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

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 “tiers”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 9 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

AI to Elementor — HTML Importer for Elementor shows at wp.org #12 but places #22 on merit, a gap of 10 places. Its 1K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 5.0★ average from 3 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.

Buried gem

Starter Templates: AI-Powered Website Templates for Elementor & Gutenberg places #8 on merit, 4.9★ from 4755 reviews, but shows at wp.org #13. A smaller install base keeps it further down the default search order than its quality signals alone would.

merit plugin wp.org
1 FluentSMTP – WP Mail SMTP Plugin with Amazon SES, SendGrid, Mailgun, Postmark, Cloudflare, toSend, Gmail and Any SMTP 700K+ · 4.8★ (410) wp.org #1 2 Discount Rules and Dynamic Pricing for WooCommerce 9K+ · 4.7★ (248) wp.org #2 3 Newsletter – Send awesome emails from WordPress 200K+ · 4.6★ (1205) wp.org #3 ↑6 4 Burst Statistics – Simple WordPress Analytics (Google Analytics Alternative) 200K+ · 4.9★ (186) wp.org #4 ↑2 5 Eventin – Events Calendar, Tickets, Registration, Booking & WooCommerce 10K+ · 4.7★ (413) wp.org #5 ↓2 6 User Registration & Membership – Free & Paid Memberships, Subscriptions, Content Restriction, User Profile, Custom User Registration & Login Builder 50K+ · 4.8★ (832) wp.org #7 ↑1 1 too low 7 Mailchimp for WooCommerce 200K+ · 4.0★ (726) wp.org #9 ↓5 2 too low 8 Starter Templates: AI-Powered Website Templates for Elementor & Gutenberg 1M+ · 4.9★ (4755) wp.org #13 ↑2 5 too low 9 Broken Link Checker 500K+ · 3.8★ (605) wp.org #8 ↑5 1 too high 10 Loyalty Points Rewards and Referral for WooCommerce – WPLoyalty 3K+ · 5.0★ (310) wp.org #14 ↑3 4 too low 11 Table Rate Shipping for WooCommerce 10K+ · 4.5★ (74) wp.org #11 ↓4 12 Advanced Dynamic Pricing and Discount Rules for WooCommerce 20K+ · 4.7★ (123) wp.org #17 ↓5 5 too low 13 Majestic Support – The Leading-Edge Help Desk & Customer Support Plugin 3K+ · 5.0★ (8) wp.org #6 ↓1 7 too high 14 EU Withdrawal and Legal Guarantee Compliance 1K+ · 5.0★ (17) wp.org #10 ↑1 4 too high 15 Points and Rewards for WooCommerce – Create Loyalty Programs, Reward Customer Purchases, Referral Points, User Badges, and Gamification 6K+ · 4.5★ (180) wp.org #24 ↓1 9 too low 16 Pay for Payment for WooCommerce – Payment Gateway Fees & Discounts 10K+ · 4.7★ (71) wp.org #22 6 too low 17 Powered Cache – Caching and Optimization for WordPress – Easily Improve PageSpeed & Web Vitals Score 3K+ · 4.8★ (58) wp.org #21 4 too low 18 WowShipping – Table Rate & Weight Based Shipping 700+ · 5.0★ (25) wp.org #20 2 too low 19 Patreon WordPress 3K+ · 3.4★ (55) wp.org #16 ↑2 3 too high 20 WPC Price by Quantity for WooCommerce 1K+ · 5.0★ (8) wp.org #15 ↑1 5 too high 21 AI Alt Text Generator 2K+ · 4.9★ (7) wp.org #19 ↓5 2 too high 22 AI to Elementor — HTML Importer for Elementor 1K+ · 5.0★ (3) wp.org #12 ↓2 10 too high 23 Cowboy MCP – Free MCP Server with Undo for Claude & ChatGPT 1K+ · 5.0★ (5) wp.org #23 24 Tiers – Tiered Pricing for WooCommerce — · 5.0★ (1) wp.org #18 ↑1 6 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.