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

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 membership sync”, 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 the install base is organic or host-pushed, and its risk of being pulled.

Ranked above its merit

SureMembers – Membership & Content Restriction Plugin shows at wp.org #17 but places #24 on merit, a gap of 7 places. Its 2K+ installs carry it up the search order; its 5.0★ average from 2 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 Ultimate Member – User Profile, Registration, Login, Member Directory, Content Restriction & Membership Plugin 200K+ · 4.4★ (1,445) wp.org #1 2 Paid Membership Subscriptions – Effortless Memberships, Recurring Payments & Content Restriction 10K+ · 4.7★ (270) wp.org #2 3 User Registration & Membership – Free & Paid Memberships, Subscriptions, Content Restriction, User Profile, Custom User Registration & Login Builder 50K+ · 4.8★ (832) wp.org #5 ↑1 wp.org ranks it 2 places below merit 4 Anti-Spam, Spam FireWall by CleanTalk 200K+ · 4.8★ (3,224) wp.org #7 wp.org ranks it 3 places below merit 5 BrikPanel: WooCommerce Dashboard & Analytics, Abandoned Cart Recovery, Order Export, Inventory Management & Bulk Editor 1K+ · 5.0★ (55) wp.org #4 wp.org ranks it 1 place above merit 6 Product Feed Manager for WooCommerce – CTX Feed – Support 220+ Shopping, AI & Social Channels 90K+ · 4.6★ (838) wp.org #9 ↓4 wp.org ranks it 3 places below merit 7 Import and export users and customers 70K+ · 4.7★ (259) wp.org #8 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 1 place below merit 8 WCFM Membership – WooCommerce Memberships for Multivendor Marketplace 10K+ · 4.0★ (25) wp.org #3 wp.org ranks it 5 places above merit 9 WP Remote Users Sync 6K+ · 4.9★ (73) wp.org #6 ↑14 wp.org ranks it 3 places above merit 10 User Frontend – Membership, User Registration, User Profile, User Directory & Content Restriction with Frontend Post Submission 20K+ · 4.1★ (537) wp.org #10 ↑8 11 User Profile Builder – Beautiful User Registration Forms, User Profiles & User Role Editor 40K+ · 4.7★ (738) wp.org #14 ↓2 wp.org ranks it 3 places below merit 12 Kadence WooCommerce Email Designer 90K+ · 4.5★ (142) wp.org #11 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 1 place above merit 13 Kit (formerly ConvertKit) – Email Subscribers, Email Newsletter, Email Marketing, Landing Pages and Membership 40K+ · 4.8★ (90) wp.org #13 ↓4 14 Stock Manager for WooCommerce 20K+ · 4.2★ (130) wp.org #12 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 2 places above merit 15 Email Subscribers & Newsletters by Icegram Express – Email Marketing, Post Notifications & WooCommerce Marekting Automation for WordPress 50K+ · 4.6★ (1,170) wp.org #24 wp.org ranks it 9 places below merit 16 FluentCRM – Email Newsletter, Automation, Email Marketing, Email Campaigns, Optins, Leads, and CRM Solution 80K+ · 4.8★ (250) wp.org #21 ↑3 wp.org ranks it 5 places below merit 17 ProfilePress – Paid Membership, Online Courses (LMS), Ecommerce, User Registration & Login Form, User Profile & Restrict Content 100K+ · 3.1★ (938) wp.org #15 ↓7 wp.org ranks it 2 places above merit 18 FuseWP – WordPress User Sync to Email List & Marketing Automation (Mailchimp, Constant Contact, ActiveCampaign etc.) 2K+ · 4.9★ (25) wp.org #16 ↓3 wp.org ranks it 2 places above merit 19 WPS Bookings for WooCommerce 3K+ · 4.5★ (43) wp.org #22 ↓3 wp.org ranks it 3 places below merit 20 StoreEngine — Complete eCommerce Solution with Memberships, Licensing, Affiliates & More 700+ · 5.0★ (17) wp.org #19 wp.org ranks it 1 place above merit 21 Square Sync for WooCommerce | Comprehensive Data Sync Between Square and WooCommerce 200+ · 5.0★ (11) wp.org #18 ↓1 wp.org ranks it 3 places above merit 22 Memberful – Membership Plugin 900+ · 4.7★ (13) wp.org #20 ↓4 wp.org ranks it 2 places above merit 23 Subscriptions for WooCommerce Recurring Payments with Membership Content Restriction 600+ · 5.0★ (5) wp.org #23 24 SureMembers – Membership & Content Restriction Plugin 2K+ · 5.0★ (2) wp.org #17 ↓3 wp.org ranks it 7 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.