16 Best Free WordPress Plugins You Need in 2023

Are you looking for the best free WordPress plugins?

WordPress is the most popular website builder in the world, and it comes with 1000s of free and premium plugins.

Because there are so many, it’s hard for a beginner to know which to choose!

Free WordPress plugins may not offer all the features of premium plugins, but they’re great for beginners getting started and businesses on a budget. Many free plugins have a premium version with more features, so you can always upgrade later as your business grows.

By using the free version, you can also test out the plugin features and options. This way, you can easily decide whether you want to stick with the plugin or look for alternatives.

In this article, we’ll share some of the best free WordPress plugins that you can use.

1. AIOSEO

AIOSEO is one of the best free WordPress plugins to consider for your site.

All In One SEO (AIOSEO) is a comprehensive SEO toolkit used on over 3 million websites. Many smart marketers trust AIOSEO to help them boost their visibility in search and drive traffic to their websites.

When setting up your website, SEO is one of the most important factors to consider. While WordPress is SEO-friendly, there’s so much more you can do to give your website a competitive edge.

To do that, you need an SEO plugin.

And one of the best WordPress SEO plugins on the market is AIOSEO.

Even with the free version, you’ll be able to configure your SEO settings and optimize your site for better rankings. And don’t worry, setting up AIOSEO is super easy as it comes with a handy setup wizard that will walk you through all the steps.

Once configured, you’ll have access to many powerful features such as:

  • On-page optimization
  • XML sitemaps
  • Woocommerce integration
  • Schema markup
  • Image SEO
  • Robots.txt editor
  • SEO audit checklist
  • Integration with webmaster tools (Google Analytics, Google Webmaster Tools, Google Search Console Bing Webmaster Tools, etc.)

While the free version comes with a comprehensive feature set, we recommend you upgrade to the paid version for more functionality. If that sounds interesting, you can check out how to install and activate the premium version of AIOSEO in this guide.

Plus, if you’re migrating from another SEO plugin, you can easily import all your data and settings to AIOSEO. This makes the transition seamless.

If you’re looking for the best free WordPress plugins for your site, there’s no better place to start than with AIOSEO.

2. WPForms

wpforms-best-form-builder-plugin

WPForms is the most beginner-friendly WordPress contact form plugin. It lets you create and add a contact form on your website in just a few clicks.

It also comes with dozens of useful addons to add more features to your WordPress forms. WPForms offers 100+ form templates to create other types of forms, including appointment booking forms, simple order forms with payments, survey forms, newsletter forms, and more.

It features a drag-and-drop form builder for easy customization. You can use the builder to add and customize your form fields without editing any code.

You can also use WPForms to add a payment form easily. It integrates with popular payment solutions like PayPal, Stripe, and Authorize.net to collect payments online.

other features you’ll enjoy with WPForms Lite that you won’t find in many form builders include:

  • Form revisions
  • Spam prevention
  • Unlimited number of forms

WPForms is easy to embed in your blog posts, pages, sidebar, footer, and other widget areas. It’s definitely the ultimate solution to adding and managing forms in WordPress.

3. MonsterInsights

MonsterInsights is the best wordpress plugin for google analytics.

MonsterInsights is the best WordPress Google Analytics plugin. It shows you real-time website traffic, actionable insights, and complete analytics within your WordPress dashboard.

You can track pages, posts, and campaigns to take quick action and grow your website. It also automatically tracks clicks on your affiliate links, email links, and all other outbound links.

If you run an online store, then MonsterInsights can also track your:

  • Total revenue
  • Conversion rate
  • Average order value (AOV)
  • Top referral sources
  • And more

MonsterInsights also lets you create custom reports to find out more about your users and take the right action at the right time. With custom reports, you can identify the best time to publish an article, find the most popular categories, and learn about your top-scoring keywords.

MonsterInsights has over 3 million active installations, making it your top choice to install and use for the growth of your business.

4. SeedProd

SeedProd is another plugin that should rank high on any best free WordPress plugin list.

SeedProd is another invaluable WordPress plugin you should consider. It’s a powerful drag-and-drop page builder that makes it easy for anyone to build beautiful websites. That’s why over 1 million websites trust it.

SeedProd allows you to easily customize your website’s theme so your website looks professional. The plugin also helps you build:

  • Custom sites 
  • Landing pages
  • Sales funnels
  • Coming soon pages
  • And more

One of the biggest advantages of SeedProd is that it’s one of the best WordPress themes for SEO. This results in ultra-fast sites that meet Google’s Page Experience standards. Fast-loading sites also result in better user experience (UX) and improved conversions.

Another much-loved feature of SeedProd is that it’s a no-code page builder. This means anyone can build beautiful websites without any technical knowledge. All this is made possible by the 150+ templates for every kind of page you may want to build. If you’re up to it, you can even build custom pages and themes from scratch.

5. WP Mail SMTP

WP Mail SMTP best wordpress plugins

Have you ever had problems with WordPress not sending emails?

