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Oldest WordPress Plugins in the WordPress.org Repository

Immerse yourself in the retrospective journey to uncover WordPress's first plugins and discover the name of the most popular plugin that originated there.

WordPress made its debut in the expansive year of 2003. As 2004 drew to a close, the first plugins began to populate its repository. In our quest to explore the inaugural year of plugins, we turned to the WordPress.org API to compile a comprehensive list.

The very first plugin to grace the repository was Blogtimes, created by Matt Mullenweg, the visionary behind the initial version of WordPress and the founder of Automattic.

While it's unsurprising that many of these early-day plugins have faded into obscurity, it's fascinating to note that some have stood the test of time and remain remarkably popular, such as Akismet.

Toggle the table into full-screen mode now and delve into this retrospective journey.

Total: 81
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Plugin Author Total downloads Active installs Published Updated
1. Text Filter Suite

Advanced filtering functions for WordPress, including the Talk Like a Pirate Day filters.

#comments #content #filters #fun #funny

Dougal Campbell 5.121 0 2004-12-10 2015-06-03
2. Blogtimes

This plugin generates a bar graph image showing when posts are made during a period of time. For this to work wp-images/blogtimes.png must be writable by the web server. Original code by Sanjay Sheth of sastools.com.

Matt Mullenweg 2.189 10 2004-12-10 2005-01-20
3. Registered Only

Registered only is a plugin to make all of your WordPress powered weblog/site protected. Once this plugin is enabled, the WordPress powered site or we …

#access-control #login #management #users

Carthik Sharma 15.051 10 2004-12-11 2005-05-12
4. WP Unformatted

The WP Unformatted plugin allows you to remove WordPress's smart quotes (texturize) and auto XHTML tags (autop) functionality on a per-post basis …

#autop #formatting #texturize

Alex King 15.296 300 2004-12-13 2022-06-24
5. Front Page Categories

Select categories to display on the front page.

Ryan Boren 13.617 30 2004-12-17 2007-10-05
6. Theme Switcher

Allow users to switch which theme they use on your WordPress, WordPress MU, or BuddyPress site.

#themes

Ryan Boren 53.040 300 2004-12-17 2009-11-09
7. Top/Recent Commenters

Retrieve the top commenters or most recent commenters to your site (if called outside "the loop") or for a particular post (if called inside "the loop").

Scott Reilly 2.273 10 2004-12-21 2005-03-25
8. Hide/Cut Post Text

Hide (so no one, or only users above a certain userlevel, can see) or cut (so only viewable on post's permalink page) portion(s) of post text. Link text for cuts can be defined per-cut or omitted, and if used, cut links are uniquely anchored. Quicktag buttons for the new tags facilitate use (but c...

Scott Reilly 7.938 20 2004-12-21 2005-04-08
9. Customizable Post Listings

Display Recent Posts, Recently Commented Posts, Recently Modified Posts, Random Posts, and other post listings using the post information of your choosing in an easily customizable manner. You can narrow post searches by specifying categories and/or authors, among other things.

Scott Reilly 29.687 1.000 2004-12-21 2016-11-21
10. Text Replace

Replace text with other text. Handy for creating shortcuts to common, lengthy, or frequently changing text/HTML, or for smilies.

#coffee2code #replace #shortcut #substitution #text

Scott Reilly 77.784 4.000 2004-12-21 2021-07-12
11. Random File

Retrieve the name, path, or link to a randomly chosen file or files in a specified directory.

#coffee2code #file #random

Scott Reilly 26.953 100 2004-12-21 2023-08-22
12. Get Custom Field Values

Use widgets, shortcodes, and/or template tags to easily retrieve and display custom field values for posts or pages.

#custom-fields #meta #shortcode #widget #widgets

Scott Reilly 127.783 2.000 2004-12-21 2023-10-10
13. Post-to-Post Links

Easily create a link to another post using a shortcode to reference the post by id or slug; the link text is the post's title, unless overridden.

#links #pages #post #posts #shortcode

Scott Reilly 10.223 70 2004-12-21 2018-06-10
14. Category Image(s)

Display an image for each category associated with a post.

#categories #category #icon #image #post

Scott Reilly 29.820 100 2004-12-21 2012-06-11
15. Rate it!

A collection of functions that allow you to add a rating to each post.

Chris J. Davis 10.212 10 2004-12-21 2005-05-13
16. Live Preview: Admin Panel, Comments

A plugin that creates a live preview for you comments and post/edit forms.

Chris J. Davis 1.626 10 2004-12-21 2004-12-28
17. Per Post Comment Text

A plugin that allows you to set the text of your comments link on a post per post basis. Thanks to rgh (http://www.frenzieddaddy.com/) and the rest on #wordpress for thier help. For directions on how to use this plugin click here.

