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I'm using use-package in my init.el for all my package installations and configuration. I thought specifying :ensure t in use-package would make sure I always have the latest versions installed. But when I did M-x package-list-packages the minibuffer tells me I have a number of package updates waiting. Isn't it enough to specify :ensure t in use-package, do I have to manually check for and install updates using M-x package-list-packages? What is the best way to handle updates when using use-package?

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2 Answers 2

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The :ensure option in use-package does not automatically keep packages up to date. It ensures that the package is installed. This might be useful if you pull your Emacs config on to a new machine (or are using it across several machines), because when you start up all your required packages would get installed.

You'll still need to deal with installing updates.

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    The reason I've heard as to why that's the case is because updating packages can break them, so it would regress in functionality.
    – zck
    Commented Mar 31, 2017 at 16:58
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    @zck I think it's more that use-package is meant to provide a quick startup and checking for updates would be slow. Also, the author of use-package doesn't use package.el packages, any related features (like :ensure) were tacked on afterwards by other users. In the original design, all packages are considered optional, your init.el just skips configuration of missing packages.
    – npostavs
    Commented Mar 31, 2017 at 17:57
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I use auto-package-update to automatically update packages.

(use-package auto-package-update
   :ensure t
   :config
   (setq auto-package-update-delete-old-versions t
         auto-package-update-interval 4)
   (auto-package-update-maybe))

With that setup, packages will be updated every 4 days, and the old packages will be removed.

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    You might want to add this as an answer here: emacs.stackexchange.com/questions/31872/…
    – glucas
    Commented Apr 3, 2017 at 18:10
  • It appears to me that the call to ` (auto-package-update-maybe)` is not the value of one of use-package's keyword options. Should it perhaps be wrapped in a progn as part of the :config, like this: ``` (use-package auto-package-update :ensure t :config (progn (setq auto-package-update-delete-old-versions t auto-package-update-interval 4) (auto-package-update-maybe))) ```
    – malcook
    Commented Nov 1, 2019 at 17:43
  • should I do (when (not package-archive-contents) (package-refresh-contents)) before running this?
    – alper
    Commented Oct 3, 2020 at 1:41

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