Plugin Pulse Beta
← Rankings

wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “full integration”

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 “full integration”, we and wp.org disagree on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 11 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

Stripe Payment Forms by WP Full Pay – Accept Credit Card Payments, Donations & Subscriptions shows at wp.org #8 but places #15 on merit, a gap of 7 places. Its 8K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 4.2★ average from 26 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

Rank Math SEO – AI SEO Tools to Dominate SEO Rankings places #7 on merit, 4.8★ from 7520 reviews, but shows at wp.org #11. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Complianz GDPR/CCPA Cookie Consent Banner 1M+ · 4.7★ (1667) wp.org #2 ↑3 1 too low 2 Yoast SEO – Advanced SEO with real-time guidance and built-in AI 10M+ · 4.8★ (27820) wp.org #3 1 too low 3 Culqi Full Integracion 300+ · 4.9★ (10) wp.org #1 2 too high 4 WooCommerce 7M+ · 4.5★ (4833) wp.org #5 ↓3 1 too low 5 Forminator Forms – Contact Form, Payment Form & Custom Form Builder 600K+ · 4.8★ (2144) wp.org #6 1 too low 6 Wordfence Security – Firewall, Malware Scan, and Login Security 5M+ · 4.7★ (5040) wp.org #9 3 too low 7 Rank Math SEO – AI SEO Tools to Dominate SEO Rankings 4M+ · 4.8★ (7520) wp.org #11 ↓1 4 too low 8 Tracking and Consent Manager – WP Full Picture 3K+ · 5.0★ (21) wp.org #4 4 too high 9 Advanced Form Integration — Connect Forms to 300+ Apps 9K+ · 4.8★ (91) wp.org #7 2 too high 10 WPForms – AI Form Builder for WordPress – Contact Forms, Payment Forms, Survey Form, Quiz & More 5M+ · 4.8★ (14387) wp.org #14 4 too low 11 Elementor Website Builder – more than just a page builder 10M+ · 4.5★ (7322) wp.org #13 2 too low 12 Hyyan Integration for WooCommerce and Polylang 8K+ · 4.7★ (124) wp.org #12 13 Bit integrations – Form Integration, Webhook, Spreadsheets, CRM, LMS & Email Automation 20K+ · 4.9★ (160) wp.org #15 ↑1 2 too low 14 All in One SEO – AI SEO Plugin to Boost SEO Rankings & Traffic (Schema, Local SEO, Sitemap & SEO Insights) 2M+ · 4.7★ (5231) wp.org #20 ↓3 6 too low 15 Stripe Payment Forms by WP Full Pay – Accept Credit Card Payments, Donations & Subscriptions 8K+ · 4.2★ (26) wp.org #8 7 too high 16 FluentSMTP – WP Mail SMTP Plugin with Amazon SES, SendGrid, Mailgun, Postmark, Cloudflare, toSend, Gmail and Any SMTP 700K+ · 4.8★ (410) wp.org #23 7 too low 17 S SQLite Database Integration 5K+ · 4.6★ (12) wp.org #10 ↑1 7 too high 18 Sentry for WordPress 10K+ · 4.9★ (16) wp.org #21 ↑1 3 too low 19 GTM Kit – Google Tag Manager & GA4 integration 30K+ · 4.8★ (20) wp.org #22 ↑2 3 too low 20 Dynamics 365 Integration 500+ · 4.7★ (13) wp.org #16 ↑2 4 too high 21 Personio Integration Light 200+ · 4.9★ (7) wp.org #18 ↑2 3 too high 22 LLMs.txt and LLMs-Full.txt Generator 4K+ · 5.0★ (7) wp.org #19 3 too high 23 Tutor LMS BunnyNet Integration 1K+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #24 1 too low 24 FS for WP – FullStory.com Integration 100+ · 3.5★ (2) wp.org #17 ↑4 7 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.