15 Essential WordPress Plugins You Must Use In 2025

Building a website and installing a theme is just the start of your online journey. You must install many more plugins to make your website fully functional. In this article, I will cover 15 essential plugins for WordPress that you must be using in 2025.

The role of a plugin is to increase the functionality of your website. Some plugins improve your website’s performance while others can be used to enhance the customer experience. Whatever niche your website might be, some of these plugins are an absolute necessity for your website.

The list of the plugins in this article contains some of the best-coded lightweight plugins that are currently available for WordPress. Read till the end to find an exclusive discount coupon as well!

Why Use Plugins?

The answer to this question is simple, a plugin can enhance the functionality of your website significantly. For example, a speed optimization plugin will make it faster. Similarly, niche-specific plugins can help your website perform certain actions such as pop-ups and chatbots.

There are also plugins available that help you create better strategies and improve your content. For instance, the Yoast SEO plugin is a great way to judge and enhance your content for SEO before you hit the plugins.

The bottom line is, that plugins for WordPress are a useful way of adding functionality and extra features to your website. Now let’s get to the list of the 15 essential WordPress plugins you need to use in 2025!

15 Essential WordPress Plugins For Your Site In 2025

Yoast SEO

Improve your WordPress SEO with Yoast SEO.

The Yoast SEO plugin is designed to help you improve your content according to the best SEO principles.

It judges the length, difficulty, and keywords in your written content and then helps you choose the ideal amount of everything.

Overall, it is the most important plugin if you want your content to rank higher on Google.

  • Best for site SEO.
  • Has a Free Version.
  • Starts at $99 per year.

W3 Total Cache

Speed Up WordPress Website with W3 Total Cache.

W3 Total Cache sorts out the caching mechanisms for your website. It helps in caching static files on your website which results in better site performance.

The ultimate result of this plugin is a faster-loading website. It also has a ton of additional features that optimize your WordPress website. In short, you can use it to improve customer experience.

  • Speed Optimization.
  • Lightweight.
  • Prices start from $99 annually.

JetPack by WordPress.com

The JetPack plugin is essentials to your WordPress website.

The JetPack plugin is one of the essentials of your WordPress website. It has several security and privacy features that make your website safer.

Its suite of tools can help improve your website’s security and ultimately improve its appearance.

The plugin has many useful features including site performance insights.

  • Security and privacy features.
  • Simple to use.
  • Free to use.

EWW Image Optimizer

EWW Image Optimizer can make your website faster by optimizing the media.

EWW Image Optimizer is another WordPress plugin that has several benefits. First, it can make your website faster by optimizing the media available on it. It does so by resizing the images to a better version.

It also converts them to the more optimized WebP format which results in lesser storage usage on your website.

  • Image resizing and conversion.
  • Site optimization.
  • Starts from $7 monthly.

Perfmatters

Perfmatters has many features like script delaying to speed optimization of your WordPress website.

The next plugin in this list is Perfmatters, which includes some interesting features. Its primary job is to clear up the junk code from your website whether CSS or something else.

But it has many other features that vary from script delaying to speed optimization of your WordPress website.

  • Site speed optimization.
  • Unused code clearance.
  • Starts from $24.95 but you can get 20% discount using the code “GRABHOSTS”.

Elementor

Elementor is a powerful page-building plugin for WordPress.

Elementor is a powerful page-building platform that can help you transform the complete appearance of your website.

You can use this plugin to create custom pages and items that meet the brand image of your website.

The plugin is also open to many add-ons and other extensions that increase its functionality and features.

  • Page building.
  • Open to add-ons.
  • Starts from $9.99 monthly.

MonsterInsights

MonsterInsights will provide you insights into your website’s performance and traffic.

MonsterInsights is an analytics plugin that will provide you insights into your website’s performance and traffic. It natively integrates the Google Analytics platform into your website.

You can use this data to create site growth strategies and then make content according to that. In simple, this is a great plugin to assess the numbers and data of your site.

  • Analytics plugin.
  • Integrates Google Analytics to your WordPress site.
  • Costs $26.63 for the starter plan.

WooCommerce

WooCommerce the all-in-one solution to creating a completely functional online store.

WooCommerce is especially necessary for business websites and online stores. This plugin is the all-in-one solution to creating a completely functional online store in 2025.

