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wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “bleeding edge”

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 “bleeding edge”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 5 of the top 20. 3 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

Elementor Beta (Developer Edition) shows at wp.org #4 but places #11 on merit, a gap of 7 places. Its 30K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 5.0★ average from 3 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Gutenberg 400K+ · 2.1★ (3885) wp.org #1 2 J jQuery Updater 20K+ · 4.5★ (64) wp.org #2 3 BuddyPress 90K+ · 4.1★ (375) wp.org #6 3 too low 4 WordPress Beta Tester 2K+ · 4.0★ (47) wp.org #3 1 too high 5 Groundhogg — CRM, Newsletters, and Marketing Automation 2K+ · 4.9★ (149) wp.org #5 6 Block Visibility — Conditional Visibility Control for the Block Editor 40K+ · 4.9★ (108) wp.org #8 2 too low 7 WP YouTube Lyte 20K+ · 4.8★ (206) wp.org #10 3 too low 8 WPGraphQL 30K+ · 4.9★ (48) wp.org #9 1 too low 9 U Update Control 4K+ · 4.4★ (17) wp.org #7 2 too high 10 WP Engine GeoTarget 300+ · 3.6★ (15) wp.org #11 1 too low 11 Elementor Beta (Developer Edition) 30K+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #4 7 too high 12 W WordPressIgniter 10+ · 4.2★ (5) wp.org #19 ↓1 7 too low 13 M MYF Fleet Booking Widget — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #13 14 UTS Sites Table of Contents — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #14 15 DecoBlocks — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #15 16 Email and SMS marketing for WordPress by DailyStory 20+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #12 4 too high 17 Seomedseb Smart Search for WooCommerce — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #16 1 too high 18 F Faster Smilies — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #20 ↓1 2 too low 19 Disable Automatic Updates – Enable/Disable core, plugins, themes, translation updates 100+ · 2.3★ (3) wp.org #17 ↓1 2 too high 20 O Ooyala 10+ · 1.8★ (4) wp.org #18 ↓1 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.