WordPress has to be able to send emails out like password reset emails (in case you forget your login), contact form notifications, important update reminders, and more.

But by default, WordPress uses a method (the wp_mail() function) that doesn’t always work, because it gets blocked by spam filters.

That’s where SMTP comes in. It’s a better way for WordPress to send emails without getting blocked.

WP Mail SMTP is the best WordPress SMTP plugin. It takes over the default WordPress email delivery system and makes it easy and reliable.

It uses the proper SMTP provider to send emails from your WordPress website. WP Mail SMTP also suggests you the best SMTP solutions on the market.

Email delivery is an important issue at the beginning of your business and you don’t want to end up in the spam folder of your users. WP Mail SMTP is trusted by over 2 million users who’re using it daily to send emails.

6. RafflePress

RafflePress is the best WordPress giveaway plugin

RafflePress is the most popular and user-friendly WordPress giveaway and contest plugin.

The best part about RafflePress is that it’s easy to use, and completely customizable.

It comes with pre-built giveaway templates and even a terms and conditions generator so you can easily create giveaways in 5 minutes or less.

It also includes tons of options for entries. You can ask users for their email addresses to sign up for the giveaway so you can build your email list quickly. Other notable features you can expect include:

  • Social media integrations
  • Tracking and retargeting
  • Email integrations
  • Fraud protection

Plus, you can also require your users to share the contest on social media to increase their entries. RafflePress makes it easy for your online giveaways to take off and go viral.

7. TrustPulse

best social proof and FOMO plugin

TrustPulse is the best WordPress FOMO plugin. It increases your sales and conversions with social proof notifications.

According to a study, 98% of users leave your website without taking any action, and 70% of users never come back.

TrustPulse uses fear of missing out (FOMO) to engage users to take action, whether that’s signing up for your newsletter, making a purchase, or whatever you need them to do.

TrustPulse offers 2 types of FOMO campaigns to boost your conversion rate. It integrates with WordPress seamlessly, and it’s also compatible with WooCommerce to increase your sales. Some of the biggest advantages of TrustPulse include:

  • Easy-to-use visual builder
  • Customization capabilities
  • Live activity

With TrustPulse, you can easily leverage social proof to boost conversions. As a result, your business will grow faster.

8. Social Photo Feeds

Social Photo Feed is the best free WordPress plugin to display your Instagram photos on your website. It’s highly customizable and easy to manage even for absolute beginners.

It lets you display Instagram posts from multiple Instagram accounts in the same or different feeds. You can also create multiple Instagram feeds on the same page, and customize the style to match your brand.

You can also add the ‘Follow on Instagram’ button to your feed to increase your followers. Social Photo Feed plugin allows you to customize your feeds and display photos in thumbnail, medium, or full size.

Other than that, you can add a beautiful header at the top of your feed. It lets you display photos in random or chronological order, just the way you want.

9. Facebook – Social Post Feeds

Social Post Feed is the best free WordPress Facebook post plugin. It lets you display Facebook posts from pages and groups on your WordPress website.

You can showcase unlimited Facebook posts from any public page and your group easily. And, you can also match it with your theme, so it appears as a part of your website.

The free version of the plugin allows you to display text and links from Facebook posts. If you want to showcase photos, videos, and comments, then you need to upgrade to the premium version of the plugin.

10. Custom Twitter Feeds

Custom Twitter Feed is the best WordPress Twitter feed plugin. It comes with tons of customization options and becomes a part of your website.

You can display Twitter feeds from multiple accounts easily. The plugin also lets you showcase Twitter feeds from any account, those you follow, and from a specific hashtag.

It’s SEO friendly and your Twitter feeds are crawlable by search engines. Custom Twitter Feed is also translatable to any language, making it the top choice for website owners.

11. Feeds for YouTube

Feeds for YouTube is the best free WordPress YouTube plugin. It lets you display your YouTube videos on your website automatically.

By default, it matches the style of your WordPress theme and is fully customizable to change the look and feel of your videos. It also offers multiple options to display YouTube videos, including gallery, list, and grid layouts.

Custom YouTube Feed plugin allows you to create multiple feeds from different YouTube channels. You can also add a ‘Load More’ button to indefinitely load YouTube videos on your website.

12. PushEngage

pushengage free push notification plugin

PushEngage is the best push notification software for WordPress. With push notifications, you can send messages right to your visitors’ desktop or mobile browsers and drive them back to your website. 

You can send new blog post announcements, abandoned cart reminders, product announcements, alert customers to a price drop, and much more. 

There are also powerful features like triggered notifications and dynamic segmentation to send the right notifications at exactly the right time.

PushEngage offers a free plan that lets you send 30 campaigns per month to up to 500 subscribers. You can upgrade to a paid plan to send unlimited campaigns to more subscribers.

Pretty Links is a popular WordPress URL shortener plugin. It customizes your URLs and makes them look pretty and professional at the same time.

This is a great option for affiliate links, which tend to be long and complicated.

