Ultimate Guide to WordPress Plugins
Ultimate Guide to WordPress Plugins
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
Introduction.
do without might seem like a daunting task. While the answer
will vary depending on each use case, this guide will help you
understand what types of WordPress plugins are out there and
which ones you might consider installing on your site.
There are many benefits of using WordPress to power your
brand’s online presence.
Plugins are extremely popular among
From its flexibility as an open source content management
system (CMS) to the dedicated community of WordPress
WP Engine customers.
developers that constantly contribute to its core software,
For a real-world view into the widespread popularity of
notable agencies and brands across the globe choose
WordPress plugins, look no further than our customers at WP
WordPress to power incredible digital experiences. One
Engine, who have more than 7.1 million plugin installs across
area where WordPress really shines is through its countless
nearly half a million WordPress sites.
integrations, including its vast ecosystem of modular code,
known as plugins. Of our more than 120,000 global customers, 37% have between
one and 10 plugins installed, another 37% have between 11 and
20, and 17% have between 21 and 30 plugins installed. That
WordPress is awesome because of its number begins to decrease as the number of active plugin installs
ability to easily extend and expand its gets higher. Nonetheless, 6% of our customers have between
functionality through plugins. 31 and 40 plugins installed, 2% have between 41 and 50, and 1%
have between 51 and 60 active plugins currently installed on their
WordPress plugins are bits of software that enable you to WordPress site(s).
easily add new functionality to your websites. From maps and
charts to SEO and eCommerce tools, plugins are added either Of those plugins, the most popular with our customers are
automatically through the WordPress dashboard or manually Gravity Forms, WP Bakery, and Slider Revolution, which together
by downloading the zip file directly (this usually requires some make up 80% of our top ten most-installed plugins. Other
familiarity with File Transfer Protocol or FTP). popular plugins among WP Engine customers include Yoast SEO
Premium, WP Rocket, WP Forms, Divi Builder, Essential Grid,
With more than 50,000 free WordPress plugins to choose from, OptinMonster, and WooCommerce Subscriptions.
figuring out which plugins you need and which ones you can
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
Plugins also require ongoing maintenance In an effort to solve this issue, WP Engine released Smart
and management. Plugin Manager, which automates plugin updates to keep your
sites secure. Once Smart Plugin Manager is up and running,
There’s no question that plugins are massively popular, but you no longer need to devote valuable time and resources
managing plugins remains a challenge for many WordPress to reviewing and updating plugins. Instead, plugins are
users. Like any piece of software, plugins require regular automatically checked for updates every 24 hours. To make
updates and maintenance to ensure that bugs and security sure those updates don’t interfere with your workflow, you
vulnerabilities are patched. can also select an ideal time of day for those updates to occur.
Finally, updates can be customized to run automatically or
At WP Engine, we keep a close eye on the growing plugin manually, depending on user preference, for each plugin.
ecosystem and even maintain a list of plugins that are
disallowed on our platform, often because they are at odds Read on to learn more about the wide range of WordPress
with our internal security standards. plugins, grouped into categories. Note: to be included in this
list, each plugin must have been updated within the last year,
Nonetheless, we still see an average of around 50 plugin and have above a three-star rating.
vulnerabilities affect our customers every month, and the bulk
of them are due to overdue plugin updates. Updating and
maintaining plugins is simply hard to keep up with, and as a
users’ plugin portfolio grows, so does the task of keeping them
all up to date and secure.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
What’s inside.
5 Marketing plugins.
12 Monetization plugins.
25 Media plugins.
36 Defensive plugins.
51 Miscellaneous plugins.
55 Plugin Index.
57 About WP Engine.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MARKETING PLUGINS
Marketing
plugins.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MARKETING PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MARKETING PLUGINS
WordLift brings the power of Artificial Intelligence to help Google XML Sitemaps is among the most popular sitemap
publishers and content editors produce richer content, grow plugins with more than 2 million active installs. You can use
their organic traffic, and engage with their audience. This this plugin to generate a special XML sitemap that helps the
plugin helps you organize posts and pages by adding facts, most popular search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, and [Link])
links, and media to build beautifully structured websites, for index your site. XML Sitemaps is easy to use and it won’t detract
both humans and search engines. from site performance.
