9 June 2010
20 Must Have WordPress Plugins For Every Website
Editors Note: In her first article for Think Vitamin WordPress specialist Amber Weinberg looks at the plugins she can’t do without.
I’ve reviewed several plugins before, but since I started using WordPress as the CMS for almost every site I do now, I’ve amassed some great and very essential plugins.
Some of these make the user experience better, but a lot of these work in the backend to help the actual functionality of the site out. While it’s best to have as few plugins as possible to speed up the site, I’ve had no problems running all 20 of these plugins on a regular shared server.
1. Akismet
Akismet is such an awesome plugin, that WordPress decided to package it with every new install. It’s great for stopping spam and works really well without having to annoy your commentors with unreadable CAPTCHAs.
2. All-in-one Cufon
I’m a huge fan of typography and it stinks that you’re stuck with only a few fonts for the web. Image replacements like Cufon are awesome because they work on every browser using javascript (including mobile phones). Cufon is quicker and easier to set up than Sifr (which uses Flash) and all the text is still selectable!
3. All-in-one SEO Pack
All-in-one SEO pack is a must have plugin for any website or blog. While it works perfectly out of the box, you can also fine-tune any of its settings if you wish. It works by giving you a unique title and meta tags for each page and post. You can even give it your own meta info from each post page.
4. Contact Form 7
I use Contact Form 7 on almost every site I develop with. Completely configurable and easy to set up, you can make any amount of forms you wish and send it to multiple users as well.
5. Dean’s Permalink Migration
If you’re redesign an existing site, Dean’s Permalink Migration is a great plugin to use to ensure your visitors who use old links won’t be directed to 404 pages. It also ensures that any site or search engine won’t also be linked to a dead page (and lose SEO in the process). Simply tell the plugin the old directory and the new one and it redirects all the pages inside the folder for you.
6. Feed Statistics
I don’t like FeedBurner because the server goes down too often and the stats are always off. I love Feed Statistics because I can check my subscriber info from my admin area, see the exact feeds they’re subscribed to, which reader they use and what links they click on. Also comes with a widget for displaying the stats on your sidebar.
7. Google XML Sitemaps
Google XML Sitemaps automatically creates a new sitemap and submits it to major search engines every time you add a new page or post to your site. Install it, set it up and forget about it!
8. Lightbox Gallery
Lightbox Gallery takes your WordPress galleries and appends a lightbox to them. You can select from a regular lightbox or the Highslide lightbox. Lightbox Gallery has some helpful settings that allow you to decide what pages, categories or posts to load lightbox on, as well as where to put the js files.
9. Page Links To
One page thing about using WordPress’s built in navigation function, or wp_list_pages(), is that you can’t add extra links in (unless you want to add them before or after the function). Page Links To solves this problem by allowing you to create a WordPress page and then telling it where to actually link to. It works with any link on or off the server.
10. Socialize This
Socialize This is almost 3 plugins in 1. The main function of this plugin is to put share links on the bottom of your post. It allows you to choose the icon set, which sites to use and what order to put them in. However, you can also set this plugin to send a tweet to your account when a new post is published and it provides short URLs for all your posts.
11. Subscribe to Comments
Subscribe to Comments is a popular plugin for users that gives them a simple checkbox next to “submit comment” that allows them to receive an email for each new comment after their’s.
12. SNV Facebook Like Button
I’m biased on this plugin because I helped to code the admin area. SNV Facebook Like Button puts a pretty button on the bottom of posts that allows the user to “Like”, which sends the article to their Facebook page, and displays which friends of the user have already liked the post. You can choose whether to auto place it at the bottom of the post, or to manually place it wherever you want (that’s what I coded!).
13. Theme Switch and Preview
If you like to code your themes while being able to mold it around the content, but don’t want the users to see the half-coded theme, Theme Switch and Preview is the perfect plugin. It allows you to see the new theme while everyone else sees the old one. I was able to completely code my new website using this plugin directly on the live site. I was also able to show several people the new theme while it was still off – thanks to their special preview URL option.