Chris J. Davis 2.242 10 2004-12-21 2004-12-28
18. Seperation Anxiety

Seperate those tracks and pings.

Chris J. Davis, Scott Merill 1.089 0 2004-12-21 2005-06-16
19. Protect old posts

This plugin puts a password specified in the protect-old.php file on every post but the latest published one that doesn't already have a password.

Matt Mullenweg 1.561 0 2004-12-26 2004-12-26
20. WP Gallery

Replace WP Gallery tags with links and images in your Gallery albums.

#gallery #photos

Geoff Hutchison 12.557 60 2005-01-03 2017-01-30
21. WP-CC

WP-CC is a plugin for the WordPress publishing system that enables easy usage of Creative Commons licenses. It can output a text or image link to you …

#creativecommons #license

Firas Durri 2.942 10 2005-01-11 2005-06-26
22. Search Hilite

When someone is referred from a search engine like Google, Yahoo, or WordPress' own, the terms they search for are highlighted with this plugin. Packaged by Matt.

Ryan Boren 11.571 90 2005-01-11 2005-06-17
23. Recent Posts

Retrieves a list of the most recent posts.

#list #posts #recent

Nick Momrik 58.205 600 2005-01-13 2015-12-08
24. Recent Comments

Creates functions to assist in displaying a list of the most recent comments.

#comments #list #recent

Automattic 30.783 300 2005-01-13 2021-02-10
25. Post Word Count

Counts the total number of words in all posts or the number of words in a single post.

#count #posts #words

Nick Momrik 5.983 30 2005-01-13 2015-12-08
26. Post Count

Counts the number of posts.

#count #posts

Nick Momrik 9.514 90 2005-01-13 2015-12-08
27. Most Commented Widget

Add a widget to display a list of the posts/pages with the most comments.

#comments #popular #rank #widget

Nick Momrik 115.824 600 2005-01-13 2015-12-08
28. Moderate Trackbacks

Automatically puts all trackbacks into the comment moderation queue.

#moderate #trackbacks

Nick Momrik 2.800 40 2005-01-13 2010-06-04
29. Moderate Pingbacks

Automatically puts all pingbacks into the comment moderation queue.

#moderate #pingbacks

Nick Momrik 3.076 50 2005-01-13 2010-06-04
30. Last Modified

Displays the date ad time the post/page was last modified.

#date #last #modified #time

Nick Momrik 6.704 100 2005-01-13 2010-06-04
31. Comment Word Count

Outputs the total number of words in all comments.

#comments #count #words

Nick Momrik 2.653 0 2005-01-13 2015-12-08
32. Comment Plugger

Gives a list of that last people to comment on a post, with a link to their site if they provided one.

#comments #links #plugger

Nick Momrik 5.732 10 2005-01-13 2010-06-04
33. Comment Count

Counts the number of comments.

#comments #count

Nick Momrik 7.827 30 2005-01-13 2015-12-08
34. Card Converter

Replace playing card abbreviations with a CSS playing card.

#cards #convert #poker

Nick Momrik 2.936 10 2005-01-13 2015-12-08
35. Bunny’s Technorati Tags

Allows easy addition to a post of a space-separated list of tags which can be displayed with adequate Technorati links in the template. Can display keywords instead if no tags are available.

Stephanie Booth 6.613 10 2005-01-20 2006-01-03
36. Disable WPautop

Disables the wpautop function for the_content and the_excerpt

#disable #wpautop

Nick Momrik 38.353 3.000 2005-01-20 2015-12-08
37. Comments Posted Elsewhere

Retrieves a list of comments posted on other sites (with the help of a hidden post and trackbacks).

#comments

Nick Momrik 2.037 0 2005-01-20 2010-06-04
38. Basic Bilingual

Allows you to set the language of individual posts and pages and to summarize

#bilingual #language #languages #multilingual #translation

Stephanie Booth 13.465 10 2005-01-23 2018-05-18
39. Staticize Reloaded

Staticize Reloaded is a plugin to make your site faster by caching the output of some WordPress pages. It creates a unique key based on the page varia …

#caching #performance

Matt Mullenweg 2.287 0 2005-02-01 2005-03-08
40. Cache Images

Goes through your posts and gives you the option to cache all hotlinked images from a domain locally in your upload folder

#hotlink #images #media #media-library #sideload

Matt Mullenweg 48.075 2.000 2005-02-08 2023-10-25
41. WordPress Heat Map

Template tags for a heat map of category links, archive links and author links. This version is for WordPress 1.5 "Strayhorn", version 1.0 of this plugin is still compatible with WordPress 1.2 "Mingus".

