Widget Output Cache

How well this listing is tuned to rank in WordPress.org search, on the factors an owner controls. Not popularity, optimization.

Directory searches this plugin turns up in, and which way each one is moving. WordPress.org publishes no history of search positions, so this starts the day we first tracked a keyword and never backfills.

Not enough tracked days yet to call a direction. Momentum needs at least three keywords measured a week or more apart.

wp.org is where the directory puts the plugin for that search. On merit is where it would sit if results were ranked on rating, support and updates, without the install boost. The last column is how far the wp.org position moved, from our first reading in the last 90 days to the latest.

6 searches this plugin appeared in over the last 90 days, 3 listed. 3 left out as unrelated or noise (years, numbers, stray words). 4 of its tags aren't in the top 24 for their own search.

Directory rank

Ranked about #11,300 to #12,900, alongside the other plugins at 200+ installs. Plugins with the same install count swap places between wp.org requests, so this is where most of them sit. Checked monthly, last on 21 Oct 2026.

How often this plugin actually ships. A steady rhythm is the maintenance signal a single "last updated" date can't show.

Share of active installs on each version of this plugin · 100% run the current release. Green is the current release; a big slice on older versions is a user base that has stopped updating.

Crossed into this band 8 months ago; a band this size takes about a year or more to cross, which places it about 50% of the way through.

1. ★★★★★ 18TommyBoy

   2.9y ago

   LiteSpeed has not integrated this yet, superb thing to it!

   Read on wp.org ↗
2. ★★★★★ Antony Booker

   10.3y ago

   Great plugin. Does it what is says and can really help give that extra speed boost. It even refreshes the cache when a widget is saved. On first installation I would recommend increasing the cache time from the default 12 minutes, using the below filter: add_filter( ‘widget_output_cache_ttl’, ‘widget_cache_custom_ttl’, 10, 2 ); function widget_cache_custom_ttl( $ttl ) { $ttl = 3600 * 24; // 24 hours return $ttl; }

   Read on wp.org ↗
3. ★★★★★ Skylightit

   10.4y ago

   We use various plugins to produce our support site with 200+ pages, widgets that pull information from our sub sites at support.skylightit.com. We are using caching, varnish and various server side and WP plugins. Our issue was that some of the custom widgets were impacting the sites performance and this just improved it. So that you to the developers for awesome work.

   Read on wp.org ↗
4. ★★★★★ menesme

   10.7y ago

   This is good plugin. Simple and easy to use although improved performance in my sites. But it has not been updated for a year. Is update yet?

   Read on wp.org ↗
5. ★★★★★ ikester7579

   10.9y ago

   If you have widgets with pics or animation, this plugin allows everything in it to be cached. Widgets do not cache normally. This even adds a little check box to not cache certain ones of you run things in there that constantly change If you do change something and just need to clear the cache just for the widget to see what it looks like. Just hit the widget save button and the changes take place. So if you have a CDN local or off site set up, the widgets will now be included in that cache Sped up my webpage big time because I use widgets that download the latest posts from 5 Face Book pages on the same subject but different information. Because that’s all cached now and does not change for 24 hours (how I have it set up in the FB feed through another plugin) the FB information is cached and loads quickly instead of waiting for FB servers to send it.. This topic was modified 9 years, 8 months ago by ikester7579.

   Read on wp.org ↗
6. ★★★★★ General Seed

   13.3y ago

   Thanks , it works very fine, fine. Please keep update Great plugin This topic was modified 9 years, 5 months ago by General Seed. This topic was modified 9 years, 5 months ago by General Seed.

   Read on wp.org ↗
7. ★★★★★ Ryan Hellyer

   13.6y ago

   This is a very simple but effective plugin. Most of the time you don’t need your widgets to be updated on every page load, so caching them makes a lot of sense. The code is nice and lean, so it’s easy to see how this thing works. Since it uses a transient, you still get a performance boost even when on shared hosting, which is a nice addition. EDIT: Addition of menus now makes it doubly awesome 🙂

   Read on wp.org ↗

Automated install-time checks, tested on PHP 7.2.16 · WP 5.3

Whether ChatGPT and Claude name this plugin when asked the category question, and whether the readme gives them something to quote.

Not measured yet for this plugin’s topics. Its tracked searches are not among the measured topics. See the topics measured so far.

Growth timeline

Install-tier crossings we have observed, and how long each tier took to outgrow

1. 2026-03-04 300+ → 200+ down after 1 days in tier
2. 2026-03-03 200+ → 300+ up after 89 days in tier
3. 2025-12-04 300+ → 200+ down after 415 days in tier
4. 2024-10-15 400+ → 300+ down after 2 days in tier
5. 2024-10-13 300+ → 400+ up after 2 days in tier
6. 2024-10-11 400+ → 300+ down after 1 days in tier
7. 2024-10-10 300+ → 400+ up after 1 days in tier
8. 2024-10-09 400+ → 300+ down after 1 days in tier

Competes with

The plugins that solve the same job, ranked by shared tags then reach, closest match first. The letter on the right is each plugin's health grade (A best, F worst).

Embed this report card

Drop a live Pulse card for Widget Output Cache into a readme, a review or a deck. It updates itself.

Widget Output Cache: 200+ active installs, 4.9★ (7 reviews). Plugin Pulse (WP Mayor), as of 2026-11-01. https://plugins.wpmayor.com/plugin/widget-output-cache