31 essential WordPress plugins you need to know

Plugins are what make WordPress so flexible and powerful.

In fact, the number of WordPress plugins is also extremely rich. This leaves you confused in choosing the best plugin for your needs.

In the article, I have compiled a list of good plugins for WordPress including both free and paid. They are also essential plugins for WordPress as used by thousands of websites around the world.

In particular, there are some plugins that have the number of active sites up to millions of websites.

Curious about this list of plugins?

Let’s get started!​

1. Jetpack

Jetpack  is a plugin that everyone who uses WordPress knows about. It is a plugin created by Automattic (the company responsible for WordPress development and management).

Saying Jetpack is a plugin is also not entirely accurate. To be precise, this is an all-in-one plugin. It means there are many plugins or functions packed in Jetpack.

Some of the functions include CDN service for faster image loading, social sharing tools, website statistics, protection against brute-force attacks.

It is because there are so many functions included in Jetpack that it is debatable whether to use this plugin or not. Basically you have the option to use or not for each module in Jetpack.

So if you only enable a few features that you need, this plugin will not affect the speed and performance of your website.

2. Akismet

Akismet  is another plugin from Automatic. This plugin can be considered as mandatory to install and use for every WordPress website. That’s why right after installing WordPress, you see this plugin already installed just waiting for you to activate it.

Why is this plugin so necessary?

Simply put, WordPress sites are always the favorites of spammers. Using Askimiet helps you have a solid anti-spam system.

The good point and also the strength of Askimet is that it has the data of a network of millions of users. So it’s smart enough to catch the latest spammers’ spam tactics.

3. Yoast SEO

Today, SEO (search engine optimization) is still an important technique to help you improve your rankings in Google’s search results.

Although WordPress is an SEO-friendly website building platform. But with the use of an SEO plugin you will have a better chance that users can easily find your website in the search results.

When it comes to WordPress SEO plugins, very few plugins can compete with Yoast SEO  in terms of feature count and ease of use.

The standout feature in Yoast SEO is the page analysis tool. With this tool, you can easily implement on-page SEO techniques for your website.

In addition, another notable feature of Yoast SEO is to generate XML Sitemap  for you to submit to Google to support better indexing. Most importantly, Yoast SEO automatically updates the XML Sitemap every time you change the website content.

Alternative Plugin : All In One SEO Pack 

4. Ninja Form

There is one thing that I know every WordPress website should have. Do you know what that is? That is the contact form. This is the connection channel between you and your readers when they need advice or contact you.

There are many plugins to help you create contact forms and many other types of custom forms. I suggest you to use Ninja Form .

Why?

Simply put, it is the easiest contact form plugin to use. Its interface is simple. Not to mention the extremely fun drag and drop form builder.

It also has many other notable features like Ajax form submission (user doesn’t have to reload the page), powerful anti-spam reCAPTCHA, and many advanced fields like date picker.

Alternative Plugins: Contact Form 7 , Gravity Form , WPForms

5. Monarch

If you need a social sharing plugin, Monarch is the best candidate.

It supports over 20 social networks, beautiful interface and very light. You have many options for display placement. See detailed review here .

Alternative Plugins : List of social sharing plugins.

6. WPDiscuz

Want to change the WordPress root comment? It looks a bit ugly and lacks many features.

WPDiscuz is the plugin you need. It is designed to extend the default WordPress commenting system.

Not only does it change the comment form, but it also offers dozens of powerful features. The standout feature is real-time commentary based on AJAX technology. Users no longer have to wait for the page to load to see comments as default.

See also : 5 popular comment plugins in WordPress

7. UpdraftPlus

UpdraftPlus is my favorite website backup and restore plugin. First, of course, it’s free. Next, it’s easy to use and has fewer backup errors than many other plugins of its kind.

This plugin helps you to backup manually plus or automatically according to the set schedule. You can upload your backup files to popular cloud services like Amazon S3, Dropbox, Google Drive and more.

Note: the plugin has a paid version with more features for advanced users.

Alternative plugin : BackupBuddy ,VaultPress 

8. WP Rocket

Having a website with good speed is the desire of everyone who owns a website. When it comes to website acceleration cache plugins, it’s hard to find any plugin that can compete with WP Rocket.

