Understanding the new WordPress Plugins and their Operations

by Nicki Jenns Solo Traveler

Apps that allow you to add new features and functionality is what the WordPress plugins are which are integrated to your WordPress website. This is works in the similar way as a smartphone does.

There are also thousands of premium WordPress plugins which are sold by individual developers and companies on top of all.

WordPress over the years evolved into a powerful content management system and application frameworks and this is solely due to the plugins.

What these Plugins do?

It is moreover noted that plugins like Cosmic WP and others are the small software apps which integrates and run on top of the WordPress software. For this reason you are able to create almost any kind of website with WordPress.

No matter what you try to do on your WordPress, you are able to do it through the WordPress plugins such as the Cosmic WP which has over 40+ content blocks which are customizable for the WordPress 5.0 Gutenberg.

It can be easily integrated in any theme through this collection. For your site, it is packed with many unique features and designing options.

These plugins are usually used to improve SEO, boost performance, and add contact forms, social media button, create galleries and so much more.

How do these work?

So that the other developers can add their own code into it, WordPress is written in a way. Offering a robust set of hooks and filters which allow developers to modify existing WordPress functionality or add new functionality is what these plugin offers.

To store data in the WordPress database, it also allows the developers to do this. Allowing users to store different types of content and not just post and pages, plugins can utilize WordPress content types, taxonomies, and custom fields.

In your WordPress database, each WordPress plugin installed in your site is registered. At any time that you want, you can activate and deactivate them.

WordPress connects to the database, loads the core software, and then loads your active plugins upon each visit. All these codes are then sent to user’s browser after they are processed.

Installing and finding the best plugins

By visiting the WordPress.org plugin directory, you can find WordPress plugins or you can also find them through the WordPress admin area.

In a list, WordPress will search the plugin directory and display the available plugins. All you need to click on install now button next to the plugin which you want to install and need to review the results.

As they are limited to free plugins, search results inside WordPress admin area are not always helpful. It becomes difficult for most of the beginners to decide on which plugin is the best for the job.

You can also look for plugin recommendations and tutorials on sites like WPBeginner which is the other approach. You can also find the best WordPress plugin through the WordPress plugins section.

You can also check out the plugins which we use on our website in the WPBeginner’s Blueprint as can also find the WordPress plugins in the editor’s picks.

Things to consider before installing a WordPress Plugin

You need to be very careful about which plugins you install as installing a WordPress plugin entails adding third-party code to your WordPress site.

The wrong plugins would probably:

· Cause an error to your site

· Hurting your WordPress site’s security opening an unintentional vulnerability.

· Slowing down your site

· Intentionally introducing malicious code

Things to avoid such problems:

· Try using plugins from reputable developers and directories.

· Reading reviews and checking on how a plugin is before installing it

· Checking for the final time when a plugin was updated to make sure that it is still maintained.

It goes a long way to ensuring you only install quality WordPress plugins while this approach is not foolproof.

How many plugins can you have?

You would probably see that people are telling you not to install too many WordPress plugins in order to avoid slowing your site down as you become more familiar with WordPress.

It is still an useful concept for the beginners to keep in mind as the idea that more WordPress plugins equal a slower site which is not technically true.