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← Rankings

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

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 “humanities”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 6 of the top 20. 7 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

Vampire Character Manager shows at wp.org #10 but places #16 on merit, a gap of 6 places. Its 10+ 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.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Wired Impact Volunteer Management 1K+ · 4.8★ (24) wp.org #1 ↑1 2 hCaptcha for WP 70K+ · 4.6★ (88) wp.org #2 ↓1 3 WP eCards – Branded Digital Greeting Cards 300+ · 4.4★ (26) wp.org #3 4 C Commons In A Box 20+ · 5.0★ (9) wp.org #4 5 Cue by AudioTheme.com 5K+ · 4.7★ (36) wp.org #11 6 too low 6 Alpaca Issue Tracker 100+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #5 1 too high 7 AI Image Generator – Easy image creation with AI 100+ · 4.5★ (8) wp.org #12 5 too low 8 The Pope Video 50+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #7 1 too high 9 Reviewer 2 Academic Rejection Stamps & Verdict Widgets — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #8 1 too high 10 PlacePress 30+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #6 4 too high 11 Checkout Firewall for WooCommerce — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #9 2 too high 12 Rich Meta in RDFa 10+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #13 1 too low 13 H Howdy Against Humanity 10+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #20 ↑1 7 too low 14 Prospect 10+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #15 ↑1 1 too low 15 Z ZERVUS — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #16 ↑1 1 too low 16 Vampire Character Manager 10+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #10 6 too high 17 Diviner Archive 10+ · 4.0★ (1) wp.org #14 ↑1 3 too high 18 D DH Press – Digital Humanities Toolkit 10+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #17 ↑1 1 too high 19 H Humanity — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #18 ↑1 1 too high 20 Persistent Forking (WordPress plugin) — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #19 ↑1 1 too high 21 Dexs.Counter 10+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #22 ↑1 1 too low 22 F Fancy Captcha 20+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #21 ↑1 1 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.