Some useless facts that might help create an unbelievable “Did you know?” fact about WordPress such as
One percent of WordPress plugins deliver blocks.
Herb Miller, based on some (not so flaky) evidence below.
Figures from Oct 2019
Plugins and Gutenberg blocks
- There are 54,582 plugins – https://wordpress.org/plugins/
- On the 15th October there were 54,896 plugins.
- Over 400 plugins provide Gutenberg blocks or extend blocks. https://wordpress.org/plugins/browse/blocks/
- These are the curated plugins.
- From a list of 53,258 blocks, I identified 551 plugins as potentially delivering blocks or somehow enhancing WordPress blocks.
- That’s 150 more than the curated list.
- Assuming each plugin provides 8 blocks per plugin that’s 4,500 blocks.
- Parsing wordpress.org’s pages I found
For more information see bobbingwide/oik-loader#1.
Some other miscellany
WordPress has been around for 16 years.
In October 2019, the new block editor was less than one year old.
- WordPress 5.2 has been downloaded over 81 million times. https://wordpress.org/download/counter
- The Classic editor plugins is installed on 5 million sites. https://wordpress.org/plugins/classic-editor/
Nearly 90K sites are using Gutenberg v6.4 or higher. https://wordpress.org/plugins/gutenberg/advanced/ - In My Honest Opinion: Themes should not deliver blocks.
Top 17 or so WordPress plugins
All these plugins have been downloaded over 25 million times.
| Plugin name and description | Plugin links | Version, total downloads, last update, tested |
|---|---|---|
| Yoast SEO Improve your WordPress SEO: Write better content and have a fully optimized WordPress site using the Yoast SEO plugin. |
wordpress-seo home |
14.6.1 260,416,989 July 24, 2020 5.4.2 |
| Jetpack by WordPress.com The ideal plugin for stats, related posts, search engine optimization, social sharing, protection, backups, security, and more. |
jetpack home |
8.7.1 186,932,197 July 14, 2020 5.4.2 |
| Akismet Anti-Spam Akismet checks your comments and contact form submissions against our global database of spam to protect you and your site from malicious content. |
akismet home |
4.1.6 171,945,331 June 4, 2020 5.4.2 |
| Wordfence Security – Firewall & Malware Scan Secure your website with the most comprehensive WordPress security plugin. Firewall, malware scan, blocking, live traffic, login security & more. |
wordfence home |
7.4.9 166,801,556 July 8, 2020 5.4.2 |
| Contact Form 7 Just another contact form plugin. Simple but flexible. |
contact-form-7 home |
5.2 148,759,276 July 4, 2020 5.4.2 |
| WooCommerce WooCommerce is a flexible, open-source eCommerce solution built on WordPress. Sell anything, anywhere and make your way. |
woocommerce home |
4.3.1 101,297,960 July 21, 2020 5.4.2 |
| All in One SEO Pack The original WordPress SEO plugin, downloaded over 65,000,000 times since 2007. |
all-in-one-seo-pack home |
3.6.2 69,706,286 July 15, 2020 5.4.2 |
| Google Analytics Dashboard Plugin for WordPress by MonsterInsights The best Google Analytics plugin for WordPress. See how visitors find and use your website, so you can keep them coming back. |
google-analytics-for-wordpress home |
7.11.0 70,671,773 July 1, 2020 5.4.2 |
| Elementor Page Builder The most advanced frontend drag & drop page builder. Create high-end, pixel perfect websites at record speeds. Any theme, any page, any design. |
elementor home |
2.9.14 64,016,892 July 21, 2020 5.5 |
| Contact Form by WPForms – Drag & Drop Form Builder for WordPress The best WordPress contact form plugin. Drag & Drop online form builder that helps you create beautiful contact forms with just a few clicks. |
wpforms-lite home |
1.6.1 49,395,786 June 25, 2020 5.4.2 |
| WP Super Cache A very fast caching engine for WordPress that produces static html files. |
wp-super-cache home |
1.7.1 33,445,997 July 20, 2020 5.4.2 |
| UpdraftPlus WordPress Backup Plugin Backup and restoration made easy. Complete backups; manual or scheduled (backup to Dropbox, S3, Google Drive, Rackspace, FTP, SFTP, email + others). |
updraftplus home |
1.16.26 37,685,539 July 31, 2020 5.5 |
| WordPress Importer Import posts, pages, comments, custom fields, categories, tags and more from a WordPress export file. |
wordpress-importer home |
0.7 32,715,671 April 4, 2020 5.4.2 |
| WordPress Gallery Plugin – NextGEN Gallery The most popular WordPress gallery plugin and one of the most popular plugins of all time with over 28 million downloads. |
nextgen-gallery home |
3.3.6 29,708,459 June 24, 2020 5.4.0 |
| Page Builder by SiteOrigin Build responsive page layouts using the widgets you know and love using this simple drag and drop page builder. |
siteorigin-panels home |
2.11.1 29,108,202 July 17, 2020 5.5 |
| Google XML Sitemaps This plugin will improve SEO by helping search enginess better index your site using sitemaps. |
google-sitemap-generator home |
4.1.0 26,664,968 May 1, 2020 5.4.2 |
| Marketing Toolkit by OptinMonster – Popups, Email Optin Forms & Newsletter Subscribers Create popups, opt-in forms, & floating bars to get more email newsletter subscribers, leads, and… |
optinmonster home |
1.9.10 35,711,414 July 28, 2020 5.4.2 |
WordPress SEO is the first plugin to reach over 200 million downloads.
Herb Miller, 17th October 2019
For more information see Top 12 WordPress plugins – October 2019.