Hey everyone! I’ve been using WordPress for a while now and I keep seeing the same popular plugins everywhere. You know the ones - the big names that everyone talks about. But I’m curious about those smaller plugins that maybe don’t get much attention but are actually really useful. I’m talking about plugins that might solve specific problems or have cool features that most people haven’t discovered yet. Maybe something that made your workflow easier or added functionality you didn’t know you needed. I’d really appreciate any recommendations you might have. What are some of your favorite underrated plugins that deserve more recognition?
duplicate post is seriously underrated - it fixes wordpress’s annoying lack of native page/post duplication. just adds a clone button that copies everything, including meta fields. way cleaner than manual copy/paste. also found admin menu editor recently - lets you completely customize the wp-admin sidebar. hide stuff from clients or reorganize however you want. both plugins are solid but nobody mentions them.
Been running a multi-author site for three years and found User Switching by accident. Complete lifesaver for client work - you can instantly jump between user accounts without logging out or needing passwords. Perfect for testing permissions or fixing user-specific problems. Another gem is Post Status Notifier which emails you when posts change status. Sounds boring but it’s crucial for editorial workflows where you’re tracking draft approvals or catching contributors who publish directly. The developer updates it regularly but it’s way under the radar compared to those bulky notification plugins. Also recommend String Locator for finding specific text across your entire WordPress site including themes and plugins. Way better than manually digging through files when you need to find hardcoded strings.
Found WP Crontrol a few months back while debugging scheduled tasks. Super niche but crazy useful for managing WordPress cron jobs manually. Most people don’t even realize WordPress runs a cron system in the background - this plugin shows exactly what’s scheduled and when it runs. Saved me hours when a backup plugin crapped out. Query Monitor’s been a game changer too - shows all database queries on your pages and spots performance bottlenecks. Interface looks scary at first but once you get it, you can catch problematic plugins instantly. Both are free with solid developers behind them, just not flashy enough for mainstream buzz.