10 Must-Have free Plugins for All WordPress Website

There are over 59,000  plugins available for use on a WordPress website, but not all are to be installed and used because having a lot of them can slow down your website speed. 

You are only mandated to install those plugins that are useful and relevant to your website.

Irrespective of the kind of website you want to build, there are compulsory and Must-Have WordPress plugins that are needed your website to perform well and become visible on search engines. 

These plugins are grouped into various categories according to their usage and functions. They include content management plugins, social sharing plugins, SEO plugins, website performance plugins, and security and web analytics.

You can obtain these plugins for free and upgrade to the pro version for better performance.

Downloading and activating these plugins is done from the admin dashboard or the developer’s platform, and then uploading them to your website in a Zip file format.

To find out the most important and compulsory plugins needed for your website’s smooth running, read this content in detail. 

10 Must-Have Free Plugins for All WordPress Websites.

Here are the top ten free plugins you must consider when building a WordPress website.

1. Really Simple SSL

If you did not secure or encrypt your website in your Cpanel, then the Really Simple SSL plugin can serve as another alternative.

Really simple SSL is a lightweight and easy-to-use security plugin for WordPress with over 5+ million users. 

It provides security for your website by leveraging SSL certifícate, scanning it for possible vulnerabilities and implementing essential WordPress hardening features.

Features 

• 301 redirect via PHP or .htaccess
• Secure cookies
• Let’s Encrypt: Install an SSL Certificate if your hosting provider supports manual installation.
• Server Health Check: Your server configuration is every bit as important for your website security
• Prevent code execution in the uploads folder.
• Prevent login feedback and disable user enumeration.
• Disable XML-RPC
• Disable directory browsing
• Username restrictions (block ‘admin’ and public names)
• Vulnerability detection 

2. WP-Optimize

WP optimization helps boost your website performance by increasing its loading speed, which increases the user experience and SERP rankings in Google.

It has over one million users and works perfectly well on 4.5 or a higher version of WordPress.

Feature:

• It caches your site: Caching helps you to save a temporary HTML version of your site on the server so the user can retrieve it more quickly, a surefire way to ensure web pages load lightning-fast. Turn it on in just one click.
• It compresses images: Large images can impact page speed load times. WP-Optimise makes it easy to identify and compress images to your preferred lossy/lossless settings in a couple of clicks.
• It cleans the database: Your WordPress database stores everything you need, plus some things you don’t. Wp-Optimize cleans and optimizes the database to speed up your site and save server resources.
• It magnifies, dramatically improving your website performance and load time.

3.RankMath

If you want your website and web content to be seen and rank high on Google and other search engines, then Rank Math is the best SEO plugin that can do that effectively amidst other SEO WordPress plugins and is very easy to install and use.

It has a five-star positive rating, and over two million WordPress users currently use it. It has great features which make it the best. 

Features:

• It has a simple and easy configuration process. 
• Google Schema Markup, aka Rich Snippets Integrated
• Optimize Unlimited Keywords
• It can write content for you using AI.
• Google Search Console integration 
• Google Analytics Integration 
• Google Keyword Ranking 
• Google Analytics Integration 
• Carry out 30 detailed SEO Analytical tests for your website. 
• Internal linking suggestions

4. Akismet Anti-Spam

This plugin helps you block unwanted comments and spam from your contact form by performing routine checks and updates.

It works perfectly well on WordPress’s 5.8 or higher version, with over six million active users and a 4.8-star rating.

Features:

• Check all your comments and trash out those that look like spam.
• It has a history box, making it possible to see those comments that were cleared as spam and unspammed.
• It helps reveal hidden or misleading links or URLs from people’s comments.
• Helps you to see the number of approved comments 
• It saves disk space and speeds up your website. 

5.WPForm

WPForm is a drag-and-drop form builder that enables you to create and modify contact forms, feedback forms, subscriptions, payment forms, and all other types of forms. 

It is one of the best contact forms with a five-star rating and has over 6+ million active users. It also requires WordPress version 5.5 and above to work properly.

You can get the free version of WPForm and then choose to upgrade to any of the pro versions.

Features:

• 100% mobile responsive
• GDPR friendly 
• Pre-build form templates ready to be installed 
• Form styling for fields, labels and buttons 
• Inbuilt spam protection 
• Instant form notification via email 
• Custom form notifications with success messages or thank you pages
• Smart field that adapts to your visitor’s location 
• Coupons for shipping and sales discounts 
• Calculator form for payment, billing, shipping and more 

6. Site kit by Google

If you want your website to work faster, installing and activating a site kite from Google will work perfectly.

Site Kit by Google gives insights into how people find and use your website. It provides daily updates on how your website is running and where your traffic sources are coming from.

Site kit helps you link your website to Google Console so you can monitor how people see your website in search results, keep records of your Adsense earnings, and see how your page performs compared to other websites.