It is the best plugin you can invest in to speed up your website. I have written a detailed post on how to use this plugin here. 

Alternative Plugins : WP Super Cache , W3 Total Cache 

Read more : Tips to speed up WordPress

9. Bloom

These days, building an email list is a must-do as soon as you’ve built a website. Email lists or email marketing are the best things to help you keep readers coming back to your website.

It is a connection channel between you and your readers to provide them with useful articles. More importantly, you can sometimes send promotional and promotional information to help convert them into customers.

To build an email list, you need a plugin that creates an email collection form, also known as an optin form. This plugin will connect to email services like Mailchimp  that host your email list.

There are many optin form builder plugins out there. But Bloom is a plugin that is the most popular one. It supports many types of optin forms such as popup, or insert inside content… It has many options to help you design a beautiful and attractive optin form yourself.

With this plugin you will have a good chance to grow your email list.

Alternative Plugins : WP Subscribe Pro , ChimpMate Pro , Sumo,

Read more: Elegant Theme 20% off Developer package

10. Slider Revolution

Slider Revolution is the #1 slider creation tool in WordPress. With a powerful visual editor, and many templates and icons included, you can create professional-looking sliders without knowing coding. 

This is also the plugin integrated in many premium themes sold on ThemeForest. ​

Alternative plugin : Layer Slider

11. Beaver Builder

Plugins about page builder arrays are growing in popularity. Why?

They simply make it easy for people who don’t know how to code to create a beautiful website with just drag and drop.

When it comes to pugin page builder, Beaver Builder gets a lot of good reviews. It has over 30 modules you can use. One and the module can be listed as

VideoBeaver Builder has a lite version for you to experience before purchasing the full version.

Alternative Plugins : Visual Composer , Divi Builder , Themify Builder

12. Themify Announcement Bar

Do you need to display notices on your website such as information about your latest sale?

The best way to impress your readers is to use the Themify Annoucement Bar plugin . This plugin will display a very catchy notification bar at the top of the screen. Besides, you can display the above message on any page using shortcodes and widgets.

Another feature is that you can schedule to show notifications at specific times during specific time periods. This is great for flash sale announcements that are short-lived.

Alternative plugin : WP Notification Bar

13. WooCommerce

If you want to build an online store using WordPress, you definitely need the WooCommerce plugin .

Plugins to allow you physical products or digital products. It gives you all the features that a sales website needs to have. For example, it provides product page, shopping cart, checkout, supports multiple payment gateways.

You can extend the functionality of WooCommerce with many other plugins or extensions.

Read more : Learn to make a sales website for beginners

14. ManageWP

If you are someone who has to manage multiple websites at the same time, you will find it annoying and time consuming to navigate and log in to multiple websites.

Manage WP is a great solution in this situation. It lets you manage all your websites in one place. I also have a detailed article about ManageWP.

15. WP Migrate DB

In the article on how to build a staging environment in WordPress , I mentioned the WP Migrate DB plugin. It is the perfect solution in such a situation.

You just need to install WP Migrate DB Pro on old and new environments. The plugin will move the entire database to both sides easily.

However, you need to have the WP Migrate DB Pro version to make the transfer of the new database as easy as that. ​

Note : If you have a need to buy a paid plugin, click the link on the 20% discount code that will automatically be applied when you buy the plugin.

Alternatives : Duplicator , All-in-One Migration 

16. iThemes Security Pro

Talking about WordPress security, I have an article that summarizes WordPress website security tips . In this article, I mentioned one of the most popular security plugins available today. It’s iThemes Security.

This plugin packs a lot of security features such as hiding the WordPress login page, limiting the number of failed login attempts, backing up the database and so on.

In short, it is a must-have plugin for every WordPress website.

Read more : Instructions for installing and using the Wordfence security plugin. ​

Alternative plugin : All in ONe WP Security and Firewall

17. Google Analytics for WordPress by MonsterInsights

Google Monster Insight is a plugin that helps you install Google Analytics on your WordPress website . This is also the simplest way to install Google Analytics.

Besides, the plugin also helps you to view Google Analytics reports right in WordPress Admin.