Jetpack
Sitemap plugins.
A sitemap is a list of website pages that puts your content
into an organized model, making it easier for web crawlers to
navigate your site. When your WordPress site has an effective
sitemap, it makes it easier for search engines to understand
what types of content you’re offering and it can improve
Jetpack by Wordpress offers a multitude of security,
search engine rankings. Aside from the already mentioned SEO
performance, and site management features, including
plugins (which include sitemap functionality), here are a few
sitemap capabilities. Upon installing, Jetpack automatically
other sitemap plugins you might consider.
creates a sitemap for your site, as well as one tailored
specifically for Google News. If you decide to use a different
sitemap plugin, you can still install Jetpack for its other features
and turn the sitemap capabilities off.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MARKETING PLUGINS
SumoMe
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MARKETING PLUGINS
MailOptin is another great plugin that helps with lead If you’re looking for a mobile-friendly and responsive template
generation, customer acquisition, and email marketing and for sharing your photo feed, then the Smash Balloon Social
automation. The plugin allows you to exponentially grow Photo Feed plugin might be for you. This plugin allows you
your mailing list and display targeted messages across your to display one or multiple Instagram accounts, giving you the
WordPress website(s) with popups, before and after post-opt- option to choose from thumbnails, medium, and large photo
in forms, and sidebar/widget subscriber forms. MailOptin also sizes. The plugin also contains a “follow on Instagram” button,
lets you send automated/event-triggered newsletters such as the ability to randomize the order of your images, shortcode
automatic new post notifications. options, and complete customization with CSS and JavaScript.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MARKETING PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MARKETING PLUGINS
InviteBox
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MONETIZING PLUGINS
Monetization
plugins.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MONETIZING PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MONETIZING PLUGINS
AffiliateWP
If you’re looking to drive more sales to your store or site, WP
Affiliate Manager might be for you. WP Affiliate Manager helps
you track your referrals and affiliates sent to your site so you
can give the correct commissions. The plugin also reports
on real-time traffic and sales so you can track earning and
payouts. Even better—there’s no limit as to how many affiliates
you can sign up.
If you’ve already launched your website and you’re still waiting
for the sales to roll in, it’s time to start telling people about your
business. Affiliate marketing is one of the simplest and most
effective marketing strategies, even if you’ve never done any
marketing, ever. AffiliateWP is a premium (paid), full-featured
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MONETIZING PLUGINS
Crowdfunding plugins.
By adding crowdfunding links to your site, you can assemble
The Charitable plugin provides a WordPress fundraising
your users behind a cause. The purpose of crowdfunding
toolkit that gives you complete control over your WordPress
is to raise funds for a cause you believe in, which is easy
fundraising efforts. Through the plugin, you can help users
to build on WordPress. Here are a few plugins that can
support a common cause. Utilize PayPal and offline payments,
implement this feature.
or you might consider a premium payment add-on, like Stripe
or PayFast, to tailor your crowdfunding needs to existing or
new content.
IgnitionDeck
Ecommerce plugins.
WordPress started out as a blogging platform, however, since
its inception, it has evolved into a fully functional platform for
creating an eCommerce site. Thanks to plugins and third-party
IgnitionDeck offers a unique crowdfunding framework that developers, you can easily add eCommerce functionality to
enables donation functionality. With this plugin installed, you your site without even knowing how to code. Here are a few of
can utilize real-time stats with both beautifully designed front- the top WordPress plugins you can use to equip your site with
end and back-end displays. IgnitionDeck works exquisitely with eCommerce functionality so you can start selling today.