14. Twitter for WordPress
Twitter for WordPress is a plugin that simply displays your latest tweets anywhere on the site. You can use their widget or you can place it anywhere in your theme with their function call.
15. WordPress Database Backups
What person wants to wake up one day and find that their server crashed and took all of your site content with it? WordPress Database Backups is a must–have plugin. You can use it download copies of your database manually, or set it to automatically email you a copy at whatever interval you’d like.
16. WordPress Related Posts
One of the best ways to increase SEO and readership is to increase the linkage between your posts. WordPress Related Posts places a set number of related articles at the bottom of each post. It’s also great for readers who wish to read more of what you’ve written on a particular topic.
17. WP PageNavi
If you’ve got a lot of articles on your site, it can be a pain to continue to hit the “Next” and “Previous” buttons to get to the first or last article on your site. WP PageNavi simply adds helpful pagination to your site to make navigation much easier.
18. WP Minify
WP Minify is one of several plugins designed to speed up the loading of your site. It basically takes all of your CSS and JS files and removes all of the extra space and combines them into one file, basically making it both smaller to download and requires less HTTP requests.
19. WP Super Cache
WP Super Cache is another plugin meant to speed up your site. It reduces load time by caching your pages and posts and giving your visitors the static file, instead of making several calls to the database.
20. WP Syntax
If you have a development blog, WP Syntax is a very helpful plugin. It colors and formats the code you use in posts for tutorials or samples. It also allows you to display PHP and other code that WordPress’s WYSIWYG normally removes.
Your Favorites
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Thomas Craig Consulting
# June 9, 2010 - 10:24 am
Nice list, wasn’t aware of the cufon plugin, but will definitely be adding this as I usually add this manually via the template code.
Chuck Reynolds
# June 9, 2010 - 10:32 am
Decent list… wanted to add/mention a couple things.
9. Page Links To – Will be irrelevant in WP3 (in RC2 with final launching soon) as the new menu system allows you to do that inside of the admin panel and is included in core and is on by default with the new default them, twentyten
18. WP Minify & 19. WP Super Cache – I still like to use W3 Total Cache, and recent tests have shown it to be somewhat superior to the others with the only thing beating it out slightly was two plugins working together. The reason I mentioned the wp minify is because W3TC does that for you as well…
:) Cheers
Rembrand
# June 9, 2010 - 12:44 pm
An addition to this addition if I may:
#11, Subscribe to Comments: It’s only compatible up to WP 2.3.1
I’ve tested it in 2.8 en 2.9 but alas, it doesn’t work. I haven’t come across a good alternative yet unfortunately.
Otherwise, a great list!
Amber Weinberg
# June 9, 2010 - 3:33 pm
That’s not true, I’m running WP 2.9.2 and am using Subscribe to Comments on my own site. What problems are you having with it?
Michael Fields
# June 9, 2010 - 8:00 pm
Currently using it on 3.0-RC2 and all is well.
Rembrand
# June 14, 2010 - 3:24 pm
Really? That’s weird. On my sites, the plugin saves the subscriptions, but doesn’t send alerts to the people who subscribe. (Tested it by using different e-mail accounts to post comments and replies)
Anyways, I checked the plugin info and it says: Compatible up to: 2.3.1
Milo Rambaldi
# July 7, 2010 - 5:41 am
9. I agree with you.
10. plus using CDN Service,, your website will be the fastest one.
:)
Chris Young
# June 9, 2010 - 10:42 am
Great list Amber – there’s a few I haven’t come across yet but will be making use of…
Laura Kalbag
# June 9, 2010 - 10:55 am
Cufon?! Old-school. I’d recommend using a plugin that communicates with Typekit, as Typekit has far superior rendering to Cufon and none of the buggy issues.
