By default, all are selected for merging.

  • Uncheck a module if you want to keep your existing customisation exactly as-is and skip the merge for that layout.

  • Click Next to apply the selected merges.

Step 7: Complete

The Debrief page confirms the upgrade is complete.

  • If any files were skipped (because you unchecked them in earlier steps), extract them manually from the upgrade ZIP and merge them into your installation directory.

  • If you chose to run SQL manually, complete that now.

Click Done. SuiteCRM will return to the Home page.

Post-upgrade steps

After the wizard completes, run a repair to ensure all caches, relationships, and extensions are rebuilt correctly:

  1. Navigate to Admin  Repair.

  2. Run Rebuild Relationships.

  3. Run Rebuild Extensions.

  4. Re-enable opcode caching if you disabled it before the upgrade.

Troubleshooting

If the upgrade fails or produces unexpected results, check the upgrade log:

<suitecrm-root>/upgradeWizard.log

See also Logs and Known Issues.

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