thousands of WordPress themes, and upgrade options allow
you to integrate with multiple gateways, build your own white
label crowdfunding platform, and much more.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MONETIZING PLUGINS
BigCommerce
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MONETIZING PLUGINS
Shopify
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEVELOPMENT + DESIGN PLUGINS
Development
+ design plugins.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEVELOPMENT + DESIGN PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEVELOPMENT + DESIGN PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEVELOPMENT + DESIGN PLUGINS
Ninja Forms
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEVELOPMENT + DESIGN PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEVELOPMENT + DESIGN PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEVELOPMENT + DESIGN PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MEDIA PLUGINS
Media plugins.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MEDIA PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MEDIA PLUGINS
WP Video Lightbox allows you to display videos in a different Compact WP Audio Player uses an HTML5 + Flash hybrid
to embed mp3 audio files on your site. Fully responsive
way. When a user starts to play a video, it will pop out and
and compatible with all web browsers, you can easily add a
make the screen behind the player dark. This makes it easier
compact audio player to any page or post on your site with a
to view the video without the distractions of the post or ads
shortcode. The plugin is compact as stated in its name, with
behind it. The plugin works with YouTube or Vimeo and it’s very
only one customization feature (located in Settings >> SC Audio
easy to embed.
Player) that determines whether or not front-end users are
If you don’t have a lot of video content, the plugin can also be able to play multiple audio files at once.
used to create a lightbox for photographs and other images.
It’s also a great plugin for infographics and diagrams.
Html5 Audio Player
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MEDIA PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE PLUGINS
Customer
experience
plugins.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE PLUGINS
plugins.
To reduce support inquiries, you might consider creating
or adding a knowledge base to your site. A knowledge base
(sometimes referred to as a “support portal” or “support
garage”) will help users find quick answers and resources for
their questions. Here are just a few WordPress knowledge base
solutions you might consider putting to use.
Heroic Knowledge Base by HeroThemes is a premium (paid)
plugin that helps reduce support costs and support tickets
WP Knowledgebase by making it easy to add an aesthetically pleasing knowledge
base to your website. Some of the plugin’s features include the
ability to add article attachments, content reordering, instant
answers, and built-in analytics.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE PLUGINS
fully SEO compatible, meaning your site will have even further
international reach. Live chat plugins.
Healthy business growth not only depends on acquiring new
Amazon Polly customers, but also maintaining your current customers’
satisfaction. While customer support comes in all shapes and
sizes, live chat is one area that allows you to resolve customer
concerns in a timely manner.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE PLUGINS
[Link] Live Chat color scheme. It evens allows for integration with Zendesk,
GetResponse, SalesForce, MailChimp, and much more.
Ratings plugins.
Whether you’re selling a product or service online, reviews
can immensely impact a potential customer’s decision. In
fact, when browsing online, 70 percent of buyers look for
[Link] Live Chat is another great chat plugin that gives users
product reviews prior to making a purchase and 72 percent of
the ability to monitor and chat with site visitors—something consumers will take action after reading a positive review.
that’s not only great for live chat, but for generating new
sales and leads as well. The plugin is compatible with all web Adding a review feature to your website is not only a great
browsers and has even developed free apps for iOS, Android, way to incentivize a purchase, it also allows for user-generated
Windows, and Mac OSX. content to appear on your site. If you’re looking to add this
functionality to your WordPress site, read below for some
notable review plugins that will encourage user feedback on
Tidio Live Chat your content, products, and business.
Rating-Widget
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The ultimate guide to plugins. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE PLUGINS
YASR—Yet Another Stars Rating is another solid option for CM Tooltip Glossary
adding ratings/ reviews to your site(s). The plugin allows for
both visitor reviews and voting reviews, and you can create
multiple sets of stars for multiple criteria on a page or post.
Installing the plugin is a little more technically advanced than
some of the other options out there, but YASR provides well-
detailed instructions in the WordPress Plugin Repository. The
plugin also supports shortcodes, rankings, and rich snippets.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE PLUGINS
WordPress Tooltips
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEFENSIVE PLUGINS
Cyber-defense
plugins.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEFENSIVE PLUGINS
While WP Engine does a lot to harden the security of its Wordfence is a great plugin for WordPress users who want
customers’ WordPress sites, it’s never a bad idea to install the added security protection of an endpoint firewall and
additional security precautions. Besides, security is about risk malware scanner, both of which were built from the ground
reduction, not risk elimination. According to [Link], up to protect WordPress specifically. Additionally, Wordfence’s
“It’s about employing all the appropriate controls available Threat Defense Feed arms the plugin with the latest firewall
to you, within reason, that allow you to improve your overall rules, malware signatures, and malicious IP addresses it needs
posture reducing the odds of making yourself a target, to keep your website safe.
subsequently getting hacked.”
