Plugin Pulse Beta
← Rankings

wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “ads.txt”

wp.org orders by popularity, so a plugin a host bundled onto millions of sites, or a big-brand one that's slow and mediocre, can sit at the top. Our ranking is built to answer a different question: which of these is actually worth installing. How this works →

For “ads.txt”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 16 of the top 20. 2 plugins are pushed down for signals wp.org ignores: errors, a host-installed base, or removal risk.

wp.org search ranks on

Install count (uncapped), the raw star average, freshness, and support. Popularity dominates, so the biggest install base usually wins regardless of how it got there.

We add

A cap on the install boost, volume-weighted ratings, and signals wp.org can't see: whether it throws errors on current PHP, whether the install base is organic or host-pushed, and its risk of being pulled.

Ranked above its merit

Snack Ads.txt shows at wp.org #9 but places #20 on merit, a gap of 11 places. Its 100+ installs carry it up the search order; its 5.0★ average from 1 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

FluentSnippets – High-Performance Code Snippets, Header & Footer Code, Custom CSS & PHP Code Manager places #9 on merit, 4.7★ from 78 reviews, but shows at wp.org #21. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Ads.txt Manager 100K+ · 4.7★ (15) wp.org #1 2 Advanced Ads – Ad Manager & AdSense 90K+ · 4.9★ (1463) wp.org #5 3 too low 3 Ad Inserter – Ad Manager & AdSense Ads 300K+ · 4.9★ (2433) wp.org #7 4 too low 4 Ads.txt & App-ads.txt Manager for WordPress 2K+ · 4.8★ (48) wp.org #2 2 too high 5 Admin and Site Enhancements (ASE) 200K+ · 5.0★ (423) wp.org #8 3 too low 6 Quads Ads Manager for Google AdSense 20K+ · 4.9★ (1087) wp.org #12 6 too low 7 Better Robots.txt – AI-Ready Crawl Control & Bot Governance 5K+ · 4.5★ (102) wp.org #14 7 too low 8 Ads.txt File Manager By Magicbid 2K+ · 5.0★ (5) wp.org #3 5 too high 9 FluentSnippets – High-Performance Code Snippets, Header & Footer Code, Custom CSS & PHP Code Manager 50K+ · 4.7★ (78) wp.org #21 12 too low 10 AdRotate Banner Manager 20K+ · 4.3★ (655) wp.org #20 10 too low 11 Ads.txt and App-Ads.txt – AdEnergizer 400+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #4 7 too high 12 WPMasterToolKit (WPMTK) – All in one plugin 5K+ · 5.0★ (28) wp.org #18 6 too low 13 Wp-Insert 9K+ · 4.5★ (142) wp.org #19 6 too low 14 Ezoic 10K+ · 3.3★ (53) wp.org #15 1 too low 15 AdFlow – Ad Inserter & Ad Manager: AdSense, Banner Ads & ads.txt 3K+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #6 9 too high 16 Actirise – Advertising & Monetization 200+ · 5.0★ (13) wp.org #24 8 too low 17 Raptive Ads 6K+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #10 7 too high 18 Mediavine Control Panel 10K+ · 4.2★ (5) wp.org #13 5 too high 19 Easy Google AdSense 5K+ · 4.3★ (7) wp.org #17 2 too high 20 Snack Ads.txt 100+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #9 11 too high 21 ads.txt Guru Connect 70+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #16 5 too high 22 Ads.txt Manager 3K+ · 3.5★ (2) wp.org #11 11 too high 23 Ad Engine – Gerenciador de Adx, Adsense e AdManager 100+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #23 24 IntentDeep Virtual Files – AI-Ready: Robots.txt, Security.txt, Ads.txt, LLMS.txt 30+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #22 2 too high

Merit ranking caps the install boost at 1M (wp.org leaves it uncapped), replaces the raw star average with a volume-weighted Bayesian score and a Wilson lower bound, and keeps wp.org's own freshness and compatibility decays. Method from the plugin-directory source; see Meta Trac #8298. Positions are tracked daily from the first visit to a keyword, so the small arrows show movement since tracking began.