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wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “mail fix”

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 “mail fix”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 6 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

Zoho Mail for WordPress shows at wp.org #5 but places #11 on merit, a gap of 6 places. Its 20K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 3.7★ average from 42 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

Newsletter – Send awesome emails from WordPress places #12 on merit, 4.6★ from 1205 reviews, but shows at wp.org #21. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 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 #1 2 FluentSMTP – WP Mail SMTP Plugin with Amazon SES, SendGrid, Mailgun, Postmark, Cloudflare, toSend, Gmail and Any SMTP 700K+ · 4.8★ (410) wp.org #2 3 WP Mail Logging 300K+ · 4.7★ (375) wp.org #3 4 Mail logging & Catcher 20K+ · 4.9★ (108) wp.org #4 5 Mail Mint – Email Marketing, Automation & WooCommerce Emails with AI Assistance 4K+ · 4.7★ (125) wp.org #6 ↑1 1 too low 6 Post SMTP – Complete Email Delivery and SMTP Solution with Email Logs, Alerts, Backup SMTP & Mobile App 300K+ · 4.7★ (528) wp.org #9 3 too low 7 Email Template Designer – WP HTML Mail 20K+ · 4.8★ (87) wp.org #7 ↓1 8 Check & Log Email – Easy Email Testing & Mail logging 90K+ · 4.8★ (292) wp.org #10 ↑2 2 too low 9 Smush – Image Optimization, Compression, Lazy Load, WebP & CDN 1M+ · 4.8★ (6053) wp.org #14 5 too low 10 Manage Notification E-mails 100K+ · 4.8★ (56) wp.org #8 ↑2 2 too high 11 Zoho Mail for WordPress 20K+ · 3.7★ (42) wp.org #5 6 too high 12 Newsletter – Send awesome emails from WordPress 200K+ · 4.6★ (1205) wp.org #21 9 too low 13 Preview E-mails for WooCommerce 20K+ · 4.9★ (85) wp.org #15 ↑1 2 too low 14 Broken Link Checker by AIOSEO – Find & Fix Broken Internal, External & Video Links 200K+ · 3.8★ (87) wp.org #13 ↓2 1 too high 15 Ultimate WP Mail 700+ · 4.5★ (21) wp.org #11 ↑2 4 too high 16 Solid Mail – SMTP email and logging made by SolidWP 60K+ · 4.2★ (52) wp.org #18 ↑1 2 too low 17 Royal Mail Shipping Calculator for WooCommerce 1K+ · 4.4★ (8) wp.org #12 ↑3 5 too high 18 F4 Shipping Phone and E-Mail for WooCommerce 700+ · 5.0★ (8) wp.org #16 ↑1 2 too high 19 Change Mail Sender 20K+ · 4.4★ (18) wp.org #22 3 too low 20 Zoho ZeptoMail 5K+ · 5.0★ (4) wp.org #19 ↑1 1 too high 21 Pro Mail SMTP 300+ · 4.4★ (5) wp.org #17 ↑1 4 too high 22 Magic Login Mail or QR Code 100+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #20 ↑1 2 too high 23 SMTP Mail Control for MailPoet 300+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #23 24 Bulk Mail Send 100+ · 3.0★ (2) wp.org #24

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.