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wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “site hardening”

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 “site hardening”, we agree with wp.org 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

Zen Site Security shows at wp.org #9 but places #21 on merit, a gap of 12 places. Its 70+ 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.

Buried gem

Forminator Forms – Contact Form, Payment Form & Custom Form Builder places #8 on merit, 4.8★ from 2,147 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.

How this rank is calculated

Each plugin's merit score multiplies these inputs together: how recently it was updated, how current its "tested up to" WordPress version is, its install base (log scale, capped at 10 million), its support thread resolution rate, and a rating score. The rating score weights the star average by review volume against a sitewide prior, then scales it by the lower bound of the share of 4 and 5 star reviews. A plugin with 3.7 stars from tens of thousands of reviews can still outscore a 4.9 with a few dozen, because the small sample carries less certainty.

A health factor between 0.4 and 1.15 then adjusts that score for what wp.org's search can't see: PHP fatals or failed activations on a test install, PHP and WordPress compatibility, memory and page-speed footprint, suspicious review patterns, closure risk, and a large install base with very few reviews. Clean, adopted plugins earn a small lift.

A keyword ranking starts from wp.org's search order for the term, weighting each position by 1 divided by its place, then applies the merit correction and health factor above. Relevance to the keyword stays in the result, so the order can differ from the all-categories list on /best, which scores plugins with no search term.

Hover a row to see the main reason for its position.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Really Simple Security – Simple and Performant Security (formerly Really Simple SSL) 3M+ · 4.9★ (8,870) wp.org #1 2 Sucuri Security – Auditing, Malware Scanner and Security Hardening 600K+ · 4.2★ (386) wp.org #2 3 SEOPress – AI SEO Plugin & On-site SEO 300K+ · 4.8★ (1,268) wp.org #4 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 1 place below merit 4 Defender Security – Malware Scanner, Login Security & Firewall 80K+ · 4.8★ (334) wp.org #5 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 1 place below merit 5 MainWP Child – Securely Connects to the MainWP Dashboard to Manage Multiple Sites 700K+ · 5.0★ (71) wp.org #3 wp.org ranks it 2 places above merit 6 Kadence Security – Password, Two Factor Authentication, and Brute Force Protection 700K+ · 4.6★ (3,992) wp.org #13 ↑6 wp.org ranks it 7 places below merit 7 MalCare WordPress Security Plugin – Malware Scanner, Cleaner, Security Firewall 100K+ · 4.4★ (561) wp.org #16 ↑6 wp.org ranks it 9 places below merit 8 Forminator Forms – Contact Form, Payment Form & Custom Form Builder 600K+ · 4.8★ (2,147) wp.org #20 wp.org ranks it 12 places below merit 9 Nexter Extension – Security, Performance, Code Snippets & Site Toolkit 10K+ · 4.7★ (13) wp.org #7 ↑2 wp.org ranks it 2 places above merit 10 Titan Anti-spam & Security – Brute Force Protection, 2FA & Spam Filter 50K+ · 4.5★ (370) wp.org #22 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 12 places below merit 11 Advanced IP Blocker 3K+ · 4.9★ (27) wp.org #11 ↑6 12 Patchstack – WordPress & Plugins Security 100K+ · 4.8★ (62) wp.org #18 ↓2 wp.org ranks it 6 places below merit 13 Intranet & Private Site – All-In-One Intranet 3K+ · 5.0★ (11) wp.org #10 ↓3 wp.org ranks it 3 places above merit 14 UWH Site Migrator – WP Migration, Backup & Restore 400+ · 5.0★ (4) wp.org #6 ↑8 wp.org ranks it 8 places above merit 15 Vigilant – 100% Free Security Suite: Firewall, 2FA, Login, Headers, Scanner… 3K+ · 5.0★ (24) wp.org #19 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 4 places below merit 16 SiteLock Security – WP Hardening, Login Security & Malware Scans 1K+ · 3.4★ (14) wp.org #8 ↓2 wp.org ranks it 8 places above merit 17 Powerkit – Supercharge your WordPress Site 10K+ · 4.5★ (14) wp.org #15 ↓3 wp.org ranks it 2 places above merit 18 Site Lockdown Security 800+ · 5.0★ (5) wp.org #12 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 6 places above merit 19 SiteFort Security – Firewall, Malware Scanner & Hardening 70+ · 5.0★ (5) wp.org #23 wp.org ranks it 4 places below merit 20 Fleet Agent Site Manager – Securely Connects Your Sites to a WPMgr Dashboard 100+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #14 ↓4 wp.org ranks it 6 places above merit 21 Zen Site Security 70+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #9 ↑4 wp.org ranks it 12 places above merit 22 WP Guardian – Security Hardening Checklist & Lightweight Firewall 100+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #17 ↓2 wp.org ranks it 5 places above merit 23 Basic Security: Prevent Cross Site Scripting 200+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #21 wp.org ranks it 2 places above merit 24 YLabs AI Site Manager with ChatGPT and Claude 5K+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #24

Merit ranking caps the install boost at 10M (wp.org leaves it uncapped), replaces the raw star average with a volume-weighted 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.