This looks like a good one:
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/typekit-fonts-for-wordpress/
I’d also add to the list that everybody should use Maintenance Mode for when they need to take their site down for maintenance. It’s great as it sends the right temporary messages as well as giving bots the next time they should check back.
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/maintenance-mode/
Andy Babic
# June 9, 2010 - 1:23 pm
Good call on using TypeKit Laura. By far the most reliable method of introducing non-standard type faces! Google are backing the method now too. For those that didn’t know, Google are even offering a small selection of fonts that you can use for free (http://code.google.com/webfonts). All you need to do is pull an additional stylesheet into your template, then apply the font to elements using standard CSS – no plugins required. So easy!
Thomas Phinney
# June 10, 2010 - 5:21 am
Cufon is free, but the quality of the rendering makes it useless for body text. TypeKit is great, but I don’t know of any evidence that it is “more reliable” than any other web font service (it has many competitors, including my own company’s WebINK).
TypeKit costs money above a certain traffic volume, or to use their most exclusive fonts, but it does have free options.
Cheers,
T
Amber Weinberg
# June 9, 2010 - 3:34 pm
Doesn’t Typekit cost $$ though? Cufon is free, which is why I use it.
Felix Eggbert
# June 9, 2010 - 6:03 pm
Seems like it. I can only recommend http://www.fontsquirrel.com. Lots of free-to-use fonts and a font-face generator that helps you with the CSS…works like a charm…(the most unbelievable about it is that it can even output CSS that works with IE 4+)…have been using it on a few of my recent projects without a problem…
Steffen Gregersen
# June 9, 2010 - 10:59 am
Awesome. Great list…
I’m really looking forward to work with the Feed Statistics and the WordPress Database Backup plugins.
I have been logging in to my host every time to backup. This plugin seems to to it very nice and quickly. Now I’ve hopefully got time to write another article or two every week, because of this :-)
WebCreationUK
# June 9, 2010 - 11:05 am
Nice list.
Wanted to ask: what is your opinion about SEOPower WP tool? It is a free one, just found it these days and I am still thinking whether to use it or not.
Thanks
Sergej Müller
# June 9, 2010 - 11:15 am
My beautiful alternatives:
http://antispambee.com
http://wpantivirus.com
http://www.wpseo.org
Derek Johnson
# June 9, 2010 - 11:25 am
Is selectable cufon text a new thing?
Amber Weinberg
# June 9, 2010 - 3:35 pm
No it’s not new to Cufon, but it was meant to compare to using an image for the fonts instead of a replacement.
Luca
# June 9, 2010 - 11:44 pm
In my experience, text is selectable but it doesn’t show on screen that you are selecting it… so it’s like going blind (but you can definetely copy and paste)
Matt Pritchett
# June 9, 2010 - 11:29 am
Excellent List. I would also add, tentatively, NextGen Gallery. It was an awesome plug in that has fallen on hard times since Chrome’s came to pass, as it does not work correctly with the current version. But once that is resolved, then most definitely!
Stefan
# June 9, 2010 - 11:31 am
Nice list, but I don’t agree #1 and #3. There are plenty of other, better tools. I suggest everyone to use AntiSpamBee and WPSeo, as they have several advantages over Akismet and AiO-Seo.
I’m also missing Google Analytics for WordPress. Is it included in any of the other plugins or do you think one should embed it directly into the template?
Jeff Woodruff
# June 10, 2010 - 3:27 am
I use Google Analyticator which I’ve found to be the best/easiest way to add your analytics code to your wordpress site. You can always add it manually to footer.php but the plugin is much easier and has areas for you to add additional tracking code before and after the tracker initialization as well as some other nice features. It also adds your analytics to the wordpress admin dashboard which is nice.
room34
# June 9, 2010 - 11:59 am
Great list! I’m already using about half of these; I’m curious to check out the rest.
