There are over 40,000 plugins in the WordPress plugin repository and there are only a few of these we disallow. By no means are we suggesting that all of these disallowed plugins are bad plugins. 


Some of them can be very good. However, the main focus of the platform is to ensure the scalability of our customers. These plugins have proven to counteract that goal.



As for insecure plugins, we work with the plugin developers to find a fix, if one can be found then we’ll happily allow it to be used once the issue has been fixed.



These plugins and classes of plugins have been shown to clash with the solutions that are part of our service. 


Related Posts Plugins

Almost all “Related Posts” plugins suffer from the same problems regarding MySQL, indexing, and search. These issues serve to make the plugins themselves very database intensive and so are disallowed. 

  • Dynamic Related Posts
  • SEO Auto Links & Related Posts
  • Yet Another Related Posts Plugin
  • Similar Posts
  • Contextual Related Posts

There are dedicated services which allow you to offload related post functionality to their servers. If you’re interested in providing related posts on your site, it is advised that you look into one of the services listed below instead.

  • Bibblio Related Posts 
  • Jetpack Related Posts
  • Related Posts for WordPress
  • Outbrain

Duplicate Behavior Plugins

Like the caching and backup plugins, the following plugins also duplicate things that we already do for you in a more efficient, scalable, and configurable manner.

  • No Revisions 
  • WordFence 
  • Bad Behavior 

Server & MySQL Plugins

Here’s a class of plugins that we disallow simply because they either cause a high load on our servers or create an unnatural number of MySQL queries.

  • Broken Link Checker 
  • MyReviewPlugin 
  • LinkMan 
  • Fuzzy SEO Booster 
  • WP PostViews
  • Tweet Blender 

Backup Plugins

We already take regular nightly backups of your site(s). These are done in an efficient, automated manner and the data is kept securely outside of your WordPress install. We make these backups available for you to rollback to (or download) whenever you’d like.


If you feel more secure with a secondary, off-site backup, we permit and recommend VaultPress.


The following backup plugins are disallowed:

  • WP DB Backup 
  • WP DB Manager 
  • BackupWordPress 
  • VersionPress

Email Plugins

Just because you are able to send emails with WordPress, it doesn’t always mean you should. We want our customers to experience the same best-in-class experience with email as we provide with web hosting, so we recommend using a 3rd party service. 


Specialist services like MailChimp, Constant Contact, AWeber and others offer complete email solutions for your business and will provide you with optimal results.


If your domain’s email provider offers its own SMTP server, you are welcome to configure that as your outgoing server. Be sure to check with your email provider about their bulk mail, opt-in mail, and anti-spam policies before doing so.


We have disallowed the following email plugin, as it allows you to send email blasts with WordPress.

  • WP Mailing List

Broken Link Checker Plugins

If you used the Broken Link Checker plugin and wish we hadn’t banned it, we recommend that you use one of the following tools to check your site for broken links. They are not plugins and will, therefore, have no effect on your server performance.

  • Broken Link Checker 

Miscellaneous Plugins

Other plugins that we’ve decided to proactively remove include:

  • Hello Dolly! 
  • WP phpMyAdmin 
  • Sweet Captcha 
  • EWWW Image Optimizer 

Additional Scripts

Some frequently used scripts are known to contain vulnerabilities and insecurities. Our platform scans the files system periodically to identify and either patch or remove these scripts.

  • TimThumb 
  • Uploadify 

Complete List

These are the files and folders that we search for when we scan for disallowed plugins. You can compare this against your “wp-content/plugins/” directory to check for conflicts. If you find any we recommend you remove these as soon as possible or they will be removed by us after we provide notification that you have 7 days before we action the removal.


adminer
async-google-analytics
backup
backup-scheduler
backupwordpress
backwpup
bad-behavior
broken-link-checker
content-molecules
contextual-related-posts
duplicator
dynamic-related-posts
ewww-image-optimizer
ezpz-one-click-backup
file-commander
fuzzy-seo-booster
gd-system-plugin
gd-system-plugin.php
google-xml-sitemaps-with-multisite-support
hc-custom-wp-admin-url
hcs.php
hello.php
jr-referrer
jumpple
missed-schedule
no-revisions
ozh-who-sees-ads
pipdig-power-pack
portable-phpmyadmin
quick-cache
quick-cache-pro
recommend-a-friend
seo-alrp
si-captcha-for-wordpress
similar-posts
spamreferrerblock
ssclassic
sspro
super-post
superslider
sweetcaptcha-revolutionary-free-captcha-service
text-passwords
the-codetree-backup
toolspack
ToolsPack
tweet-blender
versionpress
w3-total-cache
wordfence
wordpress-gzip-compression
wp-cache
wp-database-optimizer
wp-db-backup
wp-dbmanager
wp-engine-snapshot
wp-file-cache
wp-mailinglist
wp-phpmyadmin
wp-postviews
wp-slimstat
wp-super-cache
wp-symposium-alerts
wpengine-migrate
wpengine-migrate.tar.gz
wpengine-migrate.zip
wpengine-snapshot
wpengine-snapshot.tar.gz
wponlinebackup
yet-another-featured-posts-plugin
yet-another-related-posts-plugin