You can shorten links using your domain name in URLs instead of using any third-party source, so you can match your branding and look more professional. Pretty Links also lets you manage and track your URLs to monitor the clicks from users.

Pretty Links helps grow your website reach by showing you the actual resources from where you’re getting clicks on your URLs. You can also easily create nofollow/noindex links for your affiliates.

14. Shared Counts

Shared Counts is the best free WordPress social media plugin. It lets your users easily share your pages and posts on their social media channels.

You can add buttons for Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Email, LinkedIn, and other important social networks on your website. There’s also an option to display buttons before and after your post in WordPress.

The plugin also displays the total share count and comes in multiple styling options to match your website theme.

15. Insert Headers and Footers

Insert Headers and Footers is a free WordPress plugin to add any code or script to your website. It’s a useful plugin that lets you insert Google Analytics, custom CSS, Facebook Pixel, or any other code right from your WordPress dashboard.

The best part about this plugin is that you don’t need to edit any theme file. You can simply add the code in your header and footer from the plugin’s Settings page.

16. WooCommerce

WooCommerce is the most flexible WordPress eCommerce plugin. It comes with all the features you need to create an online store.

With this plugin, you can set up and run your eCommerce business all on your own without hiring a professional developer. It’s compatible with WordPress resources, including themes and plugins.

It also integrates with third-party solutions for payment integration, email marketing, social media sharing, and more.

BONUS: Best Premium Tools & Plugins to Grow Your Business

We recommended the best free WordPress plugins in the first section of this article. Now, we’ll share some of the premium resources that you’ll find worth investing your money in.

These premium plugins are proven to come with a high return on investment.

OptinMonster

OptinMonster is the most powerful lead generation and conversion optimization software on the market. It helps grow your email list, get more potential leads, and increase sales.

It comes with powerful Exit-Intent® technology that converts your abandoning visitors into subscribers and customers. You can also create custom campaigns and display them to users based on their behaviors and location.

OptinMonster comes with dozens of professionally-designed templates, and it has a drag-and-drop campaign builder to create beautiful and stylish opt-in forms for high conversion rates. It’s fully responsive and looks great on all screen sizes and devices.

It seamlessly integrates with other popular services so you can send your new leads to any email service provider or CRM. Other notable features include real-time behavior automation, A/B testing, actionable insights, and more.

MemberPress

MemberPress is the best WordPress membership plugin. It lets you charge your users to access your website content.

With MemberPress, you can turn any WordPress site into a membership site, where people can sign up to access online courses and premium content.

You can create, manage, and sell digital download products easily. It also allows you to manage users and give or block access to specific content on your website.

It’s compatible with popular WordPress plugins, third-party services, and payment solutions. With MemberPress, you can create a fully functioning membership website in just a few clicks.

Divi

Divi is a popular WordPress theme and an ultimate visual page builder plugin. It comes with 100+ layout packs and over 800 pre-built page templates to make a website quickly.

You can use Divi Builder to create and customize landing pages. It has point-and-click tools to add content to your website easily.

It also includes global elements and styles to manage your website options from a single settings page. You can undo, redo, and revise any changes on your website.

The customization options include font and text styling, custom shapes, border options, controls and effects, shadows, and filters. It’s a 1-stop solution to create and customize your website without touching a single line of code.

Nextiva

Nextiva is the best business phone service in the industry. It enables remote teams to work from anywhere and stay connected to a reliable network.

It offers phone, email, SMS, and live chat services on one platform. The features include audio and video conferencing, helpdesk software, sales CRM, unlimited calling, toll-free number, auto-attendant, and more.

You can also keep a record of your communication with call recording and rating options. It provides real-time analytics and custom reports on your dashboard.

Nextiva integrates with popular services and business applications to add more features to your phone system. It also offers real-time disaster recovery and call-forwarding features to stay available all the time.

Constant Contact

Constant Contact is the best email marketing service for small businesses. It comes with a drag-and-drop email builder to quickly create and send high-converting emails.

Constant Contact also provides eCommerce email marketing tools to grow your online store.

The best part about this email marketing service is behavioral email automation. It sends automatic emails to users based on their activities and keeps them engaged at your website.

With real-time tracking, you can see the email open rate, click rate, and shares to plan your next emails accordingly.

Constant Contact is also backed by a world-class support team, who are available by chat or phone. Not many email providers offer phone support!

We hope this article helped you find the best free WordPress plugins to grow your website quickly!

Speaking of growing your website quickly, you can’t do it without search engine optimization (SEO). That’s why you need the best SEO plugin for WordPress, and it doesn’t get any better than AIOSEO. AIOSEO enables you to easily optimize your website without having to touch a single line of code.

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author avatar
Kato Nkhoma Content Writer
Kato is one of those rare unicorns born with a pen in his hand—so the legend says. He’s authored 2 books and produced content for hundreds of brands. When he’s not creating content for AIOSEO, you’ll find him either watching tech videos on YouTube or playing with his kids. And if you can’t find him, he’s probably gone camping.

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