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

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 “digitalocean”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 7 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

FV Player 8 shows at wp.org #14 but places #24 on merit, a gap of 10 places. Its 1K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 4.0★ average from 2 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

Sunshine Photo Cart – Client Photo Gallery & Photo Proofing for Photographers places #11 on merit, 4.7★ from 138 reviews, but shows at wp.org #17. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 WPvivid — Backup, Migration & Staging 900K+ · 4.9★ (1568) wp.org #1 2 Advanced Media Offloader – Offload Media to Amazon S3, Cloudflare R2, DigitalOcean Spaces & More 7K+ · 4.7★ (48) wp.org #2 3 Migrate Guru – Site Migration & Cloning 200K+ · 4.9★ (1645) wp.org #5 ↓1 2 too low 4 Duplicator – Backups & Migration Plugin – Cloud Backups, Scheduled Backups, & More 1M+ · 4.9★ (4940) wp.org #4 ↑1 5 WP Offload Media Lite for Amazon S3, DigitalOcean Spaces, and Google Cloud Storage 30K+ · 3.7★ (115) wp.org #3 2 too high 6 Advanced File Manager – Ultimate File Manager for WordPress And Document Library Solution 100K+ · 4.8★ (441) wp.org #10 ↓2 4 too low 7 Backuply – Backup, Restore, Migrate and Clone 600K+ · 4.5★ (135) wp.org #6 1 too high 8 SpinupWP 30K+ · 5.0★ (13) wp.org #7 1 too high 9 Offload Media – Cloud Storage 1K+ · 4.4★ (18) wp.org #8 ↑3 1 too high 10 Media Cloud Sync 1K+ · 4.9★ (13) wp.org #9 1 too high 11 Sunshine Photo Cart – Client Photo Gallery & Photo Proofing for Photographers 1K+ · 4.7★ (138) wp.org #17 6 too low 12 Infinite Uploads – Offload, Optimize & Organize Your Media Library 800+ · 4.4★ (20) wp.org #20 ↓1 8 too low 13 Video Player Block – play videos beautifully on any device 2K+ · 5.0★ (8) wp.org #15 2 too low 14 Upcasted S3 Offload – AWS S3, DigitalOcean Spaces, Backblaze, MinIO Storage Integration 200+ · 3.4★ (10) wp.org #11 ↓1 3 too high 15 External files in Media Library 500+ · 5.0★ (4) wp.org #13 ↑1 2 too high 16 FlyWP Helper – Page Cache, Page Optimization, Emails for FlyWP Server Control Panel 4K+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #12 4 too high 17 Storage for Woo via S3-Compatible 100+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #16 ↓1 1 too high 18 Storage for EDD via S3-Compatible 10+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #22 ↓2 4 too low 19 CAPI Suite: Meta Pixel, Pinterest & TikTok for WooCommerce 100+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #24 ↓1 5 too low 20 SmartSync Lite 10+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #19 ↑3 1 too high 21 King SMTP – Email Log & Delivery 20+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #21 ↓5 22 A Alios Media Offload 10+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #18 4 too high 23 CloudSync Master – Offload Media to S3, Cloudflare R2 & Google Cloud 20+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #23 ↓2 24 FV Player 8 1K+ · 4.0★ (2) wp.org #14 ↓1 10 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.