Alternative plugin : Google Analytics Dashboard for WP

18. Syntax Highlighter Evolved 

Syntax Highlighter Evolved is an essential WordPress plugin if you make a website about programming topics that need to provide viewers with a lot of illustrated code. The plugin will format the code to make it not only easy for readers to read but also easy to copy when following the instructions.

19. Redirection

If visitors visit a page that doesn’t exist on your site, they’ll be greeted with a 404 error. This leaves a bad impression. The Redirection plugin is a great solution to this problem.

It will monitor for 404 errors and make the route to where you want it to be. In addition, this plugin also helps you to perform many other redirects when you change the URL of the page without worrying about losing SEO.

Alternative plugin: Simple 301 Redirects .

20. WPML

WPML is the most famous plugin and also the most popular when it comes to multilingual website builder WordPress plugins.

Plugin to let you translate every word in your website. You just need to choose the languages ​​you want, translate them using the WordPress editor. After post-translation, the user will use the widget to select a language they want from the drop-down list.

Alternative plugin : Polylang

21. BuddyPress

BuddyPress allows you to build a full community style website.

Once the plugin is installed and activated, visitors can register on the website, customize their profile, join and user-created groups, and even send private messages.

22. bbPress

bbPress is a community WordPress plugin suitable for creating forums. The plugin easily integrates with existing websites, automatically creating all the forum pages that the website needs. Users can register with your website. And join the discussion if they want to.

23. ShortCode Ultimate

When it comes to shortcodes in WordPress, ShortCode Ultimate is the most popular plugin to help you add shortcodes to your website.

This plugin contains a rich shortcode repository, over 50 shortcodes with many cool features such as price list, accordion, post slider, button, progress bar…

Alternative Plugins :  WordPress Shortcodes , Simple Shortcodes

24. WP Optimize

Did you know that every time you save a draft of your article, it is stored in the database? Imagine if you had 20-30 drafts before publishing, the database would gradually swell.

But the bad thing here is that as soon as you click the publish button, the drafts are still in the database.

WP-Optimize is a super efficient database optimization plugin. It will clean up garbage like the above drafts in the database. This makes your database lightweight and efficiently optimized.

25. BBQ Block bad Queries

Block Bad Queries is the fastest and user-friendly WordPress plugin.

It keeps your website safe at all times by blocking all malicious requests.

The good thing is that this plugin does not require configuration. Chris needs to install, activate and it will do its job in the background.

26. WP Mega Menu

The plugin helps you to create a beautiful mega menu for your website. In addition, it also provides a huge icon set to help you create a truly impressive menu.

About this plugin, I have a detailed review. If you need this feature for your website, read it here .

27. FooGalery

Foo Gallery is a free plugin to add image galleries to your website. It allows you to upload images to your gallery which you can then rearrange with drag and drop.

The galleries you create can complement any page of your website with shortcodes. Thumnail is extremely sharp thanks to retina display support. When people click on the thumbnail will display the full image in the lightbox.

Alternative Plugins:   NextGen Gallery , Justified Image Grid

29. WP Review Pro

WP Review Pro is the best plugin to help you create professional reviews. It supports many types of review systems such as points, percentages, circles, etc.

Another valuable feature is that it allows users to participate in the review of what you are reviewing.

See WP Review Pro review for more details. ​

Alternative Plugins :  Taqyeem , WP Product Review Lite  , Good Reviews for WordPress

30. Related Post for WordPress

Related Posts for WordPress is an effective plugin for displaying related posts in your website. You can display related posts either by short code or widget format.

Alternative plugin: Jetpack (Related Posts module, Y et another related post plugin () Contextual Related Post .

31. Google Authenticator

Google Authenticator is a very popular 2-factor security plugin today. It makes your admin login screen more secure by adding a code input field. This code you will spread from an app running on a smart handheld device such as a phone or tablet.

You can check out our post on installing two-factor authentication for WordPress using Google Authenticator.

Epilogue

As soon as you have installed WordPress, you definitely need to install the theme plugin to extend the functionality of WordPress. Depending on your needs, you need to choose many different plugins.

The list of plugins that I mentioned in the article is a good suggestion for your reference.

Also you can search for more plugins in the WordPress plugin repository or Codecanyon to find more plugins you want.

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