One suggested change: a plugin that only shows your latest tweets seems a bit unnecessary; you can just paste a couple of lines of JavaScript from Twitter into an empty text widget to achieve that. I prefer Twitter Tools: a powerful Twitter plugin that can do that, plus allows you to post new tweets from your sidebar; have tweet “digests” appear automatically as posts in your blog; and my favorite feature: automatically tweet a link to each new blog post you create.
madsurfer
# June 9, 2010 - 12:03 pm
Do you have a preference for WP Super Cache? Are you familiar with W3 Total Cache? Those two plugins seem to be the most used caching plugins at the moment.
Redirection is also a very powerful plugin.
Gareth Tickner
# June 9, 2010 - 12:08 pm
Quick question, have you tested these plugins with WP3?
Amber Weinberg
# June 9, 2010 - 3:36 pm
Hi Gareth,
No I haven’t. Since there’s still not an official release of 3.0 yet, neither I or my clients have wanted to use it.
David
# June 9, 2010 - 12:48 pm
Great list. I’ve used some of these in the past, but I should look into using these more on the sites I build.
WP Super Cache is one that I have not used enough. Is it relevant only on high traffic sites or is it something that you recommend using on every WordPress site?
Gabriel de Kadt
# June 10, 2010 - 3:21 pm
Using a cache is really only necessary on high volume sites to prevent melt down at busy times – but I’ve found that they speed thing up for all users – particularly if you’re on a shared host with lots of other users’ MySQL queries flying about.
Lyndsy Simon
# June 9, 2010 - 1:02 pm
If you want to foster discussions, IntenseDebate and Disqus are great, too. I like ID, but they provide a lot of the same functionality.
They both email the user when someone replies to them, which really helps turn comments into conversations. ID also has reply-by-email, which is very nice. I’ve not used Disqus, but it seems to have much the same featureset.
Rakesh Solanki
# June 9, 2010 - 1:09 pm
No confusion that You’ve shared here essential list, first i was confused with All-in-one Cufon and its function really great.
Nick Halstead
# June 9, 2010 - 1:22 pm
Missing a plugin you are using on your own site TweetMeme Retweet Button – http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/tweetmeme/
How would you get your content retweeted without it? :)
Keir Whitaker
# June 9, 2010 - 2:42 pm
Hey Nick,
Thanks for stopping by. Yes we love the TweetMeme Retweet button here on Think Vitamin. This was Amber’s top 20, there are just so many to choose from :)
Keir
Shanna Cramer
# June 9, 2010 - 1:23 pm
Thanks for listing Deans Permalink Migrator! I have been searching for something like this, but never EVER would have thought to search for “permalink migrator”.
Dimitris K
# June 9, 2010 - 1:23 pm
Thank you for the list. One plug-in that I find very useful and you have not mentioned is Widget Logic. It is very useful for any site that is more than a blog.
seo-fox
# June 9, 2010 - 1:32 pm
Hey there,
thanks for the nice list – appreciate this. Half of those plugins I already use. But I think you missed a useful and for seo also powerful plugin like “YARPP” – yet another related posts plugin. Not only for usability but also for internal linking a nice plugin.
Take care,
Tobias
Amber Weinberg
# June 9, 2010 - 3:38 pm
Hi Tobias,
I didn’t meantion YARPP because I’ve already got a Related Posts mentioned and I personally think it does a better job than YARPP.
Eric Marden
# June 9, 2010 - 2:57 pm
This list is horribly out of date and contains a number of plugins that are just plain coded sloppily, have better alternatives, will cause issues with other plugins, is obsolete now or will be obsolete when WordPress 3.0 is released in a couple of weeks.
I thought this was a blog for designers and developers of the web? A list like this belongs on some amateur WordPress blog, and not on a Carsonified project. I’m really disappointed.
zerobyte
# June 10, 2010 - 2:25 pm
Your comment could be more useful showing some alternatives to this list, and not to laugh on it…
Gabriel de Kadt
# June 10, 2010 - 3:39 pm
Hey Eric – I agree that some of these plugins are off the fresh list but would be great to hear your thoughts as to which and why.
