Best WordPress Plugins for Bloggers (2026 Edition)
In December 2007, after two years of problogging on WordPress, we shared our 50 favourite plugins. Most of them, from Subscribe To Comments to AdSense-Deluxe and Democracy polls, are long gone or built into WordPress now. Here’s the 2026 version: the best WordPress plugins for bloggers, grouped by job, including several we run on QuickOnlineTips today.
Quick answer: Most blogs need only a handful of plugins: an SEO plugin (Rank Math or Yoast), a caching plugin (LiteSpeed Cache or your host’s), backups (Jetpack VaultPress Backup or UpdraftPlus), spam protection (Akismet or Antispam Bee), login security (Limit Login Attempts Reloaded or Wordfence) and a few extras like Redirection and Site Kit. Fewer, well-maintained plugins keep your blog fast and secure.
Table of Contents
SEO
- Rank Math SEO – titles, meta descriptions, schema, redirects and sitemaps. We use it here.
- Yoast SEO – the long-time favourite with readability checks.
- Site Kit by Google – Search Console and Analytics data in your dashboard.
Speed
- LiteSpeed Cache – page caching and image optimisation on LiteSpeed servers. We use it here.
- WP Super Cache – simple caching for other hosts.
- ShortPixel or Smush – compress images and serve WebP.
Backups and security
- Jetpack VaultPress Backup or UpdraftPlus – automatic off-site backups. See our backup services comparison.
- Limit Login Attempts Reloaded – stops password-guessing bots.
- Wordfence Security – firewall and malware scanning.
- Two-Factor – adds two-factor login.
Comments and spam
- Akismet – the classic comment spam filter.
- Antispam Bee – free, privacy-friendly alternative.
Content and links
- Redirection – manage 301 redirects and find 404s.
- Pretty Links – clean, trackable affiliate links. We use it here.
- Easy Table of Contents – automatic tables of contents.
- Code Snippets – add small PHP tweaks without editing your theme.
Forms and email
- Contact Form 7 or WPForms Lite – contact forms.
- WP Mail SMTP – makes WordPress emails actually arrive.
What happened to the 2007 list
Many features we needed plugins for are now built into WordPress: threaded comments, widgets, image galleries, embeds, theme previews, automatic updates and the block editor. Others, like Feedburner redirects and AdSense-Deluxe, served services that changed or closed.
Tips for choosing plugins
- Check “Last updated” and “Tested up to” on WordPress.org.
- Avoid plugins that duplicate each other (two SEO or caching plugins).
- Delete plugins you’ve deactivated.
- Test new plugins on a staging site first.
FAQ
How many plugins should a WordPress blog have?
There’s no fixed number, but every plugin adds code to maintain. Keep only ones you actively use.
Which plugins are essential for a new blog?
SEO, backups, spam protection, login security and caching.
Are free plugins safe?
Popular, regularly updated plugins from WordPress.org are generally safe. Keep them updated.
Get our free weekly email: new tech guides and tools, no spam.
New and updated tech guides, a free tool worth bookmarking and one useful pick, once a week. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
One email a week. Unsubscribe anytime. See our privacy policy.
Great article. It’s nice to have a list of great wordpress plugins in one spot
It’s nice list of wordpress plugins but you didn’t suggest any for recent posts. However, I’d like to add one more, YD Recent Posts Plugin. As the name suggest, it shows a list of recent posts.
I am looking for a plugin that will serve the purpose of indexing my post instantly to GOOGLE. in google webmaster tool you have option to FETCH AS CRAWLER and once it is done it fetcht he page and gives an option to get it indexed almost within few hours. But there is limitation of 10 Fetches. Is there any plugin similar to this?
Any help will be appriciated.
Regards
Excellent round up of wordpress plugins. I’ve just been through the lot and will recommend these to my list. Thanks
Very impressive collection, quite a few I haven’t seen before, even after so many years blogging and searching for plugins, cheers.
Thanks a lot for the exhaustive list. I am particularly impressed by the Security plugins. My wp blogs hacked couple of times and I lost all my work but these will help me to take regular back ups and be safe!!
Thanx a lot for that great list of pluggins!! This would be of great help!!
Hi is there a plugin that,brings you the ability to create a wordpress , and auto post posts by pulling content from Amazon, Youtube and article directories,ect,ect
Hi !
may be you forgot this little bad boy :)
https://wordpress.org/plugins/category-icons-lite/
It’s a no-brainer version ! :)
you can also use disq.us for comment posting
Hi is there a plugin that,brings you the ability to create a wordpress , and auto post posts by pulling content from Amazon, Youtube and article directories,ect,ect
I love plugins! I would also recommend StatsPress and WP-Polls, once traffic is beginning to build up.
