Niche-research
View allHow to Find Abandoned WordPress Plugins and Market Opportunities
An abandoned WordPress plugin with a real install base isn't dead weight - it's a specific kind of opportunity, and which kind depends on exactly what you find.
Niche-researchHow to Find Rising WordPress Plugin Niches
Checking what's rising this month is a better habit than checking one plugin's download count - here's how to build that check into a monthly routine that actually leads somewhere.
Niche-researchHow to Find Opportunities in a Crowded WordPress Plugin Market
A crowded WordPress plugin niche usually has two exploitable seams hiding in it - a weakness the leaders share, and a share of the crowd that's already gone quiet.
Niche-researchHow to Analyze the Health of a WordPress Plugin Niche
A niche health check is seven numbers read together, not one score - here's what each one means and why none of them work alone.
Niche-research
Competitor-analysis
View allHow to Monitor Changes in Competitor WordPress Plugin Rankings
Rank and WP.org search position move for reasons the rest of the scorecard won't explain on its own - here's how to watch them specifically.
Competitor-analysisHow to Benchmark Your WordPress Plugin Against Competitors
Benchmarking means putting your own plugin through the same 11-signal scorecard you'd run on a competitor, side by side, on the same day.
Competitor-analysisHow to Track Your WordPress Plugin Competitors
A monthly habit for the fast-moving signals and a quarterly pass for the full scorecard - so a competitor's next move doesn't surprise you.
Competitor-analysisHow to Find Your Competitors' Strengths and Weaknesses
The 11-signal scorecard tells you how a competitor is doing. Strengths and weaknesses come from a different, qualitative read - reviews, positioning, and where their feature list actually gates.
Competitor-analysis
Growth-tracking
View allHow to Use Downloads and Active Installs to Measure Plugin Growth
Downloads and active installs answer different questions - and the growing gap between them is a rough, useful proxy for how many people are trying your plugin and not keeping it.
Growth-trackingHow to Measure WordPress Plugin Growth Month Over Month
Comparing this month's install count to last month's sounds simple until WordPress.org's own rounding gets in the way - here's how to compare two snapshots without mistaking a bucket for a real change.
Growth-trackingHow to Track WordPress Plugin Rankings Over Time
Your own plugin's rank is one number today and a trend line once you've logged it a few times - here's what it actually reflects, and what it doesn't.
Growth-trackingWhat Does WordPress Plugin Momentum Actually Mean?
Momentum isn't growth restated - it's whether growth itself is speeding up or slowing down, and it usually moves before growth does.
Growth-tracking
Review-analysis
View allHow to Turn a Plugin's Bad Reviews Into Your Next Feature Idea
A repeatable workflow for reading another plugin's reviews — a competitor's, or one in a niche you're researching — and turning the complaint pattern into a feature idea, with StatWP's Review Gap Finder doing the grouping and severity ranking.
Review-analysisHow to Find the Real Complaint Hiding in a 1-Star Review
Vague WordPress plugin reviews like "terrible, don't waste your time" still carry information. Here's the close-reading method for translating venting into a checkable claim.
Review-analysisHow to Tell If a Complaint Pattern Is New or Ongoing
The same complaint can mean a fresh regression or a years-old known limitation. Here's how to read the timeline of a WordPress plugin complaint pattern to tell which.
Review-analysisHow to Prioritize Which Plugin Complaints Are Worth Building a Feature For
A topic list of complaints isn't a build list. Here's a frequency, severity, and buildability framework for deciding which plugin complaint pattern is actually worth building a feature around.
Review-analysis
Wordpress-org-optimization
View allHow to Track Your WordPress Plugin's WordPress.org SEO Rankings
Your keyword position on WordPress.org is worth checking on the same schedule as the rest of your growth tracking - here's what to log and how often.
Wordpress-org-optimizationHow WordPress.org Plugin Rankings Work
A match on keywords gets a plugin into the results. A separate set of factors decides where it lands inside them - here's what's actually known about each one.
Wordpress-org-optimizationHow to Improve Your WordPress Plugin's WordPress.org Search Visibility
Search visibility on WordPress.org moves on four levers - three of them have nothing to do with keywords at all.
Wordpress-org-optimizationHow to Check Your WordPress Plugin Readme Before Publishing
Three things worth checking before a readme goes live: how it actually renders, whether your keywords are placed where the algorithm reads them, and whether the tag field is doing anything at all.
Wordpress-org-optimization
Listicles
View allWordPress Plugin Stats Tools Compared: StatWP vs WP-Rankings vs PluginSpy vs WP Analyze
A feature-by-feature look at StatWP, WP-Rankings, PluginSpy, and WP Analyze - what each WordPress plugin stats tool actually does well, and where StatWP's combination of niche research, growth tracking, comparison, and a readme checker pulls ahead.
Listicles5 Best Free WordPress Block Themes for 2026
Twenty Twenty-Five leads free FSE block themes with roughly 1.45 million estimated active installs, but it is the only theme in the top 5 with a declining download trend. Ranked from WordPress.org and StatWP install, download, and rating data.
Listicles5 Best WordPress Booking & Appointment Plugins for 2026
LatePoint, Amelia, Bookly, Simply Schedule Appointments, and Booking Calendar ranked by real StatWP install, download, and rating data - plus what a closed former competitor and a 30-day download split reveal about this niche.
Listicles5 Best WordPress AI Plugins for 2026
AI Engine, All in One SEO’s AI SEO tools, and SiteGround’s bundled AI Agent top the WordPress AI plugin category by install count in 2026 - ranked from real WordPress.org install, download, and rating data, with the gap between install size and user trust called out plugin by plugin.
Listicles
Plugin-research
View allHow to Validate a WordPress Plugin Idea With Real Market Data
A reference sheet for where each type of validation data actually lives - install trends, review sentiment, search demand, and competitive pricing - to use alongside the full 8-step validation process.
Plugin-researchWhat Makes a WordPress Plugin Successful?
Four traits that separate the WordPress plugins that actually grow from the roughly 59% of the directory that goes quiet - and why most of them have nothing to do with the code.
Plugin-researchHow to Find Profitable WordPress Plugin Ideas
Five real sources of WordPress plugin ideas - from your own workflow friction to WordPress core's own deprecation notices - before you run any of them through a validation process.
Plugin-researchHow to Research a WordPress Plugin Before You Build One
An eight-step process for checking WordPress.org install trends, maintenance history, and review complaints before you spend engineering time on a plugin idea.
Plugin-research
Product
View allStatWP Free vs. Paid: What Each Plan Actually Unlocks
What StatWP's free plan actually covers, where the casual limits on niche research, Growth Tracker, and review analysis kick in, and what upgrading to Enthusiast or Power User unlocks - including SEO keyword rank tracking, which free doesn't offer at all.
ProductHow to Check Any WordPress Plugin's Real Installs, Downloads and Growth
See downloads, active installs, ratings, rankings, and growth trends for any plugin or theme on WordPress.org.
ProductGrowth-tracking