While WP Engine does disallow some security plugins, here are iThemes Security
a few you might consider using to further harden the security
of your website.
Wordfence
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEFENSIVE PLUGINS
BulletProof Security Monitoring to better detect when (and if) you have a problem.
In addition, Sucuri provides you with remote malware scanning,
blacklist monitoring, post-hack security actions, and more.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. DEFENSIVE PLUGINS
The User Role Editor plugin lets you adjust user roles and
capabilities with ease. With full support for WordPress Multisite
networks, this plugin lets you pinpoint specific tasks per user
and even hide front-end menu items from other users. While
the plugin is free to activate in the WordPress Repository, The WPFront User Role Editor plugin is another great option
you can upgrade to a premium version for an abundance of for managing user roles in WordPress. Through this plugin,
additional modules to work with. you can add, edit, and delete user roles. The free version
also allows you to migrate users to other sites. Through paid
premium options, a ton of features are added, including
User Role Editor by Members custom post type permissions, content restriction shortcodes,
an admin menu editor, and more.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
Business
improvement
plugins.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
plugins.
Getting your name on the map as a musician, an artist, or any
other type of event-centric entrepreneur can be difficult if
people don’t come to those events. Putting a calendar directly
on your site is a great way to keep your audience informed and
get people involved. The following calendar and booking plugins
Ticket Tailor uses an intuitive, versatile e-ticketing system that
make it a lot easier for visitors to schedule appointments and
provides the ability to quickly and easily sell tickets. E-tickets
see availability right on your WordPress website. Here are a few
will be automatically sent with QR codes and a barcode to
noteworthy plugins you should know about.
attendees. Ticket Tailor is highly customizable with the ability
to customize e-tickets to say whatever you want.
Event Tickets In addition to an easy to use and highly customizable platform,
Ticket Tailor features essential integrations that make ticket
visibility and usability easier. Ticket Tailor uses PayPal for
simple credit card payments, MailChimp to email attendees,
and Facebook for direct event registration.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
Tickera show up. Whether your event is free or paid, you’ll be able
to easily keep track of attendance. You can even customize
whether or not users are able to buy bulk tickets, or get
discounts for certain items. You can also choose how the
events are displayed. For instance, you can add an image,
description, time, and map. This is a great option for users who
need to keep track of attendance.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
upload photos and accept payment for listings. With Business Sprout Invoices
Directory up and running, you’ll be able to turn your website
into a thriving online directory in no time.
Geo Directory
Invoice plugins.
Invoice plugins make manually sending an invoice a thing of
Automatically add a PDF invoice to your eCommerce order
the past. Key features of these plugins make payments easier
confirmation emails with WooCommerce PDF Invoices. With
and more flexible, and include settings to make your invoice
this plugin, you can issue invoices using multiple different
notifications more customizable.
languages, fully customize the HTML/CSS of a template, and
store all generated invoices within your account page.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
Sliced Invoices is another solid option when it comes to SP Project & Document Manager is a powerful plugin that lets
invoicing plugins, and makes invoicing a breeze. Key features you manage documents and files across many media types,
of this plugin include offline payment methods, PayPal Express allowing you to manage clients, documents, accounts, vendors,
Checkout, invoicing in any currency, exporting invoices to CSV, distribution, and more. Users at all levels are able to create
and more. and manage projects. Administrators control all aspects of
user access: interactions with clients, management of sales
organization, and more are all easily maintained within this
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
Panorama
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
Site
optimization
plugins.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
Simply install the plugin and then check the boxes for code you
want to be minified. You can even add scripts for the code you
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
WP Rocket
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
Plugins to help make The AMP project is a publishing format created by Google to
and mobile-friendly.