A new plugin I can’t w8 for it to be done
thanks for making a new plugin
the old plugin does not seem to be working all the way.
the woopra chat thing does nto seem to work on my WP
so I hope it works in the new plugin
The most SMS and Newsletter using Plugins i cannot suggest. On my blogs the most software dont work. There are some bugs but i cannot find them. But it doesnt matter because there are enough other usefull plugins … thousend of them. WordPress is a great thing.
Great list, it helped me out tremendously. Thanks for putting it together.
You have saved my time.Thanks for the list.
Best plugins…nice…we are looking to switch to wp for our site.
Great resource! But I agree with Sci-fi Si, how about an updated posting with a more current listing. You did a great job with this one, I am sure the next would be just as poplular!
Would like to recommend a tool I use for creating web menus for my WP site:
AllWebMenus WordPress Menu Addin:
https://www.likno.com/addins/wordpress-menu.html
You might want to give it a try.
Great read, to me the best wp plugin is the share it plugin because it allows users to share your content.
Very nice list! I was looking for something similar.. It helped me very well!
thanks..
I would like to have a WordPress Plugin I can use to create a WordPress blog page on my existing WP site in a format just like this page, but I’m literally overwhelmed by the number of plugins available. Maybe somebody could point me in the right direction??
Thanks for the article, I just built a blog with WordPress so your article is really help :)
I found your blog on google and read a few of your other posts. I just added you to my Google News Reader. Keep up the good work Look forward to reading more from you in the future.
Headspace recommended.
Some great plugins there. I’ve just installed some of them onto my new blog. Looks like the Enforce www. Preference plugin is now a core part of wordpress.
Thanks for this list, but now we’re at the end of 2009 and no comments have been posted for nearly two years, do you have any plans on updating your list?
All the best
Si
Hi dude, I have a WordPress comment plugin or standalone Web application to record, save and listen audio comments/messages.
Voice-it allows you to record voice messages and send it to you or your friends by mail as mp3 attachments.
You can use it in your website, on facebook or download the widget for other platform.
Try it and send us your message, or send a voice messages to your friend! Isn’t easy?
I hope you enjoy it.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/voice-it-record-and-send-voice/
or
Best
Thanks for the essay.
Can I put this essay to my general content site?
Thank you so much again.
Hi,
Are you using the wordpress mobile edition on your blog? I’ve just tried browsing with a couple of phones and got the web version instead of mobile!
I’ve created a mobile plugin for wordpress that makes sure every device in the world works as well as retaining SEO, keeps the same URLS from web to mobile and makes sure your mobile site looks as good as the web theme.
Version 1.3 has just been released – here are a few of the features available:
– dynamic resizing of images
– commenting on mobile
– customize each and every element!
The homepage can be found here: https://wordpress.org/plugins/wapple-architect/ – it’d be great to hear your feedback on it if you want to give it a go.
How about improving the WordPress search? My plugin Relevanssi makes the search work much better.
Very well written post however, I would recommend that you turn the No Follow off in your comment section.
Keep up the good work.
Hey, Thank you so much for your awesome post. This really help us wordpress noobs finding quality plugins for our sites. Best wishes!
Neat list.
Thanks for sharing.
i require plugins for making photo-blog site and other users can upload images
kinldy suggest
This is a really great post! I could really use a good login plugin. The one I’m using takes each new subscriber directly to my admin page when they login, I want them to go directly to my site’s home page…how do I do that?
Great list!
Nice to know the various solutions to the spam problem. however, I don’t see SpamTask listed, which I use myself. got it yesterday, and think it works better than my akismet did. I had about 1 spam message averagely a day passing through Akismet, and it sometimes caught a friend of mine. SpamTask has so far worked without mistakes. catches all spambots.
I think it’s worth adding to the list.
This is a great resource – Bookmarked!
Thanks so much, cheers
Thank you for this list. It not only gives me some plugins I was not aware of but organises them also.
Very valuable.
Alex
I see that you have Podpress in your list, which hasn’t been updated in over a year. I’ve developed an alternative called Blubrry Powerpress podcasting plugin that supports the latest version of WordPress 2.7+. You can check it out here: http://www.blubrry.com/powerpress/. You can also install it directly from WordPress, simply search for “powerpress” in the plugin search box in your WordPress plugins install page.
Nice list but I miss the security plugins?
Many thanks for this expansive and extremely well organised list of quality WP plugins.
One query – anyone know of a plugin that lets you invite email subscriptions to your blog at the end of every post (ie: it appears automatically at the end of each post)?
