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← Rankings

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

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 “news”, we and wp.org disagree on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 9 of the top 20. 2 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

Publish To Apple News shows at wp.org #9 but places #18 on merit, a gap of 9 places. Its 4K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 3.8★ average from 25 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

Yoast SEO – Advanced SEO with real-time guidance and built-in AI places #6 on merit, 4.8★ from 27821 reviews, but shows at wp.org #15. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 XML Sitemap & Google News 100K+ · 4.4★ (85) wp.org #2 ↑3 1 too low 2 Vertical News Scroller 5K+ · 4.3★ (17) wp.org #1 ↑1 1 too high 3 MailPoet – Newsletters, Email Marketing, and Automation 500K+ · 4.4★ (1435) wp.org #6 ↓3 3 too low 4 Ditty – Responsive News Tickers, Sliders, and Lists 30K+ · 4.6★ (106) wp.org #4 ↓3 5 T4B News Ticker – Responsive News Scroller, Slider, and Animations 7K+ · 4.5★ (16) wp.org #3 ↑1 2 too high 6 Yoast SEO – Advanced SEO with real-time guidance and built-in AI 10M+ · 4.8★ (27821) wp.org #15 ↑9 9 too low 7 WooCommerce 7M+ · 4.5★ (4833) wp.org #7 ↓1 8 RSS Aggregator by Feedzy – Feed to Post, Autoblogging, News & YouTube Video Feeds Aggregator 40K+ · 4.6★ (361) wp.org #12 ↓1 4 too low 9 Noptin – Newsletter, New Post Notifications & Email Automation 10K+ · 4.5★ (120) wp.org #8 1 too high 10 The Events Calendar 600K+ · 4.2★ (2461) wp.org #18 ↑2 8 too low 11 N News Ticker for Elementor 2K+ · 4.8★ (40) wp.org #10 ↓1 1 too high 12 GN Publisher: Google News Compatible RSS Feeds 20K+ · 4.9★ (29) wp.org #11 ↓1 1 too high 13 WP Top News — Build a Complete News Portal in WordPress 800+ · 5.0★ (7) wp.org #5 ↑2 8 too high 14 External Links in New Window / New Tab 30K+ · 4.5★ (77) wp.org #14 ↓2 15 Newsletter – Send awesome emails from WordPress 200K+ · 4.6★ (1205) wp.org #16 1 too low 16 Contact Form 7 10M+ · 4.0★ (2186) wp.org #19 3 too low 17 New User Approve 20K+ · 4.3★ (131) wp.org #17 18 Publish To Apple News 4K+ · 3.8★ (25) wp.org #9 ↓1 9 too high 19 External Links – nofollow, noopener & new window 90K+ · 4.3★ (247) wp.org #21 ↓8 2 too low 20 N news ticker benaceur 1K+ · 5.0★ (25) wp.org #23 ↓6 3 too low 21 News Kit Addons For Elementor 3K+ · 3.6★ (5) wp.org #13 ↑1 8 too high 22 News Ticker Widget for Elementor 4K+ · 4.0★ (5) wp.org #22 ↓6 23 OXP Breaking News Ticker 100+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #24 1 too low 24 Stock Market News 400+ · 3.7★ (3) wp.org #20 ↓1 4 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.