wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “user css”
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 “user css”, we agree with wp.org on the top plugin, and our order differs from theirs on 5 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
GravityWP – CSS Selector shows at wp.org #15 but places #24 on merit, a gap of 9 places. Its 4K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 5.0★ average from 8 reviews, plus freshness and upkeep, place it lower on our volume-weighted scale.
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.
Simple Custom CSS and JS 600K+ · 4.4★ (104)
wp.org #1 2 
User Role Editor 700K+ · 4.5★ (288)
wp.org #2 3 
SiteOrigin CSS 100K+ · 4.9★ (153)
wp.org #3 4 
User Profile Builder – Beautiful User Registration Forms, User Profiles & User Role Editor 40K+ · 4.7★ (738)
wp.org #4 5 
User Registration & Membership – Free & Paid Memberships, Subscriptions, Content Restriction, User Profile, Custom User Registration & Login Builder 50K+ · 4.8★ (832)
wp.org #5 ↑1 6 
Ultimate Member – User Profile, Registration, Login, Member Directory, Content Restriction & Membership Plugin 200K+ · 4.4★ (1445)
wp.org #6 ↓1 7 
Members – Membership & User Role Editor Plugin 300K+ · 4.9★ (1281)
wp.org #7 8 
LiteSpeed Cache 7M+ · 4.8★ (2778)
wp.org #9 ↑1 1 too low 9 
CSS & JavaScript Toolbox 10K+ · 4.8★ (84)
wp.org #8 1 too high 10 
WP User Manager – Registration Form, Login Form, User Profile Builder & Member Directory 10K+ · 4.7★ (350)
wp.org #12 ↓3 2 too low 11 
Elementor Website Builder – more than just a page builder 10M+ · 4.5★ (7322)
wp.org #13 ↓1 2 too low 12 
User Frontend – Membership, User Registration, User Profile, User Directory & Content Restriction with Frontend Post Submission 20K+ · 4.1★ (537)
wp.org #11 ↑5 1 too high 13 
User Submitted Posts – Enable Users to Submit Posts from the Front End 10K+ · 4.8★ (913)
wp.org #17 ↑4 4 too low 14 
Jetpack Boost – Website Speed, Performance and Critical CSS 200K+ · 4.7★ (612)
wp.org #16 ↓2 2 too low 15 
Login as User: See the Site as Any User 30K+ · 4.8★ (41)
wp.org #10 ↑3 5 too high 16 
Hummingbird Performance – Cache & Page Speed Optimization for Core Web Vitals | Critical CSS | Minify CSS | Defer CSS Javascript | CDN 70K+ · 4.7★ (1488)
wp.org #23 ↓3 7 too low 17 
Import and export users and customers 70K+ · 4.7★ (259)
wp.org #19 ↑5 2 too low 18 
Open User Map – Interactive Leaflet Maps 10K+ · 5.0★ (70)
wp.org #18 ↑5 19 
One User Avatar | User Profile Picture 100K+ · 4.7★ (41)
wp.org #14 ↓3 5 too high 20 
WPFront User Role Editor 30K+ · 4.5★ (65)
wp.org #22 ↓3 2 too low 21 
User Admin Simplifier 10K+ · 5.0★ (31)
wp.org #24 ↓2 3 too low 22 
WP User Avatars 20K+ · 4.5★ (29)
wp.org #21 ↓3 1 too high 23 
Simple User Avatar 20K+ · 4.6★ (19) thin reviews
wp.org #20 ↓3 3 too high 24 GravityWP – CSS Selector 4K+ · 5.0★ (8) thin reviews
wp.org #15 9 too high Merit ranking caps the install boost at 10M (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.