diff --git a/admin/index.php b/admin/index.php
index 410cbf6723b82..d3ec395e57444 100644
--- a/admin/index.php
+++ b/admin/index.php
@@ -416,9 +416,30 @@
 $dbproblems = $DB->diagnose();
 $maintenancemode = !empty($CFG->maintenance_enabled);
 
+// Available updates for Moodle core
 $updateschecker = available_update_checker::instance();
-$availableupdates = $updateschecker->get_update_info('core',
+$availableupdates = array();
+$availableupdates['core'] = $updateschecker->get_update_info('core',
     array('minmaturity' => $CFG->updateminmaturity, 'notifybuilds' => $CFG->updatenotifybuilds));
+
+// Available updates for contributed plugins
+$pluginman = plugin_manager::instance();
+foreach ($pluginman->get_plugins() as $plugintype => $plugintypeinstances) {
+    foreach ($plugintypeinstances as $pluginname => $plugininfo) {
+        if (!empty($plugininfo->availableupdates)) {
+            foreach ($plugininfo->availableupdates as $pluginavailableupdate) {
+                if ($pluginavailableupdate->version > $plugininfo->versiondisk) {
+                    if (!isset($availableupdates[$plugintype.'_'.$pluginname])) {
+                        $availableupdates[$plugintype.'_'.$pluginname] = array();
+                    }
+                    $availableupdates[$plugintype.'_'.$pluginname][] = $pluginavailableupdate;
+                }
+            }
+        }
+    }
+}
+
+// The timestamp of the most recent check for available updates
 $availableupdatesfetch = $updateschecker->get_last_timefetched();
 
 $buggyiconvnomb = (!function_exists('mb_convert_encoding') and @iconv('UTF-8', 'UTF-8//IGNORE', '100'.chr(130).'€') !== '100€');
diff --git a/admin/renderer.php b/admin/renderer.php
index 293bf52f225fb..bf45639be98f5 100644
--- a/admin/renderer.php
+++ b/admin/renderer.php
@@ -495,21 +495,39 @@ protected function maturity_info($maturity) {
     }
 
     /**
-     * Displays the info about available Moodle updates
+     * Displays the info about available Moodle core and plugin updates
      *
-     * @param array|null $updates array of available_update_info objects or null
+     * The structure of the $updates param has changed since 2.4. It contains not only updates
+     * for the core itself, but also for all other installed plugins.
+     *
+     * @param array|null $updates array of (string)component => array of available_update_info objects or null
      * @param int|null $fetch timestamp of the most recent updates fetch or null (unknown)
      * @return string
      */
     protected function available_updates($updates, $fetch) {
 
         $updateinfo = $this->box_start('generalbox adminwarning availableupdatesinfo');
+        $someupdateavailable = false;
         if (is_array($updates)) {
-            $updateinfo .= $this->heading(get_string('updateavailable', 'core_admin'), 3);
-            foreach ($updates as $update) {
-                $updateinfo .= $this->moodle_available_update_info($update);
+            if (is_array($updates['core'])) {
+                $someupdateavailable = true;
+                $updateinfo .= $this->heading(get_string('updateavailable', 'core_admin'), 3);
+                foreach ($updates['core'] as $update) {
+                    $updateinfo .= $this->moodle_available_update_info($update);
+                }
             }
-        } else {
+            unset($updates['core']);
+            // If something has left in the $updates array now, it is updates for plugins.
+            if (!empty($updates)) {
+                $someupdateavailable = true;
+                $updateinfo .= $this->heading(get_string('updateavailableforplugin', 'core_admin'), 3);
+                $pluginsoverviewurl = new moodle_url('/admin/plugins.php', array('updatesonly' => 1));
+                $updateinfo .= $this->container(get_string('pluginsoverviewsee', 'core_admin',
+                    array('url' => $pluginsoverviewurl->out())));
+            }
+        }
+
+        if (!$someupdateavailable) {
             $now = time();
             if ($fetch and ($fetch <= $now) and ($now - $fetch < HOURSECS)) {
                 $updateinfo .= $this->heading(get_string('updateavailablenot', 'core_admin'), 3);
diff --git a/lang/en/admin.php b/lang/en/admin.php
index c2ae229d47763..a0c322603b6ff 100644
--- a/lang/en/admin.php
+++ b/lang/en/admin.php
@@ -774,6 +774,7 @@
 $string['pluginscheckfailed'] = 'Dependencies check failed for {$a->pluginslist}';
 $string['pluginschecktodo'] = 'You must solve all the plugin requirements before proceeding to install this Moodle version!';
 $string['pluginsoverview'] = 'Plugins overview';
+$string['pluginsoverviewsee'] = 'See <a href="{$a->url}">plugins overview</a> page for more details.';
 $string['profilecategory'] = 'Category';
 $string['profilecategoryname'] = 'Category name (must be unique)';
 $string['profilecategorynamenotunique'] = 'This category name is already in use';