Amber Weinberg
# June 11, 2010 - 7:31 pm
OK you do realize that the majority of WordPress sites are NOT using WP3 yet? I’d rather see stuff I can use now, than something I have to wait months for. And how is this list out of date? I use all of these myself and they all work really well. “Better” is subjective to a point.
Stijn D.
# June 9, 2010 - 2:59 pm
I always install flutter. It’s a great way to create an easy-to-use back-end for clients.
You can create panels for inserting certain types of posts(such as “news” for example). When creating the panel you can add custom fields(img uploads/ date-fields/ ….) and u can get these fields easily in your template.
And for my multi-lingual site I tend to use “qtranslate” it has it’s hickups but it’s the best I found for create sites in multiple languages.
Brian
# June 9, 2010 - 3:53 pm
The major drawback to Cufon is that most fonts are not licensed for use with Cufon. Some foundries even go so far to explicitly forbid using Cufon with their fonts. In contrast, any font can be embedded in sIFR. That hasn’t stopped some developers from disregarding licensing and using Cufon. Might be fine for a personal site, but you probably want to be wary when using unlicensed fonts with Cufon when doing work for a client.
The_Patriot
# June 9, 2010 - 4:22 pm
Page Lists Plus, especially for those using WP to create a “website” rather than a “blog”…do bloggers ever even think about what it would be like to post content in the form of a page that you DON’T want appearing in the navigation?
Paul - WordPress designer
# June 9, 2010 - 4:52 pm
For caching, I use Hyper cache+ db cache reloaded.
I also use Cufon, but I add it via functions.php.
I’ve had some problems with WP Minify, I think due to some script conflicts, but when it works, it’s awesome.
the redirection plugin looks useful, I’ll have to remember that one.
Someone mentioned widget logic, which I also install on all my sites, which allows to have different widgets per page for example. I also use widgets reloaded which enables advanced settings for the categories bookmarks, and pages widgets.
Paul - WordPress designer
# June 9, 2010 - 5:09 pm
I forgot wp smushit! it reduces your images file size
Ted Goas
# June 9, 2010 - 5:23 pm
Admittedly I’m not a fan of list posts, but I’m a fan of Carsonified.
Usually.
When reading this list of ‘must-have’ plugins, “All-in-one Cufon” is the second one I read? A font-replacement plugin is essential?? And Cufon? The font-replacement technique that adds one http request for every word replaced on a page?
I don’t mean to be a hater, but I’m disappointed to see this here… I didn’t even finish the page…
Gabriel de Kadt
# June 9, 2010 - 9:59 pm
Hi Ted,
What’s with Cufon and one HTTP request per word? I’ve been using Cufon (without resorting to any WP plugins, mind) and have noticed no such thing. (Just checked with FF HTTP headers and seen nothing more than the two JS files required downloading. Cufon replacement is done in browser using Canvas – right?)
I know typography on the web can be a hog in terms of performance – but doesn’t need to be (choose fonts wisely, subset the glyphs and restrict use headings). A choice bit of font replacement is an easy win for look and feel…
While I’ve tried hosted and self hosted alternatives – and looking forward to using them more often (GO fontsquirrel.com @fontface kits and Google hosted fonts!) I’m still more than happy with Cufon when it beats them on filesize.
Amber Weinberg
# June 10, 2010 - 3:11 am
Ted, Cufon does not add one HTTP request for every word on the page, you can check it out on my site and using YSlow you can see it adds no additional HTTP requests other than calling the script file.
Matthew
# June 9, 2010 - 5:32 pm
I love Disqus Comment System. I’ve found it to be very good at discouraging spam posts since you can set it up to only require moderation on comments that include links, and it makes it easy to blacklist or whitelist users. I also like the fact that it offers several choices for logging in to comment.