Cheers!
One of the BEST WordPress related articles for all level of WordPress Blog Users.
Thanks for sharing this great article.
Thanks Amit. I am glad you liked it.
great list… Thanks for taking the time to compile, its going to be very helpful
Thanks for a great article ! I’ve got a favored list of plugins I use for most of my sites, but this has opened my eyes to other options.
you should try WP-SEO-Snipper plugin. It’s an awesome SEO plugin.
Great list! Found another new plugin Im gonna use right away.
Cheers,
Jeremy
Just found this through a thread on the Warrior Forum. My compliments on providing such a comprehensive list of WordPress plugins and also thanks to the commenters who added their own favorites.
I am a big fan of the WebPurify Profanity Filter plugin for wordress. https://www.webpurify.com/cms-integrations/wordpress/
Thank you for the excellent article. There’s quite a few plugins that I’ve never heard of that sound really interesting. I do have to say that the wordpress backup is a god send. Plus there’s also a wordpress upgrade plugin too that updates your wordpress software automatically.
You can never have enough plugins. Thanks for adding to my ever plugin-heavy WordPress installs…
Whew! 50 plug-ins! That’s just so many. When is it going to come to the point when somebody says, “Hey, here’s the world’s simplest template with all the automatic plugins you need and it will help you retain an audience?”
Great list. I’ve used many of these. Anyone have a good sitemap plugin, not for google purposes but to have a nice index or table of contents?
nice post. :) very helpful. I downloaded some of the plugins you mention and used it on my blog. thanks for sharing.
Do these plugins still work in WordPress 2.6.2?
Great list of powerful plugins which i hadn’t noticed earlier. I’ve download few of them and bookmarked this page.
Thanks for sharing this. Cheers.
This is an awesome post. Thanks for writing it. I just recently added a whole bunch of these plugins to my wordpress blog.
i came here just for a couple of plugins, and instead i picked up some good usage for other plugins that im going to start using on all my blogs. ive only recently just started blogging and still learning as i go.
thanks for helpful post..:)
John Braman
This is amazing, I was looking for a list of best plugin for wordpress and here it is.
Thanks for sharing the resource :)
wow… nice wordpress resource..
i particularly liked the Admin Management Plugins.
thanks for posting.
The URL for Bad Behavior is wrong.
Good Tutorial! But is there any plugin to add the tags for the blog post?
Hello,
A comprehensive and detailed plugin collection. Some of them I will into the limelight and most of them are known to me or I use these plug-ins already.
Ad Rotator look I need. Thanks for the tips.
Alex greetings …
hi very nice collection need plugin for for masking posts. The content which is hidden can only be seen by registered user.Please help me out thaks
Great list.
I’d like to add retaggr. The wordpress plugin adds context to your blog posts and comments by providing an easy way to understand your community. It does this by providing you with a retaggr card – which is an interesting way of showing who you are, guaging credibility etc. Proper explanation and details at retaggr.com.
Great plugins!! I specially like the Permalinks Migration Plugin. I was planning how to change my permalink structure but this plugin will help me a lot, thanks for sharing!
Hi there,
Know anyone which plugin to use if I want only a part of the article to be displayed? If someone want to read more there will be a “read more” link…
On my blog right now is displayed all of article content and I don’t want this…
I’m talking about the latest 10 articles displayed on the first page of my blog.
I’m using WordPress.
Can anyone help?
One of the best plugins index.Better than the WordPress plugins site itself.Thank You
Some good suggestions here. I just used Google XML Sitemaps Generator and it did a great job. I also like the idea of the Theme Test Drive.
Another couple of plugins for your list, to improve WordPress’s rubbish search facility:
Search Everything – search pages, not just posts.
Search Reloaded – lists search results by relevance.
Good work in this post , I’m really inspired by your post and blog. Well and im a lot from here.
WordPress rocks, but wordpress with power pluggins will add more ammo to your ammunitions.
You will be twice as much stronger.
Cheers.
You could add to your list the new Divva plugin for WordPress: DivvaFlip
DivvaFlip 1.0 : make your photos galleries more glamorous with a flipping engine on your WordPress blog.
A very cool website with quality photos. it’s fun , easy and it’s free : so enjoy !
would be nice if the send email plugin could open in a pop up window and look like the one on the guardian newspaper!!
Wow, this is even better than the previous post about plugins I found on your blog. I am pretty excited about checking some of these plugins out and getting them setup on my blog.
I am new to blogging and have 13 readers on my blog now. Man, I am impressed with the amount of readers you have…
I need a jukebox plugins for the WP 2.3.1 Anybody have or who can wirte it for me?
