Plugin Updates

The following table describes the behavior of differential plugin updates for agents linked to either Tenable Vulnerability Management or Tenable Nessus Manager.

Note: Tenable Nessus Agent checks its linked manager for plugin updates every 24 hours.

Linked	Differential Update	Full Update
Tenable Vulnerability Management	The agent performs a differential update when any of the agent plugin sets are 15 days or less behind the Tenable Vulnerability Management plugin sets.	The agent performs a full plugin update at scan time for any required plugin set if the agent does not have any plugins for that plugin set. The agent also performs a full plugin update when any of the agent plugin sets are more than 15 days behind the Tenable Vulnerability Management plugin sets. The agent deletes unused plugin sets after a configurable amount of time (for more information, see the days_to_keep_unused_plugins advanced setting). After the amount of time passes, the agent deletes the unused plugin sets.
Tenable Nessus Manager	The agent performs a differential plugin update when the agent plugin set is 5 days or less behind the Tenable Nessus Manager plugin set.	The agent performs a full plugin update when the agent plugin set is more than 5 days behind the Tenable Nessus Manager plugin set.

Linked

Differential Update

Full Update

Tenable Vulnerability Management

The agent performs a differential update when any of the agent plugin sets are 15 days or less behind the Tenable Vulnerability Management plugin sets.

The agent performs a full plugin update at scan time for any required plugin set if the agent does not have any plugins for that plugin set.

The agent also performs a full plugin update when any of the agent plugin sets are more than 15 days behind the Tenable Vulnerability Management plugin sets.

The agent deletes unused plugin sets after a configurable amount of time (for more information, see the days_to_keep_unused_plugins advanced setting). After the amount of time passes, the agent deletes the unused plugin sets.

Tenable Nessus Manager

The agent performs a differential plugin update when the agent plugin set is 5 days or less behind the Tenable Nessus Manager plugin set.

The agent performs a full plugin update when the agent plugin set is more than 5 days behind the Tenable Nessus Manager plugin set.