Pablo
# June 9, 2010 - 7:52 pm
You should add some Google Analytics plugin to the list.
And, my favorite, OpenID. I hate to remember my blog password. I just generate a very strong password for my account, but I actually use my OpenID to login.
TheAL
# June 9, 2010 - 8:53 pm
Good list. I usually use WP for small sites where Drupal is overkill, so I tend not to worry about plug-ins. But these will still be very helpful for me. I was also kinda hoping for a really good image gallery (I’ve tried probably six already with no satisfaction, and my impression was that ‘Lightbox Gallery’ isn’t really a gallery – it just makes images Lightbox accessible), and also something for e-comm. Not necessarily a full solution. I’d resort to Drupal for that any day of the week. But something small that syncs with Pay Pal for quick payments of single items. Any suggestions?
Guido Tapia
# June 9, 2010 - 9:28 pm
Good list Amber, I suggest looking at http://www.picnet.com.au/met/ it has a good plugin to heat map visitor activity on your website.
Thanks again for great list
Ozh
# June 9, 2010 - 10:17 pm
From SVN Facebook first lines of code:
//plugin defaults
add_option ( ‘width’, ’450′ );
add_option ( ‘height’, ’70′ );
add_option ( ‘font’, ‘arial’ );
add_option ( ‘verb’, ‘like’ );
add_option ( ‘padding-vert’, ’0′ );
add_option ( ‘padding-horz’, ’0′ );
add_option ( ‘color-scheme’, ‘light’ );
FAIL.
Not only you should add all the options in *one array* instead of 7 individual records, but what is the point in issuing 7 extra SQL requests on every page request to re-save those values???
I hate when somehow influential blogs recommend WP plugins, most of the time they recommend bad stuff.
Keir Whitaker
# June 10, 2010 - 7:38 pm
Hey Ozh,
Whilst we really appreciate you commenting on the site, and you make a good point, wouldn’t it be better to offer a code example that we could learn from rather than pointing out a so called “failing” of someone else’s? That way we all benefit from your obvious knowledge :)
Amber Weinberg
# June 10, 2010 - 9:02 pm
I’m sorry you feel this way and I’m sorry you feel you have to express it in such a trolling manner. The guy who coded the majority of this plugin (I only did the auto/manual placement in the admin) was his first plugin. Let’s stop being nasty to newcomers and instead show them the correct manner of coding.
Ozh
# June 11, 2010 - 6:26 am
Amber, I blame you more than the plugin author. Releasing a plugin for the first time is great, making newbie mistakes is everyone’s share one day or another. But recommending poor code on a high visibility site? That’s irresponsible.
Keir: I thought my comment was rather self explanatory. More details: http://planetozh.com/blog/2009/09/top-10-most-common-coding-mistakes-in-wordpress-plugins/
Amber Weinberg
# June 11, 2010 - 7:33 pm
Ozh,
If you don’t like the code, no one is forcing you to use it.
Cerys
# June 9, 2010 - 11:00 pm
That’s a great list, I use most of the ones you have listed here on a regular basis too – and that cufon one is going to come in very handy! Thank you :)
Sally Strebel
# June 10, 2010 - 12:57 am
A plugin that we automatically add to all our sites is Viper Video Quicktags. Its a great plugin and the developers are stand up guys too.
Donna from SurveyGizmo
# June 10, 2010 - 2:05 am
I’d like to add #21 to your must-have list if I may: SurveyGizmo. Our free account offers a WordPress plugin that allows you to:
Run everything from polls to multi-page surveys right from within your WordPress posts and pages
Build a custom and full-featured contact form or lead generation form for your “Contact Us” page
Take results from a survey/form and post them to another API, such as Constant Contact, Sales Force, Aweber, etc.
Basically, if you need a form on a web page, SurveyGizmo can help you build it. You can download the plugin here: http://www.surveygizmo.com/add-ons/wordpress-survey-plugin If you have any questions please feel free to send us an email or ask us on twitter (@SurveyGizmo), we’re happy to be of help.
