Title: WP_Widget::update
Published: April 25, 2014
Last modified: April 28, 2025

---

# WP_Widget::update( array $new_instance, array $old_instance ): array

## In this article

 * [Description](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#description)
 * [Parameters](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#parameters)
 * [Return](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#return)
 * [Source](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#source)
 * [Related](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#related)
 * [Changelog](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#changelog)

[ Back to top](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#wp--skip-link--target)

Updates a particular instance of a widget.

## 󠀁[Description](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#description)󠁿

This function should check that `$new_instance` is set correctly. The newly-calculated
value of `$instance` should be returned. If false is returned, the instance won’t
be saved/updated.

## 󠀁[Parameters](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#parameters)󠁿

 `$new_instance`arrayrequired

New settings for this instance as input by the user via [WP_Widget::form()](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/form/).

`$old_instance`arrayrequired

Old settings for this instance.

## 󠀁[Return](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#return)󠁿

 array Settings to save or bool false to cancel saving.

## 󠀁[Source](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#source)󠁿

    ```php
    public function update( $new_instance, $old_instance ) {
    	return $new_instance;
    }
    ```

[View all references](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/files/wp-includes/class-wp-widget.php/)
[View on Trac](https://core.trac.wordpress.org/browser/tags/6.9.4/src/wp-includes/class-wp-widget.php#L131)
[View on GitHub](https://github.com/WordPress/wordpress-develop/blob/6.9.4/src/wp-includes/class-wp-widget.php#L131-L133)

## 󠀁[Related](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#related)󠁿

| Used by | Description | 
| [WP_Widget::update_callback()](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update_callback/)`wp-includes/class-wp-widget.php` |

Handles changed settings (Do NOT override).

  |

## 󠀁[Changelog](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_widget/update/?output_format=md#changelog)󠁿

| Version | Description | 
| [2.8.0](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/since/2.8.0/) | Introduced. |

## User Contributed Notes

You must [log in](https://login.wordpress.org/?redirect_to=https%3A%2F%2Fdeveloper.wordpress.org%2Freference%2Fclasses%2Fwp_widget%2Fupdate%2F)
before being able to contribute a note or feedback.