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← Rankings

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

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 “licenses”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 9 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

License For Envato shows at wp.org #2 but places #18 on merit, a gap of 16 places. Its 9K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 5.0★ average from 2 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

WP Mail SMTP by WPForms – SMTP for Reliable Email Delivery with Gmail, Outlook, Amazon SES, Brevo, Other SMTP & More places #6 on merit, 4.8★ from 5209 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 UpdraftPlus: WP Backup & Migration Plugin 4M+ · 4.8★ (8706) wp.org #1 2 TablePress – Tables in WordPress made easy 600K+ · 5.0★ (4625) wp.org #4 2 too low 3 License Manager for WooCommerce 6K+ · 4.6★ (147) wp.org #3 4 TranslatePress – Translate Multilingual sites with AI Translation 400K+ · 4.7★ (1667) wp.org #6 2 too low 5 Advanced Ads – Ad Manager & AdSense 90K+ · 4.9★ (1463) wp.org #9 4 too low 6 WP Mail SMTP by WPForms – SMTP for Reliable Email Delivery with Gmail, Outlook, Amazon SES, Brevo, Other SMTP & More 4M+ · 4.8★ (5209) wp.org #11 5 too low 7 Spectra Legacy – Gutenberg Blocks 1M+ · 4.7★ (1872) wp.org #8 1 too low 8 Translate WordPress with GTranslate 900K+ · 4.9★ (4962) wp.org #12 ↑1 4 too low 9 Digital License Manager 800+ · 4.7★ (30) wp.org #5 4 too high 10 Under Construction 600K+ · 4.8★ (1285) wp.org #14 ↓4 4 too low 11 Software License Manager 900+ · 4.6★ (35) wp.org #7 4 too high 12 BackWPup – WordPress Backup & Restore Plugin 400K+ · 4.0★ (1323) wp.org #10 ↓1 2 too high 13 Rank Math SEO – AI SEO Tools to Dominate SEO Rankings 4M+ · 4.8★ (7519) wp.org #20 ↓1 7 too low 14 Maintenance 1M+ · 4.4★ (869) wp.org #13 ↓1 1 too high 15 Easy Digital Downloads – eCommerce Payments and Subscriptions made easy 40K+ · 4.7★ (591) wp.org #21 ↑1 6 too low 16 ManageWP Worker 1M+ · 4.6★ (679) wp.org #16 ↓1 17 Disable Comments 1M+ · 4.7★ (281) wp.org #17 18 License For Envato 9K+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #2 16 too high 19 Duplicator – Backups & Migration Plugin – Cloud Backups, Scheduled Backups, & More 1M+ · 4.9★ (4940) wp.org #19 ↓1 20 Schema & Structured Data for WP & AMP 100K+ · 4.5★ (252) wp.org #18 ↓1 2 too high 21 Serial Numbers – Ultimate License Manager for Selling, Licensing & Securely Delivering Digital Content with WooCommerce 1K+ · 4.7★ (78) wp.org #15 ↓1 6 too high 22 MxChat – AI Chatbot & Content Generation for WordPress 2K+ · 5.0★ (31) wp.org #23 1 too low 23 Snow Monkey Blocks 30K+ · 4.4★ (7) wp.org #22 ↓1 1 too high 24 Lemon Squeezy — Sell Digital Products, Subscriptions, and Licenses 500+ · 3.7★ (3) wp.org #24 ↓3

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.