Christoph Wimmer 2.406 10 2005-02-11 2005-02-17
42. GeshiSyntaxColorer

Program languages colorer based on GeSHI engine

Mikhail Kyurshin 1.595 0 2005-02-19 2005-05-03
43. TTLB Ecosystem Cache

This is to replace the javascript tag that the TTLB Ecosystem currently provides to display your sites current status in the Ecosystem. It caches the results every 24 hours so as to reduce load times.

Glenn Slaven 837 0 2005-02-25 2005-07-04
44. Verse Of The Day

Displays a daily bible verse on your site, using a Verse of the Day RSS feed.

#bible #christian #verse #votd

Glenn Slaven 8.754 40 2005-03-01 2007-05-20
45. iCal Events

Display upcoming events from a shared calendar.

#calendar #events

Daniel Westermann-Clark 15.059 40 2005-03-10 2011-10-02
46. HTTP Authentication

Use an external authentication source in WordPress.

#authentication

Daniel Westermann-Clark 39.423 700 2005-03-10 2024-04-24
47. Link Library

The purpose of this plugin is to add the ability to output a list of link categories and a complete list of links with notes and descriptions.

#directory #library #link #list #page

Yannick Lefebvre 2.269.085 10.000 2005-03-17 2024-03-31
48. PhotoPress

Making WordPress work for photographers with beautiful image galleries, slideshows, meta-data tools, and more.

#gallery #gallery-block #images #masonry #photos

Peter Adams 14.977 100 2005-03-18 2021-12-14
49. WYSIWYG Editing

This plugin activates WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) editing for different fields in WordPress. It is based on the widgEditor.

Matt Mullenweg 22.357 100 2005-03-24 2005-03-24
50. Firefox Counter

This allows you to put the firefox_count() function in your template to get the latest download count for everyone's favorite browser. Call like firefox_count('thunderbird') to get the count for Thunderbird.

Matt Mullenweg 1.698 0 2005-04-04 2005-04-18
51. Singular

By default in Wordpress 1.5 and onwards, a post's sanitised name that appears in a permalink structure is checked for duplication and a numeral i …

#admin #permalink #postname #singular #slug

Jamie Talbot 3.558 10 2005-04-12 2005-04-24
52. Preserve Code Formatting

Preserve formatting of code for display by preventing its modification by WordPress and other plugins while also retaining whitespace.

#code #content #display #formatting #post-body

Scott Reilly 46.158 800 2005-04-14 2021-04-14
53. Obfuscate Email

Obfuscate email addresses to deter email-harvesting spammers.

#email #obfuscate #obfuscation #security #spam

Scott Reilly 95.575 9.000 2005-04-14 2021-04-14
54. Author Image(s)

Display image (if present) and/or name for the author of a post, or for all authors on the blog.

#author #authors #avatar #image #widget

Scott Reilly 21.450 100 2005-04-14 2012-01-04
55. Draft Notifier

Draft Notifier sends a notification email to your blog's admin address when a post written by a Contributor is Submitted for Review.

#draft #notification #notify

Michael D. Adams 10.199 500 2005-04-23 2010-06-03
56. Cricket Moods

Cricket Moods is a flexible "mood tag" WordPress plugin. It allows an author to add one or more "moods" to every post.

#meta #mood #post

Keith "kccricket" Constable 14.073 30 2005-05-02 2008-12-11
57. Paged Comments

Paged Comments enables comment paging. Useful for those popular blog entries receiving many comments, or a simple guestbook page within WordPress.

#comments #paged #paged-comments #paginate #split

Keyvan Minoukadeh 22.255 100 2005-05-10 2008-12-24
58. wiki2xhtml

transforms your writing from wiki to xhtml valid - adaptation of an extraordinary php class from dotclear.net

pierro 884 0 2005-05-11 2005-05-11
59. Code Markup

Code Markup is a WordPress plugin that makes it easy to include program code samples in your posts.

#code #format #html-xml #java #markup

Bennett McElwee 20.491 300 2005-05-12 2008-04-14
60. Evermore

Evermore automatically abbreviates all posts when they appear on a multiple-post page such as the main blog page.

#abbreviate #extract #more #preview #short

Bennett McElwee 93.371 1.000 2005-05-12 2018-10-23
61. Top Cat

Top Cat allows you to specify a main category for your posts. Even though WordPress posts can have more than one category, you may want to specify whi …

#category #main #primary #single

Bennett McElwee 2.395 10 2005-05-12 2005-05-27
62. Random Hadith WordPress 1.5 Plugin (Not tested on 1.2 – tester required)

Displays Random Hadith on your website. Powered by http://www.kyantonius.com/hadith/

Usayd Younis 1.035 0 2005-05-21 2005-05-21
63. Kramer

Kramer will add inbound links to a post on your weblog as pingbacks by checking Technorati and by monitoring incoming referrers.

#cosmos #links #pingback #technorati

Nik Cubrilovic and Mark Jaquith 8.901 10 2005-05-28 2007-03-15
64. Just One Category

On a category's archive page, displays only the posts directly in that category, not in any sub-categories.

