100+ Essential Best WordPress Plugins [Part I of II]

One very important feature which makes WordPress very cool is the huge number of WordPress Plugins it has in it’s database, WordPress Plugins can extend WordPress to do almost anything imaginable. In the plugin directory you can find, download, rate, and comment on all the best plugins the WordPress community has to offer. With a database of over 26,500 plugins, and each of these plugins offering custom functions and features enabling users to tailor their sites to their specific needs, getting the best WordPress plugins can sometimes become overwhelming. There are huge number of plugins being created almost on daily basis by thousands of web developers around the world, while some of them are excellent, some are just ok while some are not. In this article, we have listed over 100 of such best available WordPress plugins that will not just help you save a lot of time but will enhance and increase your productivity in many ways
100 Essential Free and Premium WordPress Plugins [Part I]
Plugins INDEX:
- Backup Plugins
- Portfolio Plugins
- Search Plugins
- Post Rating Plugins
- Data Performance Plugins
- Typography Plugins
- SEO And Usability Plugins
- Slider Plugins
- Comments Plugins
- Author Box Plugins
- Attention-Grabber Plugins
- Authentication Plugins
- PayPal Plugins
- Anti-Spam Plugins
- Plugins For AdSense
- Archive Plugins
- Membership Plugins
- Facebook Plugins
- WooCommerce Plugins
- Filter Plugins
- Forum Plugins
- Contact Form Plugins
- Dashboard Plugins
Backup WordPress Plugins
BackUpWordPress
BackUpWordPress will back up your entire site including your database and all your files on a schedule that suits you. It has the ability of keeping the back up of your entire site, including the option of Option to have each backup file emailed to you, it also works on Linux & Windows Server and gives you the option to schedule your backups at your own convenience.
Online Backup for WordPress
This is another cool plug-in that provides protection for your WordPress website and their data. It is an online Backup for WordPress allows you to easily backup your WordPress site with encryption locally, to email, or free 100 MB secure online storage.
XCloner – Backup and Restore
Designed for PHP/MySQL websites, XCloner is a Backup and Restore component designed for PHP/Mysql websites, it can work as a native plugin for WordPress and Joomla! XCloner design was specifically created to Generate custom backups of any LAMP website through custom admin inputs, and to be able to Restore the clone on any other location with the help of the automatic Restore script we provide, independent from the main package. XCloner Backup tool uses Open Source standards like TAR and Mysql formats so you can rest assured your backups can be restored in a variety of ways, giving you more flexibility and full control.
WP Complete Backup
WP Complete Backup plug-in will backup the WordPress entire database as well as the file system. It is an easy to use, complete backup solution for WordPress. The plug-in offers users the ability to backup both the database as well as complete file system.
Search WordPress Plugins
Better Search
Better Search replaces the default WordPress search with a better search that gives contextual results sorted by relevance, You can also play with the weight you give each, this plugin doesn’t give you results based on the title or content of the post, but by date. The plugin supports templates for perfect integration into your blog template.
Search Everything
Search Everything improves WordPress default search functionality without modifying any of the template pages. You can configure it to search pages, excerpts, attachments, drafts, comments, tags and custom fields (metadata) and you can specify your own search highlight style. It also offers the ability to exclude specific pages and posts. It does not search password-protected content. Simply install, configure… and search.
WP Search
The WP Search plugin seeks to increase relevancy by focusing on titles and content rather than ordering search results by date.. It also allows you to control the importance you give to both of the titles and the content. The plugin lets you increase relevancy by keeping a focus on titles and content instead of ordering search results by date.
Relevanssi
The Relevanssi plugin offers a number of features that make it attractive. Relevanssi replaces the default search with a partial-match search that sorts results by relevance. It also indexes comments and shortcode content.
Authentication WordPress Plugins
Membee Login
This plug-in allows a WordPress developer to utilize the popular membership management system, Membee to control user access to a WordPress site. What this plugin does is to add member authentication and access role management to your WordPress site via Membee’s Member Single Sign-On web service.
WP Email Login
Since email addresses are required to be unique within WordPress anyway, they also make good identifiers for logging in. This plugin allows you to use your email address instead of a username to log into your WordPress.
Duo Two-Factor Authentication
The plugin allows you easily add Duo Two-factor Security / authentication to your WordPress website. It gives you the functionality of two-factor authentication for your admins and/or users.
Peter’s Login Redirect
The plugin is used to redirect users to different locations after logging in and logging out.
Login Security Solution
The plugin offers protection against Security against brute force attacks by tracking IP, name, password; requiring very strong passwords. Idle timeout. Maintenance mode lockdown.
ManageWP Worker
The plugin allows you to manage your WordPress sites from one dashboard remotely.
Google Authenticator
Just like the duo two-factor authentication, this plugin gives you two-factor authentication using the Google Authenticator app for Android/iPhone/Blackberry.
WP Login Security 2
WP Login Security 2 provides enhanced security by requiring users to whitelist their IP address. If the IP address is not recognized, the plugin will send an email to the user with a link that contains a one-time key. Optionally the blog administrator can also be notified.
Membership WordPress Plugins
WordPress eMember
The plugin is a powerful tool which can turn your existing or new WordPress site into a fully featured membership site easily.
