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← Rankings

wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “now playing”

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 “now playing”, 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

Jock On Air Now (JOAN) shows at wp.org #4 but places #16 on merit, a gap of 12 places. Its 400+ installs carry it up the search order; its 3.8★ average from 9 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

MP3 Audio Player – Music Player, Podcast Player & Radio by Sonaar places #12 on merit, 4.8★ from 302 reviews, but shows at wp.org #20. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 SiteOrigin CSS 100K+ · 4.9★ (153) wp.org #3 ↑2 2 too low 2 Easy Video Player 20K+ · 4.2★ (57) wp.org #2 ↑1 3 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 #5 ↑1 2 too low 4 Essential Addons for Elementor – Popular Elementor Templates & Widgets 1M+ · 4.9★ (4132) wp.org #6 ↑2 2 too low 5 Lean Player – Video and Audio Player with Playlist for WordPress, Elementor and Gutenberg 2K+ · 4.7★ (6) wp.org #1 4 too high 6 AI-Powered Carousel, Slider, Video & Photo Gallery Blocks by WP Carousel 60K+ · 4.7★ (434) wp.org #10 4 too low 7 Lazy Load for Videos 9K+ · 4.4★ (105) wp.org #8 ↑4 1 too low 8 Podcast Player – Your Podcasting Companion 10K+ · 4.8★ (113) wp.org #11 3 too low 9 AudioIgniter Music Player 10K+ · 4.6★ (64) wp.org #9 10 WP YouTube Lyte 20K+ · 4.8★ (206) wp.org #13 3 too low 11 Gutenberg 400K+ · 2.1★ (3888) wp.org #7 4 too high 12 MP3 Audio Player – Music Player, Podcast Player & Radio by Sonaar 20K+ · 4.8★ (302) wp.org #20 ↑1 8 too low 13 LifterLMS – WP LMS for eLearning, Online Courses, & Quizzes 10K+ · 4.8★ (393) wp.org #24 11 too low 14 Embed Plus for YouTube Gallery, Livestream and Lazy Loading with Facades 100K+ · 4.6★ (572) wp.org #23 9 too low 15 Vimeography: Vimeo Video Gallery WordPress Plugin 5K+ · 4.5★ (122) wp.org #17 ↓1 2 too low 16 Jock On Air Now (JOAN) 400+ · 3.8★ (9) wp.org #4 12 too high 17 StreamWeasels Twitch Integration 1K+ · 4.8★ (23) wp.org #12 ↓2 5 too high 18 SilentShield – Captcha & Anti-Spam for WordPress (CF7, WPForms, Elementor, WooCommerce) 10K+ · 4.7★ (24) wp.org #15 3 too high 19 ExactMetrics – Google Analytics Dashboard for WordPress (Website Stats Plugin) 200K+ · 2.5★ (1546) wp.org #22 3 too low 20 Audio Player Block – Advanced Block for Embedding Audio Files 2K+ · 5.0★ (10) wp.org #19 ↓1 1 too high 21 Simple YouTube Embed 4K+ · 4.2★ (15) wp.org #18 ↓1 3 too high 22 Tutor LMS BunnyNet Integration 1K+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #16 ↓2 6 too high 23 Pira.cz Now Playing — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #14 9 too high 24 F fliix – Now Playing for Soundtrack Your Brand — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #21 ↓2 3 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.