ranklite

RankLite focuses on the essentials of on-page SEO. It’s intentionally small, fast, and easy to configure. You get all the core tools—without the kitchen sink:
<ul>
<li>Titles & Meta Descriptions per post/page with live counters</li>
<li>Global defaults with smart fallbacks</li>
<li>Open Graph & Twitter Cards (title, description, image)</li>
<li>Canonical and robots meta (index/noindex, follow/nofollow)</li>
<li>XML Sitemaps (<code>/sitemap.xml</code>) with pretty permalink support and pings to Google & Bing</li>
<li>JSON-LD Schema for Website, Article, Breadcrumbs + FAQ/How-to blocks (basic)</li>
<li>Breadcrumbs output helper</li>
<li>Manual 301 Redirects</li>
<li>Analytics helpers (Google Analytics/GTAG & Google Tag Manager passthrough)</li>
<li>Optional data wipe on uninstall</li>
<li>Multisite-aware and performance-minded</li>
</ul>
No telemetry. No ad pixels. No phone-home calls—everything stays on your site.
<h3>Why RankLite?</h3>
<ul>
<li>Performance first. Lightweight code, minimal queries, no admin nag spam.</li>
<li>No lock-in. Uses standard WordPress fields/meta so you can switch any time.</li>
<li>Clean UI. Sensible defaults and clear controls that won’t overwhelm you.</li>
</ul>
<h3>What’s included in the Free version?</h3>
<ul>
<li>Titles/meta with counters and fallbacks</li>
<li>Canonical, robots</li>
<li>Open Graph & Twitter Cards</li>
<li>Website/Article/Breadcrumbs + FAQ/How-to schema (basic, JSON-LD)</li>
<li>XML sitemaps with Google/Bing pings</li>
<li>Breadcrumbs helper</li>
<li>Manual redirects (301)</li>
<li>Analytics & GTM helpers</li>
<li>Tools page with wipe on uninstall option</li>
</ul>
<h3>Pro add-on</h3>
A separate Pro add-on (not required) can extend RankLite with AI-assisted titles/descriptions/alt-text/articles, advanced schema & sitemaps, a 404 monitor, and auto-redirects. The free plugin is fully functional on its own and does not require Pro.
<h3>Features</h3>
<ul>
<li>Meta box on posts/pages for custom SEO Title & Description</li>
<li>Smart fallback to site title/tagline or post excerpt</li>
<li>Open Graph/Twitter image fallback</li>
<li>Robots (index/noindex, follow/nofollow) per post and global</li>
<li>Sitemaps: index + post types; pretty <code>/sitemap.xml</code> with:
<ul>
<li>Fallback query route for non-pretty permalinks</li>
<li>Automatic pings to Google and Bing when content changes (with safe throttling)</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Schema: Website, Article, Breadcrumbs + FAQ/How-to via blocks (basic) with safe defaults</li>
<li>Breadcrumbs: simple template function/filter to output a trail</li>
<li>Redirects: add simple 301 manual redirects from an admin screen</li>
<li>Analytics: GA4/gtag and GTM helpers (paste ID and go)</li>
<li>Developer-friendly (filters/actions documented below)</li>
<li>Privacy-friendly: no data leaves your site</li>
</ul>
<h3>Privacy</h3>
This plugin does not:
<ul>
<li>Collect personal data</li>
<li>Send usage data to third parties</li>
<li>Set cookies on the front end by itself</li>
</ul>
If you enable Analytics or GTM helpers, you are integrating external services—ensure you have the proper disclosures/consent (e.g., via your cookie banner).
<h3>Performance</h3>
<ul>
<li>Minimal queries and safe caching behavior</li>
<li>No assets loaded on the front end unless necessary</li>
<li>Short timeouts and safe throttling for sitemap pings to Google/Bing</li>
</ul>
<h3>External services</h3>
This plugin can optionally connect to the following external services:
<ol>
<li>Google Search and Bing (sitemap ping)</li>
</ol>
– What it does: When sitemap pinging is enabled, RankLite can notify search engines that your sitemap has been updated. 
– What is sent: The public URL of your sitemap is sent as a query parameter to: 
 – https://www.google.com/ping?sitemap= 
 – https://www.bing.com/ping?sitemap= 
– When: Only when sitemap pinging is enabled in the plugin settings and a sitemap is generated/updated. 
– Terms / Privacy: 
 – Google: https://policies.google.com/privacy / https://policies.google.com/terms 
 – Microsoft (Bing): https://privacy.microsoft.com / https://www.microsoft.com/servicesagreement
<ol>
<li>Google Analytics / Google Tag Manager (optional)</li>
</ol>
– What it does: If you choose to enable Analytics or Tag Manager in RankLite, the plugin outputs the official tracking/snippet code provided by Google. 
– What is sent: Standard analytics/usage data as defined by Google, associated with your own property IDs (e.g. GA4, GTM). No additional data is sent by RankLite beyond what Google’s scripts normally collect. 
– When: Only when you explicitly enable these features and enter your own tracking IDs. 
– Terms / Privacy: 
 – Google Analytics / Tag Manager: https://marketingplatform.google.com/about/analytics/terms/us/ 
 – Google Privacy Policy: https://policies.google.com/privacy
<h3>Developers</h3>
<h3>Filter the final title string</h3>
<pre><code>`php
</code></pre>
/** 
 * Filter the final value RankLite outputs. 
 * 
 * @param string $title Final title string. 
 * @param array $parts Parsed parts (h1, site_name, brand, etc). 
 * @param WP_Post|null $post Current post object (or null). 
 * @param string $type Detected type: ‘news’ | ‘product’ | ‘default’. 
 */ 
add_filter( ‘ranklite_meta_title_final’, function( $title, $parts, $post, $type ) { 
 return $title; 
}, 10, 4 ); 
 `
<h3>Add extra sitemap index entries (e.g. news/video)</h3>
<pre><code>`php
</code></pre>
add_filter( ‘ranklite/sitemaps/index_items’, function( $extra, $opts ) { 
 $extra[] = array( 
 ‘loc’ => home_url( ‘/news-sitemap.xml’ ), 
 ‘lastmod’ => gmdate( ‘c’ ), 
 ); 
 return $extra; 
}, 10, 2 ); 
 `
<h3>Tweak the breadcrumb trail before output</h3>
<pre><code>`php
</code></pre>
add_filter( ‘ranklite_breadcrumb_trail’, function( $trail ) { 
 // $trail is an array of arrays like [ ‘name’ => ‘Blog’, ‘url’ => ‘https://example.com/blog/’ ]. 
 return $trail; 
} ); 
 `
<h3>Programmatic redirect registration</h3>
<pre><code>`php
</code></pre>
do_action( ‘ranklite/register_redirect’, ‘/old-path’, ‘/new-path’, 301 ); 
 `
See inline docs for more hooks and parameters.