Thanks for this great list. Also, some of these plugins won’t be needed with WordPress 2.5+ including “Full Text Feed”.
Just found this through one of the del.icio.us RSS feeds, and I’ve subscribed!
I’ve viewed dozens of these lists and usually don’t find anything new at all. You not only had some wordpress plugins I’d never heard of that do things I don’t currently have any solution for – but the way you categorized them and described them made it much easier to decide which ones I needed to download.
thanks – a great resource!
I would recommend my plugin, Yet Another Related Posts Plugin as an alternative to the Related Entries plugin. My new plugin does not require any SQL query or any tampering with theme files, and limits the number of related entries produced by a “relatedness” threshold rather than an arbitrary number of posts. Let me know if you have any questions!
mitcho
I just recently converted my site to WordPress and this will really help me save time searching for all the great plugins. Thanks!
I would also add WordPress automatic upgrade. It is a life saver on updating wordpress. I never used the upgrade plug-in that you mentioned.
I also like better comments manager too because I hate going back and responding to commenters in a particular post. With this plug-in you can enter right there in the comment section of wordpress.
One thing I have found,the more plug-ins the slower the site. Has anyone else found this too? Plus I need a popular article sidebar plug-in for Wp 2.3.2. I just want my most popular read article to show up on a side bar. Simple.
Any suggestions. I tried Alex King’s popularity plug-in. I want something that just shows up on the sidebar. Anna http://www.green-talk.com
What a great list! I’ve just started my blog, and this is just what I needed to find today. Thanks!
Great post with a great list of WordPress Plugins. I’m starting a new blog and now I have a great list of plugins to use. Thanks
You missed forum plugins… Best one is over at:
Simple Forum.
And now there’s a new forum plugin to the market:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/talki-embeddable-forums/#stats
great post to let every one know on one place what to choose rather than search for each one
You’ve saved me a ton of time by compiling and sharing this list. A couple of these plugins are going really helpful additions. Thank you!
The first plugin I now install on a new blog is “PlugInstaller”. Gets me out of ftp mode.
Thanks for this great list! I just finished installing the math comment spam plugin and am looking at a couple others to add as well. I’ve linked to this post on my site, this is valuable information!
This is an awesome list. Most of the plugins that I’m using are on this list. There are many more I could use, especially the RSS-related ones.
Great job :)
Great list, a lot to learn.
Somebody, please, explain why can’t I see at the WP Admin Page for Plugins the plugin I’ve uploaded to FTP? I can’t see it, I can’t activate it. Do I have to chmod anywhere?
Great list of add-ons, I just recently migrated by custom blog to WordPress so I’m in the business of finding random plugins right now. I’m trying not to get too carried away with features.
I have seen some sites that have entirely too many options that make everything a little confusing when all you want to do is read the post.
waw… there are so many useful plugins, thanks for the info.
Very finest Plugin Index.
If is so much importent.
goood Luck NN
I love plugins! I would also recommend StatsPress and WP-Polls, once traffic is beginning to build up. Both can be used to gain insight into your readers. Thanks for your list, which includes a number that are new to me. Especially like your brief description for each one — very helpful.
I’m interesting in a plugin to serve geo located ads. Any idea ?
A fantastic list which is well worth bookmarking!
My Favs are:-
– All in one SE
– Google XML sitemap
Jamie
I believe the best plugin for inserting adsense into posts is the “All in One Adsense and YPN” plugin:
http://linewbie.com/wordpress-plugins/all-in-one-adsense-and-ypn
Thanks a lot for this list. I never knew the existence of Google Analytics and Feedburner Reports plugin…
Hope you will make more list like this one in future.
– Abdul Rahman
Timeless post, it is going to my bookmarks… keep rocking!
additions
Trackback Validator – *extremely* valuable – highly underutilized
http://seclab.cs.rice.edu/projects/
WordPress PDA – makes simple mobile phone site
https://www.imthi.com/wp-pda
attribtuion link welcomed :)
WordPress rocks, but wordpress with power pluggins will add more ammo to your ammunitions.
You will be twice as much stronger.
Cheers.
Respect, thanks and tausend Dank!
This plug-ins are really very helpful for high-quality content management!
Im writing the same article about Joomla CMS extentions, which are helpful for easy and semiautomated Joomla Blogging. There are not many plattforms, which give so much extentions and freedom on publishing methods as WordPress and Joomla CMS.
I second the suggestion of Custom Query String. Great list though. Very helpful.
Custom Query String – set the number of posts (custom queries) for every single page on your website like categories, archives, or search results pages.