#archive #category #exclude

Michael D Adams 17.546 40 2005-06-01 2010-03-07
65. Google Adsense for Feeds

This puts Google RSS Ads in your feed, make sure you fill in your publisher ID by editing the plugin file.

Matt Mullenweg 20.776 70 2005-06-08 2008-01-05
66. Subscribe to Comments

Subscribe to Comments allows commenters on an entry to subscribe to e-mail notifications for subsequent comments.

#comments #email #subscription

Mark Jaquith 533.619 30.000 2005-06-09 2015-07-13
67. Subscribe2 – Form, Email Subscribers & Newsletters

Sends a list of subscribers an email notification when you publish new posts.

#email #notify #posts #subscribe #subscription

weMail 2.392.624 20.000 2005-06-16 2023-11-23
68. XML Sitemap Generator for Google

Generate multiple types of sitemaps to improve SEO and get your website indexed quickly.

#google-sitemaps #indexnow #seo #sitemap #xml-sitemap

Auctollo 39.244.615 1.000.000 2005-06-16 2024-04-10
69. Identify External Links

Searches the text for links outside of the domain of the blog. To these, it adds class="extlink" (and optionally, target="_blank").

Mark Jaquith 9.360 50 2005-06-21 2006-01-30
70. Nice Categories

Displays the categories conversationally, like: Category1, Category2 and Category3

Mark Jaquith 3.768 10 2005-06-21 2005-06-22
71. WordPress Version Check

WordPress Version Check provides you with an easy way of checking that you are

#admin #security

Peter Westwood 4.895 0 2005-06-28 2009-05-26
72. Database Backup for WordPress

Database Backup for WordPress is your one-stop database backup solution for WordPress.

#backup #database #database-backup #mysql

Delicious Brains 3.689.921 100.000 2005-07-12 2022-05-26
73. Page Links To

Lets you make a WordPress page (or port or other content type) link to a URL of your choosing (on your site, or on another site), instead of its norma …

#external-link #link #page #redirect #repoint

Mark Jaquith 4.501.983 200.000 2005-07-23 2024-03-26
74. Subpage Listing

Allows you to display a list of the child pages of the currently viewed page.

#hierarchy #pages #subpages #tree

Mark Jaquith 26.246 300 2005-07-29 2012-05-16
75. GetRSS

A quick RSS puller for Wordpress. Use <?php getRSS('http://example.com/feed/', '5', '<li>', '</li>');?> to fetch a feed.

Mahangu Weerasinghe 3.667 10 2005-08-17 2005-08-17
76. Random Qur'anic Verse WordPress 1.5 Plugin (Not tested on 1.2 – tester required)

// v 1.15, added Malay language support. Steps to install: Download the plug-in (ZIP) and extract. Open your Sidebar.php or any template file and a …

Usayd Younis 1.361 10 2005-08-23 2005-08-24
77. Flashfader

Put a flash slideshow on your wordpress site

#flash #image #images #sidebar #slideshow

Marcus Grellert 26.690 200 2005-08-24 2010-11-22
78. Akismet Anti-spam: Spam Protection

The best anti-spam protection to block spam comments and spam in a contact form. The most trusted antispam solution for WordPress and WooCommerce.

#anti-spam #antispam #comments #contact-form #spam

Automattic - Anti-spam Team 319.680.287 5.000.000 2005-10-20 2024-03-21
79. |=== Usayd's HijriDate Plugin v1.87 ===|

Adds the Hijri Date to your posts and an admin panel for configuration.

#date #hijridate #usayd

Usayd Younis 1.771 10 2005-10-28 2005-10-28
80. Geo Mashup

Include Google and OpenStreetMap maps in posts and pages, and map posts, pages, and other objects on global maps. Make WordPress into a GeoCMS.

#google-map #google-maps #map #mapping #maps

Dylan Kuhn 232.165 5.000 2005-11-15 2023-07-14
81. Memcached Object Cache

Use memcached and the PECL memcache extension to provide a backing store for the WordPress object cache.

#cache #memcached

Ryan Boren, Denis de Bernardy, Matt Martz, Andy Skelton 158.253 30 2005-12-19 2022-11-08

We trust this list has sparked the inspiration for you to contribute to the WordPress community in your own way. Whether it's assisting with translations or publishing your own plugin, every contribution counts toward the vibrant ecosystem of WordPress.

If you're eager to continue exploring, consider diving into articles on the Oldest WordPress Themes or the Most Popular WordPress Plugins.

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About the Author

Maxim Akimov

Certified WordPress expert from Ukraine with over 8 years of experience. Advocate of the BEM methodology and the overall modular approach. Loves sporting activities and enjoys going to the gym and regularly plays table tennis.

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