More Info | Price: $49.95
Suma
The plugin is a purpose-built for WordPress and is designed specifically to run membership-based sites. It provides the three functions necessary for a Membership site.
More Info | Price: $29
MemberWing-X
The plugin allows quick and easy building of Powerful, Secure and SEO Optimized Professional Membership Portals.
More Info | Price: $199.95
aMember
The plugin lets you accept subscription payments, manage customer profiles, deliver digital content, integrate with your blog, forum, or CMS, send opt-in newsletters, run your own affiliate program.
More Info | Price: $179.95
Members
The plugin will extend your control over your blog. It’s a user, role, and content management plugin that were created to make WordPress a more powerful CMS.
s2Member
The plugin suited best for professional WordPress membership management, integrating seamlessly with User Roles & Capabilities for WordPress.
More Info | Price: $69
WP Premium Members + Pre Advertisements admin
The plugin display Premium content to your paying members only as well as manages Pre Post Advertisements. The plugin is designed to work both as a standalone premium membership plugin and it works together and extends the possibilities of the WP Pre Advertisement plugin.
WP-Membership Plugin
The plugin helps you sell your content; you only need to install the plugin, create a category for your private content, setup the prices of your memberships and your Paypal account. Don’t hesitate and purchase it today.
More Info | Price: $25
PayPal WordPress Plugins
WP PayPal Simple Donation Widget
The plugin allows you to place a PayPal button within your WordPress theme. You can choose between 3 standard PayPal buttons or use your own custom button. The widget will also allow you to put in custom text or html to display before the button within your widget.
WP Easy PayPal Payment Accept
The PayPal sidebar widget allows you to place a PayPal button within your WordPress theme
WordPress Simple PayPal Shopping Cart
WordPress Simple Paypal Shopping Cart allows you to add an ‘Add to Cart’ button for your product on any posts or pages. This simple shopping cart plugin lets you sell products and services directly from your own WordPress site and turn your WP blog into an ecommerce site.
PayPal Digital Goods powered by Cleeng
The plugin enables you to make money online with your high quality content.
Easy PayPal Custom Fields
You to easily add a PayPal ‘donate’ or ‘buy now’ button to your site with this powerful plugin
Multi Currency PayPal Donations
Use this plugin to receive PayPal donations through WordPress in multiple currencies with the lowest possible fees.
PayPal Pay Now, Buy Now, Donation and Cart Buttons Shortcode
The plugin lets you add a shortcode to display PayPal’s pay now, buy now, donation and add to cart buttons with features to customize your PayPal checkout page.
PayPal Framework
The plugin gives you a great framework to use for integrating with PayPal. It stores both live and sandbox API credentials and allows you to switch back and forth easily.
Anti-Spam Plugins
Spam Free WordPress
This plugin blocks automated spam with zero false positives.
Anti-spam
This plugin blocks spam in comments automatically, invisibly for users and for admins.
WP Anti Spam
This plugin can anti automated spambots or anti spams by “comment”, “ip”, “name”, “email” and “url”.
Growmap Anti Spambot Plugin
This plugin defeat automated spambots by adding a client side generated checkbox asking the comment author to confirm that they are not a spammer.
Spammer Blocker
This plugin prevents users from commenting or viewing your website if a comment of theirs has been marked as spam.
WordPress Plugins For AdSense
Google AdSense
This plugin provides a streamlined interface to deploy Google ads on your blog. You can also customise the colours and sizes of the ad blocks and activate them right from the plugin interface.
AdSense Now!
AdSense Now! is the simplest possible way to generate revenue from your blog using Google AdSense. Aiming at simplicity, AdSense Now! does only one thing: it puts your AdSense code in up to three spots in your posts and pages (both existing ones and those yet to be written).
Google AdSense for Responsive Design
Google Adsense for Responsive Design allows you to easily place responsive (asynchronous optional) Google AdSense in your website’s content via the use of the shortcode [GARD] while custom shortcode option available in GARD Pro.
Google AdSense Plugin
The plugin allows you to set parameters of the ads displaying, such as format (text ad, image, text with an image or link), size, color of the elements in the ad block, rounded corners and the ad block position on the website.
Quick Adsense
The plugin offers a quicker & flexible way to insert Adsense or any Ads code into a blog post. Besides, it can randomly place the Ads anywhere within a post. It comes with a simple setting page, and it does not overwhelm you with complicated customisable options.
WP Simple Adsense Insertion
The plugin is an easy to use WordPress plugin to insert Google Adsense to your posts, pages and sidebar.
Better AdSense Targeting
The plugin will help the ads being displayed be more relevant to the content on your pages.
Archive WordPress Plugins
Archive
The plugin archive your post types, also possible with cron and list via shortcode on frontend.
jQuery Archive List Widget
It’s a simple jQuery widget (can be used in posts) for displaying an archive list with some effects.
Grid Archives
The plugin offers a grid style archives page for WordPress, just put “[grid_archives]” in your Post or Page to show the grid-style archives.
EG-Archives
The plugin provides a widget (and a template tag) to display archives in yearly mode, AND monthly, according a specified pivot date.
Smart Archives Reloaded
The plugin easily display posts grouped by year and month, in one or more elegant formats.
Watch out for Part II