RankLite – Fast, Clean SEO

Fast, clean SEO: titles & meta, Open Graph/Twitter Cards, JSON-LD schema, and XML sitemaps with Google/Bing pings. No bloat, no tracking.

Arya Dhiratara

A lightweight plugin to make your site more SEO Friendly. This plugin provides SEO features that are really matters to optimize your site’s SEO in a non-intrusive way.
<h3>Features</h3>
<ul>
<li>Meta Description (This plugin use the built-in WordPress excerpt function to get all description metas. So you can simply use the excerpt box if you want to customize the output)</li>
<li>Social Media Meta Tags (Open Graph protocol)
<ul>
<li>Set default Facebook Image</li>
<li>Set default Twitter Image 
(by default, all social media images will get the featured image first. If the entry does not have a featured image, it will use these images as a fallback. if you leave this blank, the plugin will try to get the first image from each entry)</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Structured Data (Schema) Markup (JSON-LD)
<ul>
<li>Organization Schema</li>
<li>Local Business Schema</li>
<li>Sitelinks Search Box Schema</li>
<li>Breadcrumbs Schema</li>
<li>Article Schema</li>
<li>Product Schema for Shop & Product Category Page – Add Product Schema with offer and ratings to Shop & Product Category Page (this option only appear if you use WooCommerce, useful if you enable ratings for your products)</li>
<li>Custom JSON Schema – Utilize WordPress native post meta fields to add custom JSON Schema. Simply add new “jsonScript” to the name field and add the JSON schema markup to the value field. You can add custom JSON schema markup as many as you like in each page/post since this using <code>foreach</code>.</li>
<li>Custom Title for Search Engine and Social Media – Utilize WordPress native post meta fields to use different titles for search engines & social media. Simply add new post meta field named “seoTitle” for search engine title, “twitterTitle” for twitter title, and/or “ogTitle” for other social media titles, then add the custom title to the value field.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Sitemap – Utilize the built-in WordPress sitemap features. Use this plugin to control / configure:
<ul>
<li>The sitemap index url</li>
<li>Remove posts / pages / products / taxonomies / any registered custom post types globally from the sitemap</li>
<li>Remove Users (globally) from the sitemap</li>
<li>Remove each entries individually from each entries edit screen</li>
<li>Add attachments (image / video) to the sitemap</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Change your Robots.txt Content – Easily customize you robots.txt content using the provided textarea.</li>
<li>Image Alt Tags – Add empty image alt tags with title.</li>
<li>Disable Feeds – Disable WordPress Feeds to prevent scrappers from duplicating your content.</li>
<li>Works well with WooCommerce.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Disclaimer</h3>
<ul>
<li>As the plugin name says, you will not find any non-matter features for SEO in this plugin.</li>
<li>This plugin was built by prioritizing the use of built-in WordPress features.</li>
<li>Still not tested thoroughly in FSE themes.</li>
<li>Still not tested in multisites websites.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Found any issues?</h3>
Please use this <a href="https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/seo-that-matters/" rel="ugc">support forum</a> to report it.
<h3>Check out my other plugins:</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/optimize-more/" rel="ugc">Optimize More!</a> – A DIY WordPress Page Speed Optimization Pack.</li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/optimize-more-images/" rel="ugc">Optimize More! Images</a> – A simple yet powerfull image, iframe, and video optimization plugin.</li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/lazyload-preload-and-more/" rel="ugc">Lazyload, Preload, and more!</a> – This tiny little plugin (around 14kb zipped) is a simplified version of Optimize More! Images. Able to do what Optimize More! Images can do but without UI for settings (you can customize the default settings using filters).</li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/shop-extra/" rel="ugc">Shop Extra</a> – A lightweight plugin to enhance your WooCommerce & Business site.</li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/image-video-lightbox/" rel="ugc">Image & Video Lightbox</a> – A lightweight plugin that will automatically adds Lightbox functionality to images.</li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/animate-on-scroll/" rel="ugc">Animate on Scroll</a> – Animate any Elements on scroll using the popular AOS JS library simply by adding class names.</li>
</ul>

SEO that Matters

A lightweight plugin to make your site more SEO (and Social Media) Friendly in a non-intrusive way.

RankLite – Fast, Clean SEO vs SEO that Matters