Get 10 of the best WordPress plugins that make blog management easier, conversion optimization better and your workflow smooth.
You’ve probably heard that over 39.5% of the world’s websites are currently built using WordPress. If you are a blogger who runs his or her own website, you know the importance of having first-class content. But this is only the beginning. You have to get it present in front of your readers in an appealing manner that results in an increasing number of visitors visiting again and again.
The web is ever-changing, and as a result, we need plugins to help us stay on top of our game. I have been working with WordPress for more than 10 years as a blogger and developer. In this post, I have compiled my Top 10 list of free WordPress plugins. From social media sharing tools to simple design enhancements, each of the below plugins are essential for any blog.
1. Yoast SEO
Yoast SEO is one of the most popular WordPress plugins for search engine optimization. It helps you optimize your website for search engines and provides advice on how to improve your site’s performance in organic (meaning unpaid) search results.
This plugin also gives you tips on how to optimize your content based on topics, keywords, categories, and more. Yoast SEO can help you create better-optimized pages and posts that will rank higher in organic searches.
Alternative: The SEO Framework – Fast, Automated, Effortless
2. W3 Total Cache
W3 Total Cache is a WordPress plugin that optimizes your site for speed. It can make your site load faster, reduce bandwidth usage and improve search engine ranking. The plugin also adds many advanced features such as HTML minification, browser cache management, and more.
Alternative: LiteSpeed Cache
3. Wordfence
Wordfence is a plugin that can help you secure your website. This may seem like an obvious thing to have, but there are a lot of WordPress sites out there without any security measures in place.
Wordfence is one of the best ways to protect yourself from hacking attempts on your website. It scans for malware and other malicious software, blocks brute force attacks (which occurs when someone uses automated programs to guess at passwords until they get it right), and alerts you if anyone has tried to log into your site via IP address or email address that isn’t yours. You can also use this plugin for things like basic analytics so you know how many visitors come to your blog each day and where they’re coming from. You can even see which posts are most popular with readers by looking at the stats provided by WordFence!
Alternative: All In One WP Security & Firewall
4. WP Clean Up
WP Clean Up is the best free WordPress plugin to clean up and optimize your blog. It removes all unwanted code on a page, including unused CSS and JavaScript files. This plugin can also be used to remove site bloat by removing old revisions, meta data, and other unnecessary pages from your website.
Alternative: WP-Optimize – Cache, Clean, Compress.
5. WP-Smushit Image Optimization
WP-Smushit Image Optimization is a helpful plugin that allows you to compress and optimize your images. The plugin uses lossy compression on JPEGs (lossy means there’s some quality loss) and can also be used for PNG files. It will automatically optimize your images as you upload them, so avoid having to manually upload each one before it gets processed by this plugin!
The reduced file sizes will help speed up your site without sacrificing much quality at all. In addition, if there are any issues with the approach being taken by this plugin, you can select an option called “Optimize for Web” which will reduce image sizes without reducing quality as much as before. This option works especially well for images that have already been compressed using another method such as Photoshop or GIMP (a free image editor).
Alternative: Imagify – Optimize Images & Convert WebP
6. UpdraftPlus WordPress Backup Plugin
UpdraftPlus simplifies backups and restoration. It is the world’s highest-ranking and most popular scheduled backup plugin, with over a million currently-active installs. Back up your files and database backups into the cloud and restore with a single click!
Backup into the cloud directly to Dropbox, Google Drive, Amazon S3 (or compatible), Rackspace Cloud, DreamObjects, FTP, Openstack Swift, Updraft Vault, and email. The paid version also backs up to Microsoft OneDrive, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Storage, Backblaze B2, SFTP, SCP, and WebDAV.
Alternative: ManageWP Worker
7. WordPress Social Sharing Plugin – Social Warfare
The Social Warfare plugin is a great free WordPress plugin for blogs. It’s easy to use and allows you to easily share content on a variety of social media sites. This social sharing plugin comes with preset themes, so it’s easy to customize your site in any way that you want. It also works with any other theme, which makes it incredibly versatile.
It’s great for increasing traffic to your site because it can be used with the new Gutenberg editor or classic editor. This means that even if you’re not ready for Gutenberg yet (or maybe never will be), Social Warfare will still help increase your traffic!
Alternative: AddToAny Share Buttons
8. Spectra – WordPress Gutenberg Blocks
Power-up the Gutenberg editor with advanced and powerful blocks that help you build websites in no time! This first Gutenberg addon is here to make website building an ultimate journey.
Available blocks:
- Section
- Advanced Heading
- Post Grid
- Post Carousel
- Post Masonry
- Info Box
- Google Map
- Team
- Content Timeline
- Social Share
- Testimonial
- Icon List
- Restaurant Menu
- Post Timeline
- Call To Action
- Advanced Columns
- And much more…
Alternative: Page Builder Gutenberg Blocks – CoBlocks
9. Akismet Anti-Spam
Akismet Anti-Spam is one of the most popular WordPress plugins, and it’s not hard to see why. It’s an easy-to-use anti-spam technique that prevents comment spam in your blog and saves you time from having to manually block comments.
This plugin allows you to automatically block spam comments as well as manually approve them, which can be done from within your Dashboard or through a shortcode in any post or page on your site. When you approve a comment, Akismet will automatically flag it as legitimate so that future visitors don’t see it flagged as spam when they visit your site.
Akismet uses an internal database of users whose accounts have been blocked by other sites using Akismet; these users’ IP addresses are blacklisted when they try to comment again on other blogs using this plugin. The plugin also uses third-party services such as Google Analytics or Cloudflare IP reputation lists (which means that if someone has previously been blocked by another website running Akismet Anti Spam), their IP address will be flagged automatically upon trying to post on one of their sites using this plugin too!
10. Ninja Forms Contact Form
The Ninja Forms plugin is a great option for creating forms, as it is easy to use and affordable. The plugin allows you to quickly create forms with ease, as well as customize them so they work exactly how you want them to. It can be integrated with other tools like MailChimp or PayPal so that your form data will be collected automatically.
You can also use this plugin to collect data from your visitors by adding checkboxes and dropdowns, limit the number of characters users can input into text fields or even have them upload files from their computer. This tool is useful for gathering feedback on products or services as well as testimonials from customers about their experiences using your business’ services/products (or website).
Conclusion
We have mentioned some of the most useful WordPress plugins that will enhance your blog’s functionality, security, and performance. These plugins are completely free to download and use, but it is important to note that each functions differently and should be used based on your personal needs. Choose wisely!