pages are specially designed for search users to quickly load
website pages without using any extraneous or unnecessary
data. With the AMP Plugin for WordPress, you can enable your
Looking good on a mobile device isn’t just an option anymore— web experiences to be consistently fast, beautiful, and high-
it’s a requirement. In 2018, 58% of web traffic came from performing across different platforms. This plugin is a great
mobile devices, while the average mobile bounce rate was option for sites with a ton of content (like news sites) and can
50%. More people are visiting websites on their mobile devices
also help your content rank better on search engines.
than ever before, but the user experience they receive remains
problematic.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MICELLANEOUS PLUGINS
Miscellaneous
plugins.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MICELLANEOUS PLUGINS
All of the above is included in the free version, but if you want
to go pro, you can display maps based on a user’s current
If you like a little more control and customization for your
location, use custom post types, and more. The free version is
Google Maps, then installing the Google Maps Widget is a
full-featured and will display maps in minutes.
great way to go. With Google Maps Widget you can easily set
up a thumbnail with a lightbox. After it’s installed, you can
adjust how the thumbnail looks and decide whether or not you
want street or satellite view. Once users click on the thumbnail,
the map will expand for a clearer view.
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MICELLANEOUS PLUGINS
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The ultimate guide to plugins. MICELLANEOUS PLUGINS
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Plugin Index.
Easy Digital Downloads
Easy Google Fonts
Easy Property Listing
Event Tickets
10Web Social Photo Feed
Events Manager
AccessPress’ iFeeds
Geo Directory
AdRotate
Google Maps Widget
AffiliateWP
Google Website Translator
All in One SEO
Google XML Sitemaps
Amazon Polly
Heroic Knowledge Base
AMP for WordPress
Html5 Audio Player
AMR Shortcode Any Widget
Hubspot All-in-One Marketing
ARI Fancy Lightbox
iThemes Security
Autoptimize
IgnitionDeck
BigCommerce for WordPress
InviteBox
BulletProof Security
Jetpack
Business Directory
Leaflet Maps Marker
Charitable
Loco Translate
Child Theme Configurator
MailOptin
Child Theme Wizard
Ninja Forms
Cloudflare Stream Video
Optima Express + MarketBoost IDX
CM Tooltip Glossary
Optimize Database after Cleaning Revisions
Comments – wpDiscuz
OptinMonster
Compact WP Audio Player
Panorama
Contact Form 7
PayPal Buy Now Button
Contests by Rewards Fuel
PHP Compatibility Checker
Disable Comments
Rating-Widget
Easy Affiliate Links
Responsive Lightbox by dFactory
Shopify WP Google Map
Shortcodes Ultimate WP Knowledgebase
Sliced Invoices WP-Live Chat by 3CX
Slider by 10Web WP-Optimize
Slider Revolution WP Project Manager
Smash Balloon Social Photo Feed WP Rocket
SP Project & Document Manager WP-Smush Image Optimization
Sprout Invoices WP-Typography
Sucuri Security WP Video Lightbox
SumoMe YASR—Yet Another Star Rating
Superfly Yoast SEO
[Link] Live Chat Youtube Embed
Ticket Tailor
Tickera
Tidio Live Chat
Touchy
Translate WordPress with GTranslate
User Role Editor
User Role Editor by Members
Visualizer: Tables and Charts Manager
WooCommerce
WooCommerce PDF Invoices & Packing Slips
Wordfence
WordLift
WordPress Tooltips
WP Affiliate Manager
WPForms
WPFront User Role Editor
The ultimate guide to plugins. SITE OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS
About WP Engine.
WP Engine is the world’s leading WordPress Digital Experience Platform that gives
companies of all sizes the agility, performance, intelligence, and integrations they
need to drive their business forward faster. WP Engine’s combination of tech
innovation and an award-winning team of WordPress experts is trusted by more
than 85,000 companies across 135 countries to provide counsel and support,
helping brands create world-class digital experiences. Founded in 2010, WP Engine
is headquartered in Austin, Texas, and has offices in San Francisco, California;
Omaha, Nebraska; San Antonio, Texas; London, England; Limerick, Ireland; and
Brisbane, Australia. For more information, visit [Link].
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