There is a wide range of helpful WordPress plugins, but you should never use too many of them, as this can jeopardize the performance of the website. Therefore, we often have to decide which WordPress plugins to use.

To make your choice a little easier, we present the best WordPress plugins for 2023 in this article.

What are WordPress plugins?

The content management system (CMS) WordPress has many plugins that can be installed in the backend. Plugins extend the range of functions of your website and thus make it easier to create and edit; they can be small extensions or complex software packages. Most are free and can be found using a keyword or by typing in the plugin name.

Some plugins are bells and whistles, while others are worth their weight in gold as they improve website performance tremendously. Many WordPress plugins are used for search engine optimization (SEO) and eliminate technical and content-related problems that would require a lot more work to solve without plugins.

How to install WordPress plugins?

You have to be careful with the manual installation because a little know-how is required here. The file with the plugin is first unpacked manually and then uploaded to the FTP server. However, this is only possible if access rights have been granted.

What do you need WordPress plugins for?

You can use plugins to expand functions; for example, you can accelerate the loading speed (page speed) of a website, have the site freed from spam, or use text analysis tools for content optimization. Other WordPress plugins, on the other hand, improvise the design and visual design of the website or add a payment gateway that regulates more complex payment processes in an online shop. Other tools improve the search function or add special forms (e.g., contact forms).

Why not use too many WordPress plugins?

You’ve probably already noticed that WordPress has a huge selection of helpful plugins. But less is often more here. A guideline is around 20 plugins. You should never install too many plugins, as this can degrade the performance of your website. The loading speed decreases, and hackers have easier access.

You should also stay away from unknown plugins with few or even bad ratings because they can contain malicious malware.

If you no longer need plugins, you should not only deactivate them but uninstall them immediately.

Quick tip:

Don’t install too many plugins, as this will negatively impact website performance!

You can install WordPress plugins either automatically via the backend or manually. This only requires a few clicks, which prompts WordPress to carry out the installation. To do this, simply go to the menu item ” Plugins, “then ” Install,” and then select the desired plugin using the search function. Click Install now or Install. As soon as the download or installation is complete, you can “activate” the plugin by clicking on the button.

Now that you know how to install plugins and what you should definitely pay attention to when choosing, we would now like to finally introduce you to the 25 best WordPress plugins. We divide the plugins into various functional and optimization areas:

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Security

Performance (loading speed)

Image optimization

Content Optimization

WordPress Plugins for Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

There are a few ways to do WordPress SEO with the right plugins on a technical and content level. For example, you should take a look at broken links, 301 redirects, and XML sitemaps.

1. Broken Link Checker (Free)

The Broken Link Checker checks your website for broken internal and external links. It also checks for defective images. Unlike Screaming Frog, the broken links can be replaced or deleted right within the WordPress dashboard.

Why is the Broken Link Checker important? Broken links are a bad signal for Google and will negatively affect your ranking.

2. Autoptimize (Free)

If you prefer a free alternative, you should choose WP Rocket Autoptimize instead. The plugin compresses CSS and Javascript files, which reduces the number of files loaded ( cache ).

3. EWWW Image Optimizer (Free)

EWWW Image Optimizer can automatically optimize images while maintaining image quality. The plugin has the benefit of optimizing both new and old images. This can be very helpful for a large media library. It can also convert JPG and PNG files into resource-saving WebP format.

4. Yoast SEO

It is probably one of the best and most well-known WordPress plugins that offer a wide range of functions. It is particularly good for creating snippets (meta description, title) and analyzing texts in terms of keyword density and readability. It can also generate a sitemap and let you decide which archives can be indexed by Google.

5. WP-Rocket

This is one of the best all-in-one load-time optimization plugins.

It not only offers a very good page caching function (with preloading) but also various other functions for which you would normally have to install additional plugins:

CSS and JS minification

Critical CSS generation (my favorite feature!)

JavaScript execution delay

Disabling embeds

Aggregate and preload Google Fonts

Lazy loading for images, videos, and iframes

Database cleanup

Added missing width and height information for images (ensures fewer layout shifts during loading and improves the CLS).

6. Sucury Security – Auditing, Malware Scanner and Security Hardening

Is the plugin recommended by us for the security of your website.

If upload speed is very important, security and hacker protection is a must.

Sucuri is a free WordPress security plugin that protects you from DDoS attacks, malware, malicious code and many other threats.

A hacked site will be penalized by Google and in addition you can lose control over that site. WordPress is preferred by hackers because it is very popular and many websites have lost valuable information once they have been attacked by hackers.

Sucuri plugin does not consume many resources and are very easy to install without requiring advanced knowledge in this field.

7. Kubio Builder for WordPress

Out custom WordPress website builder gives you the chance to builder your own website as you like.

You can create from scratch custom headers & footers, blog pages and many other elements that you can personalize as you like. Also when you install Kubio on your website you will have over 170 ready-made section like: hero, testimonials, clients and many other more.

Also with over 50+ customizable blocks you can enhance your WordPress site.

Feel free to check the rest of our articles on our blog or watch Kubio tutorials on Youtube.