It also has plenty of add-ons and extensions built for it. The combined result of this plugin and add-ons adds store-like characteristics to your WordPress site.

  • Built for business and online stores.
  • Has add-ons and extensions.
  • Is a complete solution for selling online.

Solid Security

Solid Security is built to enhance the security of your WordPress website.

As the name suggests, Solid Security (Formerly iThemes Security) is built to enhance the security of your WordPress website. It will add extra security layers, and provide other security features to secure your website.

The plugin also has many other features that include protection against external attacks. Overall, it is an important plugin to use for your website’s safety.

  • Security and privacy.
  • Protection against attacks.
  • Starts from $99 only.

UpdraftPlus

With the UpdraftPlus plugin you can back up and restore your WordPress website.

The UpdraftPlus plugin for WordPress adds restoration and backup features to your website. You can create instant drafts of your content even when offline using this plugin.

It is a simple and easy solution never to lose unfinished drafts when your internet connection faces failure. The restoration features also come in handy when you need past drafts.

  • Backup and restoration features.
  • Easily create drafts.
  • Costs $49 for the starting plan.

Redirection

The Redirection plugin It redirects 301 errors directly to the destination web pages. Essential WordPress Plugins.

The Redirection plugin can come in handy when the URLs of your website’s pages are changed. It redirects 301 errors directly to the destination web pages without even requiring that much manual effort.

The plugin is great for those who regularly update and change the permalinks or URLs. You can also solve other related errors using the Redirection WordPress plugin.

  • Redirects 301 errors to destination URLs.
  • Solves similar errors.
  • It is free to get.

Really Simple SSL

The Really Simple SSL plugin can analyze your website settings and configure the HTTPS settings accordingly.

Next, the Really Simple SSL plugin will analyze your website settings and configure the HTTPS settings accordingly. Hence, creating a secure connection between the reader and your hosting server.

This is a must-have plugin for WooCommerce websites and those that directly take payments for visitors. It can prevent fraud and attacks.

  • Best for a secure connection.
  • Ensures safe transactions.
  • Its price starts from $49 only.

WPForms

With WPForms you can create different types of forms for your website.

The WPForms plugin allows you to create a ton of different types of forms for your website. The plugin has several other features that include calculation and related functions.

It enables you to make user registration forms, surveys, and petition forms. WPForms is a user-friendly form builder suitable for all types of websites.

  • Simple to use form builder.
  • Can create different types and sizes.
  • Costs $49 for its Basic annual plan.

Broken Link Checker

Essential WordPress Plugins - The Broken Link Checker conduct details audits of your website to detect if any links are broken.

The Broken Link Checker is one of the best plugins a large website could install in 2025. It will conduct details audits of your website to detect if any links are broken.

The results of its search can save your website’s brand image and lots of conversions. You can use it to do scheduled checkups and then filter the previews of the results of these checkups.

  • Detects broken links.
  • Has useful features like scheduled checkups.
  • Is completely free on WordPress.com.

Thrive Architect

Essential WordPress Plugins - Thrive Architect takes the traditional WordPress editor to the next level by adding tons of new features and functions.

The last plugin on our list is the Thrive Architect plugin. It is too good to be put in last place but I have created the list just for sequence and not priority.

This plugin takes the traditional WordPress editor to the next level by adding tons of new features and functions. It is a self-supported and optimized editor for your WordPress website.

  • Powerful visual editor.
  • Has more features than the native editor.
  • Starts from $19 monthly but also has a free version.

Wrap Up

Since WordPress is the universal hub for almost all of the internet’s websites, many people build useful plugins for it. These plugins make your website safer, enhance its security, and add extra functionality and features to it. All websites need these plugins to make them better.

Some plugins are more useful than others while there are some that you can’t build a website without. In this article, I crafted a list of the 15 most essential WordPress plugins that you must use in 2025. The list consists of plugins that range from speed optimization to security enhancement.

The order of the list is not based on priority but some of the top ones can be preferred more than the others. I hope you have found useful ideas for plugins that will help make your website better this year!

Disclosure: We sometimes use affiliate links in our content. Some of the links in this post are “affiliate links.” It means if you click on the link and purchase the item, we will receive an affiliate commission. It helps our website keep on running and allows us to offset our writing team’s cost. Thanks for your support.

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