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wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “social feed”

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 “social feed”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 7 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 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

My Social Feeds – bring your social content into WordPress shows at wp.org #16 but places #24 on merit, a gap of 8 places. Its 500+ 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

Social Media Share Buttons & Social Sharing Icons places #7 on merit, 4.8★ from 5334 reviews, but shows at wp.org #12. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 Smash Balloon Social Photo Feed – Easy Social Feeds Plugin 1M+ · 4.9★ (4350) wp.org #1 2 Product Feed Manager for WooCommerce – CTXFeed – Support 220+ Shopping & Social Channels 80K+ · 4.6★ (829) wp.org #2 ↑1 3 Spotlight Social Feeds – Block, Shortcode, and Widget 60K+ · 4.7★ (170) wp.org #3 ↑1 4 Smash Balloon Social Post Feed – Simple Social Feeds for WordPress 200K+ · 4.7★ (1508) wp.org #6 ↑2 2 too low 5 Social Feed Gallery 80K+ · 4.5★ (303) wp.org #5 ↑2 6 WP Social Ninja – Embed Social Feeds, User Reviews & Chat Widgets 30K+ · 4.8★ (71) wp.org #4 ↑2 2 too high 7 Social Media Share Buttons & Social Sharing Icons 100K+ · 4.8★ (5334) wp.org #12 ↑1 5 too low 8 Feed Them Social – Social Media Feeds, Video, and Photo Galleries 20K+ · 4.7★ (638) wp.org #10 2 too low 9 Easy Social Feed – Social Photos Gallery and Post Feed for WordPress 30K+ · 4.6★ (501) wp.org #11 ↓2 2 too low 10 WPZOOM Social Feed Widget & Block 50K+ · 4.3★ (50) wp.org #7 ↑4 3 too high 11 Widgets for Social Photo Feed 10K+ · 4.7★ (26) wp.org #8 ↓3 3 too high 12 Social Share Icons & Social Share Buttons 10K+ · 4.9★ (1911) wp.org #17 5 too low 13 Buttonizer – Social Media Share Buttons, Social Icons, & Social Feeds 40K+ · 4.8★ (396) wp.org #13 ↓1 14 Premium Addons for Elementor – Elementor Templates, Widgets & MCP Tools 600K+ · 4.9★ (1677) wp.org #24 10 too low 15 Simple Social Icons 100K+ · 4.3★ (92) wp.org #14 ↑2 1 too high 16 Inavii Social Feed – Live Social Proof Gallery 9K+ · 5.0★ (17) wp.org #9 ↓7 7 too high 17 Reviews Feed – Add Testimonials and Customer Reviews From Google Reviews, Yelp, TripAdvisor, and More 100K+ · 4.4★ (34) wp.org #15 ↓1 2 too high 18 Social Slider Feed – Social Media Feed & Gallery Widgets 10K+ · 3.9★ (126) wp.org #22 ↓1 4 too low 19 Bit Social – Social Media Auto Poster and Scheduler 6K+ · 4.5★ (36) wp.org #18 ↑1 1 too high 20 Tagembed: Social Media Feeds and Customer Reviews Widget 9K+ · 3.8★ (60) wp.org #21 ↓3 1 too low 21 Flow-Flow Social Streams 8K+ · 3.3★ (100) wp.org #20 ↑4 1 too high 22 QuadLayers TikTok Feed 7K+ · 3.9★ (61) wp.org #23 1 too low 23 Widgets for Social Post Feed 400+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #19 ↑1 4 too high 24 My Social Feeds – bring your social content into WordPress 500+ · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #16 ↓1 8 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.