Jeff Woodruff
# June 10, 2010 - 3:37 am
I like the list you’ve compiled Amber. I just thought I’d add my own personal favorites to the collection…Google Analyticator (for google analytics integration), My Custom Widgets (enables you to build custom PHP/HTML widgets), cform II (form plugin with a number of great features), FD Feedburner Plugin (redirects to your feedburner feed and helps track subscribers).
Jeff
zabawy dla dzieci
# June 10, 2010 - 8:36 am
Very nice information Amber, thanks a lot for this information! it is very useful, great Plugin!!!
Erik Rostad
# June 10, 2010 - 11:23 am
Great post. I’ve been using Cufon fonts but didn’t realize there was a plugin.
Here is my list of my 12 favorite plugins:
http://www.eprcreations.com/my-favorite-wordpress-plugins/
mark rushworth
# June 10, 2010 - 12:33 pm
My standard plugin lineup is:
askimet
cbnet-ping-optimiser
comment-rating
gd-star-rating
google-analytics-for-wordpress
google-sitemaps-generator
headspace2
redirection
robots-meta
sem-dofollow
seo-image
seo-slugs
sexybookmarks
smart-youtube
subscribe-to-comments
wordtwit
wp-pagenavi
wp-spamfree
yet-another-related-post
Jacob
# June 10, 2010 - 1:27 pm
Thanks for the great list, Amy!
I must say, the functionality you get from some of those plugins is possible to achieve from a line or two of code in your functions.php file. Granted, if you change themes often, a plugin is a better way to go.
One plugin I find myself using very often is: Executable PHP Widget, which allows me to run php code in my widgets. I do this for all kinds of reasons, like retrieving author meta or displaying a list of random posts in my sidebar or footer.
Cheers,
Jacob
Mike Robinson
# June 10, 2010 - 2:25 pm
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/mloovi-translate-widget/
This will give you instant translations into 58 languages, and each language version is indexable by search engines.
Oh, and of course you absolutely need this one…http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/england-world-cup-countdown/ (OK, maybe not, unless you are an England Football fan ;))
Dave Hodgkinson
# June 10, 2010 - 4:13 pm
Not a bad crossover with my top 10:
http://www.davehodgkinson.com/blog/2010/05/wordpress-plugins-for-photographers/
Some of yours could be redundant: Dreamhost has great idiot-proof backups for example.
You also missed rpx authentication. Facebook/Twitter logins FTW!
CSSReX
# June 10, 2010 - 5:06 pm
I am using 14 out of 20 you listed and I think that is enough. I believe in custom programming than plugins though. Anyways, Thanks for this wonderful list :) looking for more..
Ross
# June 10, 2010 - 7:24 pm
W3 Total Cache is better than WP-Super-Cache in my opinion. It comes bundled with html/css/js minification and CDN integration.
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/w3-total-cache/
+1 SmushIt!
Also like WP Security Scan and Login Lockdown – WordPress is increasingly more of a target now that 8% of the entire internet runs on WordPresss.
Tony Naccarato
# June 11, 2010 - 4:58 am
Great list. I already use a lot of these but there were some that I haven’t come across that I will be putting on my “have to use” plugin list. One that I’m always using is Exclude Pages from Navigation
James Pearce
# June 11, 2010 - 6:29 am
Any self-respecting blog should look nice on a mobile browser – and of course, not just the iPhone.
For all-round mobile support, I recommend http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wordpress-mobile-pack/
(But then I would ;-) )
Yari
# June 11, 2010 - 1:02 pm
Cufon sounds so great! I wasn’t aware this existed and will definitely check it out soon! Thanks for sharing Amber
Ayman Aboulnasr
# June 13, 2010 - 12:09 pm
Thanks alot for sharing the list Amber.
In fact this is my first time to hear of some of them.
