Plugin Pulse Beta
← Rankings

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

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 “crawl”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 11 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

Crawl Hunt – Advanced SEO Optimization Tool shows at wp.org #6 but places #21 on merit, a gap of 15 places. Its 40+ 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

Blackhole for Bad Bots places #9 on merit, 4.7★ from 148 reviews, but shows at wp.org #22. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Yoast SEO – Advanced SEO with real-time guidance and built-in AI 10M+ · 4.8★ (27821) wp.org #1 2 Better Robots.txt – AI-Ready Crawl Control & Bot Governance 5K+ · 4.5★ (102) wp.org #2 3 All in One SEO – AI SEO Plugin to Boost SEO Rankings & Traffic (Schema, Local SEO, Sitemap & SEO Insights) 2M+ · 4.7★ (5231) wp.org #4 ↑1 1 too low 4 Broken Link Checker 500K+ · 3.8★ (605) wp.org #3 1 too high 5 404 to 301 – Redirect Manager, 301 Redirection, 404 Error Logs & 404 Monitoring 100K+ · 4.7★ (321) wp.org #11 ↓1 6 too low 6 Make Column Clickable for Elementor 100K+ · 4.9★ (53) wp.org #10 ↓2 4 too low 7 SmartCrawl SEO checker, analyzer & optimizer 10K+ · 4.8★ (171) wp.org #14 ↑1 7 too low 8 Booter – Bots & Crawlers Manager 7K+ · 4.7★ (12) wp.org #5 ↑1 3 too high 9 Blackhole for Bad Bots 30K+ · 4.7★ (148) wp.org #22 ↑1 13 too low 10 Broken Link Checker by AIOSEO – Find & Fix Broken Internal, External & Video Links 200K+ · 3.8★ (87) wp.org #13 3 too low 11 SEO Redirection Plugin – 301 Redirect Manager 10K+ · 4.3★ (73) wp.org #20 9 too low 12 404 Solution 10K+ · 4.9★ (44) wp.org #23 ↓6 11 too low 13 ReCrawler 3K+ · 5.0★ (11) wp.org #12 ↓1 1 too high 14 H HTTP 410 (Gone) responses 4K+ · 4.6★ (21) wp.org #16 2 too low 15 Block AI Crawlers 2K+ · 4.4★ (8) wp.org #7 8 too high 16 Staatic – Static Site Generator for WordPress 3K+ · 4.4★ (21) wp.org #21 5 too low 17 Sitemap Generator 3K+ · 3.7★ (23) wp.org #19 ↑1 2 too low 18 A Add Featured Image to RSS Feed 2K+ · 4.3★ (12) wp.org #17 ↑1 1 too high 19 AJ Agent Crawl Optimizer – AI Readiness Scanner & llms.txt for WordPress 30+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #8 ↑1 11 too high 20 Link Checker 4K+ · 3.2★ (30) wp.org #18 ↑1 2 too high 21 Crawl Hunt – Advanced SEO Optimization Tool 40+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #6 ↓2 15 too high 22 Adriano GEO Context and Crawl Monitor 20+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #9 ↑3 13 too high 23 Lead Generation Contact Widget & AI Chatbot: Chat Button, Phone Call, Telegram, Email – SiteLeads 10K+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #24 1 too low 24 Static Porter 100+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #15 ↓1 9 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.