Plugin Pulse Beta
← Rankings

wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “continuous”

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 “continuous”, we and wp.org disagree on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 14 of the top 20. 5 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

Continuous PDF Viewer shows at wp.org #8 but places #24 on merit, a gap of 16 places. Its 10+ installs carry it up the search order; its 2.0★ average from 1 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

Cookiebot – Cookie Banner & Cookie Consent for GDPR, CCPA & Google Consent Mode places #8 on merit, 4.4★ from 440 reviews, but shows at wp.org #18. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Elementor Website Builder – more than just a page builder 10M+ · 4.5★ (7323) wp.org #2 1 too low 2 BlogVault Backup & Staging 80K+ · 4.6★ (332) wp.org #4 2 too low 3 Strong Testimonials 80K+ · 4.8★ (614) wp.org #10 ↑1 7 too low 4 Image Ticker & Logo Slider – Continuous Auto-Scroll Carousel with Lightbox 1K+ · 3.6★ (9) wp.org #1 3 too high 5 AudioIgniter Music Player 10K+ · 4.6★ (64) wp.org #6 ↑2 1 too low 6 Smash Balloon Social Photo Feed – Easy Social Feeds Plugin 1M+ · 4.9★ (4358) wp.org #12 ↓5 6 too low 7 PWA for WP – Progressive Web Apps Made Simple 10K+ · 4.6★ (230) wp.org #14 7 too low 8 Cookiebot – Cookie Banner & Cookie Consent for GDPR, CCPA & Google Consent Mode 100K+ · 4.4★ (440) wp.org #18 ↓6 10 too low 9 Block Visibility — Conditional Visibility Control for the Block Editor 40K+ · 4.9★ (108) wp.org #17 ↑1 8 too low 10 Marquee Addons for Elementor – Essential Motion Widgets & Templates 20K+ · 5.0★ (6) wp.org #3 7 too high 11 Username Changer 40K+ · 4.3★ (77) wp.org #13 2 too low 12 Podcast Importer SecondLine 4K+ · 4.8★ (13) wp.org #7 ↑2 5 too high 13 Advanced Marquee Effect for Elementor – Smooth Marquee, News Ticker, Image Box & Icon Box Marquee 2K+ · 4.7★ (6) wp.org #5 ↑1 8 too high 14 Real3D Flipbook – 3D Flipbook, PDF Flipbook, PDF Viewer, PDF Embedder 10K+ · 4.5★ (11) wp.org #11 ↓1 3 too high 15 Vertical News Scroller 5K+ · 4.3★ (17) wp.org #21 6 too low 16 Image Ticker Carousel | by Creavi 500+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #9 ↑7 7 too high 17 Vertical Image Slider – Responsive Thumbnail Slider with Lightbox 1K+ · 4.9★ (7) wp.org #16 ↑1 1 too high 18 Tockify Events Calendar 2K+ · 4.5★ (20) wp.org #23 5 too low 19 NOWPayments for WooCommerce – Crypto Payment Gateway 3K+ · 4.1★ (16) wp.org #22 3 too low 20 Automatic Internal Links for SEO by Pagup 1K+ · 3.0★ (8) wp.org #15 5 too high 21 Push Notifications for WP – Self Hosted Web Push Notifications 6K+ · 4.2★ (5) wp.org #24 3 too low 22 Gridable 4K+ · 2.9★ (10) wp.org #20 2 too high 23 Auto Focus Keyword for SEO 2K+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #19 4 too high 24 Continuous PDF Viewer 10+ · 2.0★ (1) wp.org #8 ↓3 16 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.