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

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 “pantheon”, we and wp.org disagree on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 11 of the top 20. 3 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

Pantheon HUD shows at wp.org #4 but places #12 on merit, a gap of 8 places. Its 1K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 5.0★ average from 1 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Migrate Guru – Site Migration & Cloning 200K+ · 4.9★ (1640) wp.org #2 1 too low 2 Pantheon Migrations 1K+ · 5.0★ (7) wp.org #1 1 too high 3 BlogVault Backup & Staging 80K+ · 4.6★ (331) wp.org #6 3 too low 4 Native PHP Sessions 10K+ · 4.9★ (16) wp.org #5 1 too low 5 WP Redis 9K+ · 4.7★ (20) wp.org #7 2 too low 6 Version Info – Server Health Monitor, PHP & MySQL Version Display, Environment Indicators 10K+ · 5.0★ (15) wp.org #13 7 too low 7 WP SAML Auth 7K+ · 4.5★ (8) wp.org #8 1 too low 8 Pantheon Advanced Page Cache 10K+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #3 5 too high 9 Advanced GeoIP Redirect 1K+ · 3.6★ (11) wp.org #14 5 too low 10 Easy Symlinks 100+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #10 11 The Cache Purger 1K+ · 4.5★ (6) wp.org #11 12 Pantheon HUD 1K+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #4 8 too high 13 Easy Digital Downloads – Pantheon Compat 10+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #9 4 too high 14 Cloud SAML SSO – Single Sign On Login 80+ · 4.0★ (4) wp.org #20 6 too low 15 RankReady – AI SEO, Schema, llms.txt, AEO and GEO for ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity 400+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #19 4 too low 16 Pantheon Content Publisher — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #15 1 too high 17 Clear Cache Everywhere 900+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #12 5 too high 18 Trinity Backup – Backup, Migrate, Restore, Clone & Schedule Backups 100+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #18 19 365i Environment Indicator 10+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #22 3 too low 20 Tika Doc PDF Indexer 10+ · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #23 3 too low 21 D Divine Apparitions Uploads Proxy — · 0.0★ (0) wp.org #24 3 too low 22 DXP ToolKit 10+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #21 1 too high 23 Solr Search for WordPress 100+ · 4.0★ (2) wp.org #16 7 too high 24 Traffic Jammer 50+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #17 7 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.