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wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “button maker”

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 “button maker”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 8 of the top 20.

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 the install base is organic or host-pushed, and its risk of being pulled.

Ranked above its merit

MainWP Key Maker shows at wp.org #8 but places #20 on merit, a gap of 12 places. Its 3K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 4.2★ average from 5 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

Anti-Spam, Spam FireWall by CleanTalk places #8 on merit, 4.8★ from 3221 reviews, but shows at wp.org #16. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Quiz Maker by AYS 20K+ · 4.9★ (601) wp.org #1 ↑1 2 Popup Maker – Boost Sales, Conversions, Optins, Subscribers with the Ultimate WP Popup Builder 600K+ · 4.9★ (4514) wp.org #2 ↓1 3 WP Recipe Maker 50K+ · 5.0★ (356) wp.org #3 4 Quiz and Survey Master (QSM) – Quiz Maker & Survey Maker 40K+ · 4.7★ (1282) wp.org #5 ↑2 1 too low 5 Form Maker by 10Web – Mobile-Friendly Drag & Drop Contact Form Builder 30K+ · 4.5★ (778) wp.org #6 ↓1 1 too low 6 Popup Maker – Responsive popup, Exit Intent Pop up, Email Optins, Autoresponder & More 7K+ · 4.5★ (144) wp.org #4 2 too high 7 Survey Maker by AYS 5K+ · 4.8★ (79) wp.org #7 ↓3 8 Anti-Spam, Spam FireWall by CleanTalk 200K+ · 4.8★ (3221) wp.org #16 ↓1 8 too low 9 Newsletter – Send awesome emails from WordPress 200K+ · 4.6★ (1205) wp.org #15 6 too low 10 Popup Builder & Popup Maker for WordPress – OptinMonster Email Marketing and Lead Generation 1M+ · 4.3★ (821) wp.org #10 ↓5 11 Buttonizer – Floating Menus, Sticky Buttons, & Popup Builder 70K+ · 4.5★ (151) wp.org #11 12 Poll Maker by AYS – Versus Polls, Anonymous Polls, Image Polls 6K+ · 4.4★ (91) wp.org #9 ↓1 3 too high 13 Quiz Maker, Poll Maker & Survey Maker by Opinion Stage 6K+ · 4.4★ (277) wp.org #13 ↓1 14 Buttonizer – Social Media Share Buttons, Social Icons, & Social Feeds 40K+ · 4.8★ (396) wp.org #19 ↓1 5 too low 15 Popup Builder – Create highly converting, mobile friendly marketing popups. 200K+ · 4.7★ (2215) wp.org #24 9 too low 16 FluentSMTP – WP Mail SMTP Plugin with Amazon SES, SendGrid, Mailgun, Postmark, Cloudflare, toSend, Gmail and Any SMTP 700K+ · 4.8★ (410) wp.org #17 ↓3 1 too low 17 Buttonizer – Live Chat, AI Chatbot, Call, Chat, Contact Button 50K+ · 5.0★ (23) wp.org #12 ↓1 5 too high 18 AI Infographic Maker 600+ · 4.4★ (17) wp.org #14 ↓1 4 too high 19 Easy MCP AI – Connect Claude to WordPress: MCP Server for ChatGPT & AI Agents 30K+ · 4.9★ (16) wp.org #20 ↑3 1 too low 20 MainWP Key Maker 3K+ · 4.2★ (5) wp.org #8 ↑1 12 too high 21 WPB Popup for Contact Form 7 – Showing Contact Form 7 Popup on Button Click 5K+ · 4.6★ (16) wp.org #23 ↓4 2 too low 22 Coupon & Discount Code Reveal Button 1K+ · 5.0★ (4) wp.org #21 ↓4 1 too high 23 Modal Popup Box — Popup Maker & Popup Builder 2K+ · 3.5★ (10) wp.org #18 ↓2 5 too high 24 Testimonial Customer Feedback 1K+ · 4.0★ (4) wp.org #22 ↓2 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.