Freemius

designplug

<p>ReviewStars displays a Google Places star rating and total review count via a shortcode: <code>[reviewstars]</code>.</p>
<p>It is built as a design tool: you can style the output in the admin and use Preview Mode to design without an API key or Place ID, which is useful for staging sites, page builders, and client approval.</p>
<h3>Free build features</h3>
<ul>
<li>Shortcode: <code>[reviewstars]</code></li>
<li>Google Places rating and review count using your own API key</li>
<li>Caching via WordPress transients</li>
<li>Configurable front-end auto-refresh</li>
<li>Preview Mode with custom preview rating and review count</li>
<li>On-click behavior: open your Google listing or “Write a review”</li>
<li>Optional language parameter for the Google Places API</li>
<li>Style controls for spacing, typography, review count background, Google icon placement, and separators</li>
</ul>
<p>The WordPress.org build includes only the free functionality listed here. Additional paid functionality is delivered in a separate plugin package outside WordPress.org and is not included in this package.</p>
<h4>Style editor</h4>
<p>Control spacing, typography and icon placement without custom CSS:</p>
<ul>
<li>Toggle: show/hide review count and review text</li>
<li>Stars font size</li>
<li>Review text font size and font weight</li>
<li>Optional review text color</li>
<li>Number spacing: padding, margin, and vertical adjustment</li>
<li>Number typography: font size, font weight, and optional color</li>
<li>Optional number background: solid or gradient background, padding, radius, and border width</li>
<li>Google icon: show/hide, position, gap, icon size, and separator styling</li>
</ul>
<h3>External Services</h3>
<p>This plugin connects to the following third-party services:</p>
<p>1) <strong>Google Places API (Google Maps Platform)</strong><br />
Used to retrieve the rating and review count for the configured Place ID. Requests are made when the shortcode is rendered, when the admin “Test API settings” button is used, and when live refresh is enabled.<br />
Service: https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/places/web-service/overview<br />
Terms: https://cloud.google.com/maps-platform/terms<br />
Privacy: https://policies.google.com/privacy</p>
<p>2) <strong>Freemius SDK (optional)</strong><br />
The plugin bundles the Freemius SDK for optional account, opt-in, and commercial upgrade flows. The free plugin functionality works without opting in to Freemius. If you opt in or use Freemius account features, data may be processed by Freemius according to their policies.<br />
Privacy: https://freemius.com/privacy/<br />
Terms: https://freemius.com/terms/</p>
<h3>Shortcodes</h3>
<pre><code>[reviewstars]
</code></pre>
<p>Optional attributes:</p>
<ul>
<li><code>refresh_ms="300000"</code> – override refresh interval in milliseconds</li>
<li><code>preview="1"</code> – force preview output without API calls</li>
<li><code>rating="4.8"</code> – preview rating</li>
<li><code>reviews="1250"</code> – preview review count</li>
</ul>


ReviewStars

Displays a modern Google Places rating badge with style controls, caching, auto refresh, and optional preview mode.

JS Morisset

<p></p>
<p><strong>Includes a 5 Star Rating in Schema markup:</strong></p>
<ol>
<li>If the Schema markup does not have an ‘aggregateRating’ property.</li>
<li>If Google allows an ‘aggregateRating’ property for that Schema type.</li>
</ol>
<p>Google allows an ‘aggregateRating’ property for these Schema types and their sub-types:</p>
<ul>
<li>Book</li>
<li>Course</li>
<li>Event</li>
<li>HowTo (includes Recipe)</li>
<li>LocalBusiness</li>
<li>Movie</li>
<li>Product</li>
<li>SoftwareApplication</li>
</ul>
<p>If the Schema type in the Document SSO metabox is not one of these types (or one of their sub-types), then a 5 star rating cannot be added, as doing so would trigger an error in the Google search console. <a href="https://developers.google.com/search/docs/advanced/structured-data/review-snippet" rel="nofollow ugc">See Google’s Review snippet documentation for additional information.</a></p>
<p></p>
<h3>WPSSO Add Five Stars is a Fallback Solution</h3>
<p>The Google’s Review Snippet technical guidelines reminds us to:</p>
<blockquote>
<p><a href="https://developers.google.com/search/docs/advanced/structured-data/review-snippet#technical-guidelines" rel="nofollow ugc">Make sure the reviews and ratings you mark up are readily available to users from the marked-up page. It must be immediately obvious to users that the page has review content.</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>The WPSSO Add Five Stars add-on includes a 5 star rating <em>if the document Schema markup does not already have an ‘aggregateRating’ property</em>. It is always preferable to include actual ratings and reviews from your visitors and/or customers in the webpage. The WPSSO Add Five Stars add-on can be used in combination with any of the following third-party plugins and service APIs, or the <a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wpsso-ratings-and-reviews/" rel="ugc">WPSSO Ratings and Reviews</a> add-on.</p>
<p><strong>Suggested Rating and Review Plugins and Services:</strong></p>
<p>The <a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wpsso/" rel="ugc">WPSSO Core plugin</a> supports a selection of plugins that provide ratings and reviews:</p>
<ul>
<li>WP-PostRatings</li>
<li>WP Product Review</li>
<li>Yotpo Social Reviews for WooCommerce</li>
<li>WooCommerce</li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wpsso-ratings-and-reviews/" rel="ugc">WPSSO Ratings and Reviews</a></li>
</ul>
<p>The <a href="https://wpsso.com/" rel="nofollow ugc">WPSSO Core Premium plugin</a> also supports a selection of remote service APIs that provide ratings and reviews:</p>
<ul>
<li>Judge.me (Ratings and Reviews)</li>
<li>Shopper Approved (Ratings and Reviews)</li>
<li>Stamped.io (Ratings and Reviews)</li>
</ul>
<h3>WPSSO Core Required</h3>
<p>WPSSO Add Five Stars is an add-on for the <a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wpsso/" rel="ugc">WPSSO Core plugin</a>, which creates extensive and complete structured data to present your content at its best for social sites and search results – no matter how URLs are shared, reshared, messaged, posted, embedded, or crawled.</p>

WPSSO Add Five Stars for Google Rich Snippets

Add a 5 star rating and review from the site organization if the Schema markup does not already have an 'aggregateRating' property.

ReviewStars vs WPSSO Add Five Stars for Google Rich Snippets