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wp.org search vs our merit ranking: “woocommerce bundles”

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 “woocommerce bundles”, 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

YITH WooCommerce Product Bundles shows at wp.org #10 but places #21 on merit, a gap of 11 places. Its 3K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 3.2★ average from 24 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.

merit plugin wp.org
1 WooCommerce PayPal Payments 800K+ · 2.9★ (588) wp.org #1 ↑2 2 PDF Invoices & Packing Slips for WooCommerce 300K+ · 5.0★ (1,866) wp.org #5 wp.org ranks it 3 places below merit 3 Customer Reviews for WooCommerce 80K+ · 4.8★ (1,539) wp.org #6 ↑1 wp.org ranks it 3 places below merit 4 Product Bundle Builder for WooCommerce 6K+ · 4.8★ (61) wp.org #3 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 1 place above merit 5 WooCommerce Stripe Payment Gateway 700K+ · 3.1★ (237) wp.org #2 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 3 places above merit 6 Germanized for WooCommerce 70K+ · 4.8★ (496) wp.org #8 ↑1 wp.org ranks it 2 places below merit 7 WPC Product Bundles for WooCommerce 30K+ · 4.4★ (221) wp.org #7 ↑1 8 Product Feed PRO for WooCommerce by AdTribes – Product Feeds for WooCommerce 80K+ · 4.7★ (1,072) wp.org #11 ↑2 wp.org ranks it 3 places below merit 9 WooPayments: Integrated WooCommerce Payments 800K+ · 3.4★ (179) wp.org #4 wp.org ranks it 5 places above merit 10 Payment Plugins for PayPal WooCommerce 80K+ · 4.8★ (127) wp.org #9 ↑6 wp.org ranks it 1 place above merit 11 Product Feed Manager for WooCommerce – CTX Feed – Support 220+ Shopping, AI & Social Channels 90K+ · 4.6★ (838) wp.org #14 ↓3 wp.org ranks it 3 places below merit 12 Back In Stock Notifier for WooCommerce | WooCommerce Waitlist Pro 20K+ · 4.7★ (122) wp.org #12 ↑7 13 Price Based on Country for WooCommerce 20K+ · 4.8★ (262) wp.org #17 wp.org ranks it 4 places below merit 14 TI WooCommerce Wishlist 100K+ · 4.7★ (503) wp.org #18 ↑4 wp.org ranks it 4 places below merit 15 Discount Rules and Dynamic Pricing for WooCommerce 9K+ · 4.7★ (248) wp.org #15 ↑9 16 BrikPanel: WooCommerce Dashboard & Analytics, Abandoned Cart Recovery, Order Export, Inventory Management & Bulk Editor 1K+ · 5.0★ (55) wp.org #13 wp.org ranks it 3 places above merit 17 Polylang 900K+ · 4.7★ (3,004) wp.org #22 wp.org ranks it 5 places below merit 18 Variation Swatches for WooCommerce 300K+ · 4.8★ (926) wp.org #24 wp.org ranks it 6 places below merit 19 WPML Multilingual & Multicurrency for WooCommerce 100K+ · 4.2★ (454) wp.org #23 wp.org ranks it 4 places below merit 20 YITH WooCommerce Compare 100K+ · 4.1★ (38) wp.org #19 ↑1 wp.org ranks it 1 place above merit 21 YITH WooCommerce Product Bundles 3K+ · 3.2★ (24) wp.org #10 ↑2 wp.org ranks it 11 places above merit 22 ShipStation for WooCommerce 40K+ · 3.3★ (13) wp.org #16 wp.org ranks it 6 places above merit 23 Shiptastic for WooCommerce 10K+ · 5.0★ (5) wp.org #20 wp.org ranks it 3 places above merit 24 WooCommerce Shipping 70K+ · 2.0★ (18) wp.org #21 ↓11 wp.org ranks it 3 places above merit

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.