The plugin has a high star rating and about four million active users.

Features:

• Easy-to-understand site kit by Google directly on from WordPress
• Official sit kit forms multiple Google tools, all on your wordpress website
• It is easy to setup a multiple Google tools without having to change the source code of your site
• Provide metrics for your entire site and individual posts
• Easy-to-manage, granular permissions across WordPress and different Google products

7.UpdraftPlus

One of the most important things you should do as a website owner is to regularly back up your website to avoid the total loss of your files in your WordPress database. Installing backup plugins like updraft plus will help you achieve this.

Updraft Plus is the most popular and powerful migration plugin that backs up your website files to your preferred location and restores them with just three clicks.

It can backup your files to Dropbox, Google Drive, Amazon S3, Rackspace cloud, FTP, Dreamobjects, OpenStack, Swift or Email.

You can also decide to upgrade to the Pro version for enhanced functionality.

Features: 

• Backup, Migrate and Restore your file.
• Gives you a lot of storage options and location 
• Allows you to schedule a backup in ahead of time
• It is understandable and easy to use
• It works with almost all different kinds of WordPress sites.

8. Wordfence Security 

Wordfence Security protects your website through malware detection scanning, robust login features, live traffic and views.

It provides many security features that help protect your website from hackers.

Features:

• It identifies and blocks malicious traffic.
• It protects your website from any form of brute force attacks by limiting login attempts. 
• Integrated malware scanner blocks
• Block attackers by IP or build advanced rules based on IP Range.
• Helps set up two-factor authentication (2FA) for your website.
• Check the safety of your content by scanning file contents, posts, comments and URLs that are dangerous to your site. 
• Blocks you from login into your account with a compromised password 

9. Sassy social share

There are different ways of getting traffic to your website, one of which is by leveraging various social media platforms. 

To do this, you need an effective social media plugin, and the best plugin that can do the job perfectly well is Sassy Social Share.

Sassy Social Share allows website visitors to share your content on social media platforms. It has a high star rating with about 10,0000+ active users.

Features:

• Compatible with Gutenberg editor
• Compatible with WPML and multilingual website
• Compatible with myCRED (append myCRED referral ID at the end of the URL being shared)
• Around 100 Social Sharing/Bookmarking Services
• Social Media follow icons (Redirect website visitors to your Social Media pages)
• Share counts are supported for X (Twitter), Buffer, Reddit, Pinterest, Odnoklassniki, Fintel and Vkontakte.
• FREE Icon Customization options
• Options to specify sharing icon shape – Square, Round and Rectangular
• Options to specify sharing icon size – minimum 16 pixels, no upper limit
• Options to specify sharing icon background colour and logo colour

10. Elementor 

If you are looking for a plugin that can help you build the pages of your website without you doing the work yourself,  I recommend you download Elementor.

Elementor has many no-code drag-and-drop interfaces, allowing you to build a professional website by dragging and dropping its already-made templates.

It has a five-star rating and more than 10 million users. The Elementor page builder also has a Pro Version, which you can upgrade to use the advanced features.

Features

• Full website kits and template library
• Advanced capabilities 
• Build pixel-perfect websites
• Fully responsive 
• 40+ free widgets
• Speed up your web creation process 
• Produces fast-loading websites 
• Accessibility to best practices 
• It is translated into 63+ languages, including RTL support 

FAQ

What is a WordPress plugin, and how does it work?

A WordPress plugin is tailor-made software added or installed to your website to perform a specific function.

It integrates seamlessly with WordPress, allowing you to customize your website freely without changing the original code.

How many plugins should I use in WordPress?

The number of plugins you should use depends on the type and nature of your website. It would help if you used only those necessary plugins, as too many can slow down your website speed.

What are the Must-Have plugins for my WordPress website?

Must-have plugins are those you need for your website to function properly. They are compulsory for all kinds of websites and include

• Really simple SSL
• WP-Optimize
• Rank Maths
• Akismet Anti-spam
• WP Form
• Sit kite by Google 
• Updraft plus 
• Wordfence Security 
• Sassy Social Share 
• Elementor Page Builder

Final Thought 

A website can only function with the plugins listed below. Although other plugins perform the same function, the ones listed above are considerably the best.

They have excellent reviews and ratings, active users and installation, frequently updated, compatible, and exceptional customer support.

For your website to work effectively with any of these plugins, ensure that a good and reliable hosting company hosts your website.

To install any of them on your website, login to your admin dashboard of your website, click on the plugin, click on add new plugins, and type the plugin’s name in the top right corner of the search bar.

Once this is done, click on activate, and your plugin will be ready. You can go to the settings of the individual plugins to make some changes and necessary adjustments.

You can advance to using the paid version if you have enough money.