Kevin
# June 14, 2010 - 3:51 pm
Thanks a bunch for the list! I’m getting started with a blog and these installs helped me to check off a bunch of items on the to-do list very nicely.
Shiva
# June 16, 2010 - 4:48 am
This is a pretty good list of plugin. In fact I have used all of them at some or the other point of time but currently many of them are missing from my lineup. I had not heard abotu CUfon before. I will try this one. It sounds cool
JP
# June 18, 2010 - 12:17 am
WP Super Cache is ok…but Quick Cache is WAY better. It will auto cache based on your sitemap (google XML sitemap pluggin). It is really easy and very slick! Check it out.
New Signature
# June 18, 2010 - 5:30 pm
WordPress Easy Post Types plugin was released yesterday. Complex WordPress 3.0 sites made easy. The Easy Post Types plugin extends WordPress and provides a GUI interface that combines and leverages the power of custom post types, custom taxonomies, and meta tags. Publishers don’t have to hack code to take advantage of the new powerful features of WP 3.0. Easy Post Types is distributed under the GNU General Public License. http://www.wpeasyposttypes.com
Features
• Ready to Use. Use standard WordPress query rules to quickly list content in your page templates, no need for any custom PHP coding.
• Pre-Packaged. Create custom content types on the fly through the WordPress backend.
• Themable. Available out of the box with the base theme or quickly override using your own.
• Robust. Add unlimited fields to your content types.
• Extensible. Many out of the box field types available, or create your own through the plugin API.
• Customizable. Fields can be ordered in the template to allow better input workflow for the user.
• Pluggable. Simply create a field and it’s plugged into your content type automatically.
• Simple. One single call to display any field in an output.
• Advanced Users. Access to the plugin object for advanced users at the post level.
Jennifer R
# June 20, 2010 - 4:00 pm
I think WP super cache is too old and slow, you should replace it with WP hyper cache or V3 total cache :)
toribloger
# June 20, 2010 - 8:55 pm
very cool post and plugins! add this in favourites
Corbin
# June 21, 2010 - 10:37 am
I always love looking through these sort of lists and use them to see how well my skills measure up to other designers. There are a few on this list I hadn’t heard of before, so will be keen to check them out.
One thing I didn’t see here (and apologies if I skipped over someone’s comments), is any reference to protecting your content/publications on the net. I have just signed up for MYOWS and see there is a WordPress plugin:
http://myows.com/forum/comments.php?DiscussionID=78
inspirationfeed
# June 21, 2010 - 12:53 pm
Great list!
In using most of these on my blog!
Ranjith
# July 7, 2010 - 7:40 am
thanks for sharing this list. I already have a few plugins on my website. I am planning to add the “contact form” plugin shared by you in this list. Thanks again :) keep up the good work.
David
# July 10, 2010 - 6:36 am
I’m researching plugins for creating a new blog and this is a great post thanks!
On the Feedstats plugin vs Feedburner, if you want to monetize your feed with Adsense then I think you need to use Feedburner since the plugin doesn’t give you that (AFAIK).
I’ve also decided to go with Platinum SEO instead of All in one as if you do a google search for reviews of comparisons of both, Platinum shows up as the first item (great SEO!), and there are some extra features in Platinum.
Jay Philips
# July 19, 2010 - 2:46 am
Great list. What about AddToAny, DandyID, WordPress.com Stats & WP-Stats-Dashboard?
For some other WordPress plugins check out — http://wfapm.com/bQUWxv
Andy
# July 19, 2010 - 11:27 am
This is a valuable feature especially for people who are not very confident coding a navigation from scratch. I have not personally used this method so could not comment on its flexibility but I am sure the user will have a lot of control over the look and functionality.
Brian
# August 23, 2010 - 8:42 pm
Very valuable list.
One question – How do you rate All-in-one-SEO in comparison to headspace. Some people swear by each but no one has been able to give me a solid answer which one is superior. What is everyone’s thoughts on these 2 plugins?