My 20+ Favourite WordPress Plugins
January 20, 2011 
3 Comments
Today I would like to share my own favourite WordPress plugins. As a webdesigner, I create a lot of websites based on WordPress. So in the past year, I tried and tested a lot of plugins. I devided the list in 2 categories. The essential WordPress plugins should be installed on every WordPress blog. The highly recommended plugins are plugins I also use a lot, but these WordPress plugins offer extra features, so you can install them depending on your needs.Read also my previous post “How to Install a WordPress Plugin” to learn how to install WordPress plugins.
Essential WordPress plugins
Essential plugins are WordPress plugins that actually should be installed by default.
Askimet
Askimet is a service that removes spam reactions on your blog. You can also manually remove spam reactions, but if you have a popular blog, this can take a lot of time.
Askimet is free for non-commercial blogs.
More information about Askimet
All In One SEO Pack
All In One SEO Pack is one of the best WordPress plugins to optimize your blog for search engines. It gives you more control about the post and page titles of your blog and a lot more. This plugin is simple but effective.
More information about All In One SEO Pack
Google Analyticator
Google Analytics is one of the best ways to analyze the visitors of your blog or website. There are several very interesting statistics for getting to know your visitors. This tool is essential to optimize your blog or website.
To start with Google Analytics, you need a google-account. Google Analytics is a free service!
The Google Analyticator plugin adds the necessary JavaScript code to enable Google Analytics on your WordPress blog or website.
More information about Google Analytics (free service by Google)
More information about Google Analyticator
Google XML Sitemaps
This WordPress plugin will generate a special XML sitemap which will help search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo and Ask.com to better index your blog. Additionally it notifies all major search engines every time you create a post about the new content.
More information about Google XML Sitemaps
pageMash
With pageMash, it’s easy to reorder your pages. PageMash has a drag and drop ajax user interface.
More information about pageMash
W3 Total Cache
Easily optimize the speed and user experience of your site with caching. Especially when you have a lot of traffic, this is an essential plugin!!
More information about W3 Total Cache
WordPress Database Backup
WP-DB-Backup allows you easily to backup your core WordPress database tables.
More information about WordPress Database Backup
Highly recommended plugins
Advertisement Management
This WordPress plugin lets you administrate the blog advertisements from the backend. It’s a rather simple plugin but it does what it has to do.
More information about Advertisement Management
Breadcrumb NavXT
This WordPress plugin generates locational breadcrumb trails for your WordPress powered blog or website. These breadcrumb trails are highly customizable to suit the needs of just about any website running WordPress.
More information about Breadcrumb NavXT
CMS
If you want to turn your WordPress blog into a CMS, this is the plugin you need!
This WordPress plugin makes it easier for developers to create websites with WordPress and for their clients to manage these websites.
Exec PHP
The Exec-PHP plugin executes PHP code in posts, pages and text widgets.
More information about Exec PHP
FD Feedburner Plugin
This WordPress plugin redirects the main feed and optionally the comments feed seamlessly and transparently to Feedburner.com.
More information about FD Feedburner Plugin
Lightbox 2
This WordPress plugin is used to overlay images on the current page.
More information about Lightbox 2
Page Links To
This WordPress plugin redirects visitors of a page or post to another URL.
More information about Page Links To
Role Scoper
Role Scoper is a comprehensive access control solution, giving you CMS-like control of reading and editing permissions. Assign restrictions and roles to specific pages, posts or categories.
More information about Role Scoper
SEOPressor
SEOPressor is a premium WordPress plugin that analyzes how your post or page will score in Google.
More information about SEOPressor
SexyBookmarks
Adds an attractive social bookmarking menu to your posts, pages, index, or any combination of the three.
More information about SexyBookmarks
TinyMCE Advanced
This WordPress plugin adds a couple of advanced features to this WYSIWYG editor.
More information about TinyMCE Advanced
Wickett Twitter Widget
Display the latest Tweets from your Twitter accounts inside WordPress widgets. Customize Tweet displays using your site or theme CSS.
More information about Wickett Twitter Widget
WPML
WPML makes it possible to turn WordPress blogs multilingual in a few minutes with no knowledge of PHP or WordPress. Its advanced features allow professional web developers to build full multilingual websites.
