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wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “modern admin theme”

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 “modern admin theme”, we and wp.org disagree on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 12 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

Clean WP Admin Theme – Simple design shows at wp.org #5 but places #18 on merit, a gap of 13 places. Its 100+ installs carry it up the search order; its 5.0★ average from 3 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

Essential Addons for Elementor – Popular Elementor Templates & Widgets places #8 on merit, 4.9★ from 4132 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 Admin Menu Editor 300K+ · 4.6★ (312) wp.org #2 1 too low 2 Modern Cart – WooCommerce Side Cart & Popup Cart 60K+ · 4.9★ (16) wp.org #1 1 too high 3 BrikPanel: WooCommerce Dashboard & Analytics, Abandoned Cart Recovery, Order Export, Inventory Management & Bulk Editor 1K+ · 5.0★ (55) wp.org #4 1 too low 4 Modern Footnotes 6K+ · 4.8★ (32) wp.org #3 1 too high 5 WP Rollback – Rollback Plugins and Themes 200K+ · 4.9★ (215) wp.org #7 2 too low 6 FluentSMTP – WP Mail SMTP Plugin with Amazon SES, SendGrid, Mailgun, Postmark, Cloudflare, toSend, Gmail and Any SMTP 700K+ · 4.8★ (410) wp.org #9 3 too low 7 User Admin Simplifier 10K+ · 5.0★ (31) wp.org #8 1 too low 8 Essential Addons for Elementor – Popular Elementor Templates & Widgets 1M+ · 4.9★ (4132) wp.org #17 ↓1 9 too low 9 Dark Mode – Improve Accessibility with AI Powered Dark Theme 20K+ · 4.5★ (391) wp.org #15 ↑2 6 too low 10 Admin Bar Editor – Toolbar Customization with User Role based access & Custom menus 3K+ · 4.4★ (24) wp.org #6 ↓1 4 too high 11 Admin Menu Tree Page View 10K+ · 4.6★ (48) wp.org #10 1 too high 12 W3 Total Cache 900K+ · 4.4★ (5420) wp.org #19 ↑4 7 too low 13 AI Engine – MCP Server & AI Chatbot for WordPress, with Claude, ChatGPT & Gemini 90K+ · 4.9★ (874) wp.org #24 11 too low 14 Ultimate Member – User Profile, Registration, Login, Member Directory, Content Restriction & Membership Plugin 200K+ · 4.4★ (1445) wp.org #22 ↓2 8 too low 15 Tutor LMS – eLearning and online course solution 100K+ · 4.4★ (590) wp.org #20 ↑1 5 too low 16 Darkify – Dark Mode & Night Mode for Website & Admin (Dark Theme Included) 1K+ · 4.7★ (27) wp.org #11 ↑2 5 too high 17 Post Category Filter (WP Admin) 1K+ · 5.0★ (25) wp.org #14 ↑1 3 too high 18 Clean WP Admin Theme – Simple design 100+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #5 ↑1 13 too high 19 UiPress lite | Effortless custom dashboards, admin themes and pages 6K+ · 4.1★ (21) wp.org #13 ↑1 6 too high 20 Modern Fields, Custom Fields for Gutenberg 40+ · 5.0★ (11) wp.org #18 2 too high 21 ShayanWeb Admin FontChanger | افزونه‌ی تغییر فونت پیشخوان وردپرس شایان وب 1K+ · 5.0★ (11) wp.org #21 ↑3 22 Unlimited Theme Addon For Elementor 600+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #12 ↓1 10 too high 23 WP Admin Audit 1K+ · 3.7★ (6) wp.org #16 ↑2 7 too high 24 Shortcodes and extra features for Phlox theme 80K+ · 2.1★ (7) wp.org #23 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.