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Jeff Chandler

WordPress Plugin Directory Surpasses One Billion Total Downloads

The WordPress project achieved a milestone earlier today as the official WordPress plugin directory surpassed one billion total downloads.

One billion total plugin downloads

More than one billion total downloads

According to Scott Reilly who helps maintain WordPress.org, we’ll never know which plugin generated the one billionth download. That’s because WordPress.org doesn’t log information that matches downloads to plugins.

“A download counter exists for each plugin for each day and the total amount is the summation of all those daily download counts,” Reilly said.

As WordPress’ market share continues to grow, so does the amount of downloads from the plugin directory. The following numbers are the total amount of downloads from March 2006 to August 2015. This year, the directory is on pace to serve more than 300 million downloads.

  • March 2006  191,567
  • 2007  2,845,802
  • 2008  15,130,856
  • 2009  49,822,116
  • 2010  72,342,598
  • 2011  108,501,907
  • 2012  141,609,682
  • 2013  182,236,517
  • 2014  241,142,505
  • January 2015 to August 2015  186,243,700

It took nine years for the plugin directory to reach one billion downloads, when do you think it will reach two billion?

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30 responses to “WordPress Plugin Directory Surpasses One Billion Total Downloads”

  1. nero of Intuitive Design says:
    August 10, 2015 at 11:48 PM

    Aren’t you missing a number there. That only looks like 184 million?!?!?

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  2. buzztone says:
    August 11, 2015 at 1:29 AM

    RE: when do you think it will reach two billion?

    My guess is 1st half of 2018.

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  3. Darren Meehanrren says:
    August 11, 2015 at 6:30 AM

    I quickly graphed the data you provided here Jeff and its a lot clearer how quickly downloads are accumulating! I believe we’ll have 2 billion downloads of plugins before 2018. http://darrenmeehan.me/my-estimate-at-wordpress-org-hitting-2-billion-downloads/

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  4. Tom Zsomborgi (@tomzur) says:
    August 11, 2015 at 7:36 AM

    Wow, one billion it’s a lot. Considering the popularity of WordPress I think we will reach two billion within the next 3 years.

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  5. Cameron Barrett says:
    August 11, 2015 at 9:20 AM

    About 1 million of those downloads was me trying to find the right events plugin to use. Just kidding!

    The rapid adoption of WordPress is escalating exponentially. I think we’ll see 2 billion plugin downloads before the end of 2016.

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  6. Will Anderson says:
    August 11, 2015 at 9:55 AM

    The trend since 2010 appears to be about 35% growth per year, on average. Assuming that continues, it should hit 2 billion downloads in late 2017.

    Assuming consistent growth too far out is a little sketchy, but if the trend continues, 2019 will be the first single year with a billion downloads.

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  7. Jeffrey says:
    August 11, 2015 at 12:26 PM

    @Jeff,

    Where did you get those numbers by year?

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  8. Jeff Chandler says:
    August 11, 2015 at 1:09 PM

    By the way, the comments in this post explain why the links were hidden from view when the Plugin directory was redesigned https://wptavern.com/wordpress-plugin-directory-launches-new-design

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  9. Dmitri Larionov says:
    August 11, 2015 at 1:14 PM

    WordPress is getting more popular so I think it will hit 2 billion downloads by end of summer in 2016.

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  10. Jeffrey says:
    August 11, 2015 at 7:02 PM

    I did a linear regression on the data provided and I estimate that it will reach 2 billion downloads in 18 months, which is January 2017. Also, according to my model, the total downloads at the end of this year will be 1,264,470,661. Here is my statistical analysis: https://www.learningpenguin.net/myblog/2015/08/11/estimate-of-time-for-wordpress-plugin-directory-surpassing-two-billion-downloads/

    Time will tell if my model is accurate or not. :-)

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  11. Terence Milbourn says:
    August 12, 2015 at 9:08 AM

    Is anything being done to help the customer with a valid complaint about poor support, or to provide a way for the customer to reward the author for delivering outstanding customer support?

    It seems very unfair to Authors who understand I am trying to run a business, and respond to my support requests quickly and knowledgeably, while others obviously either don’t have a clue how to provide support well, or simply don’t care about supporting their customers.

    There should be some inbuilt review process where customers can rate Authors’ products and support positively them with, say, points which they can allocate to different aspects.

    If that happened in a meaningful way, and was entirely transparent, I would then be better equipped to run my business, if I can see that an Author has good ratings in those aspects I am interested in. If he has no or low rating in Support, for example, I will be buying elsewhere.

    Lately, I tend to buy the “pro” versions of software from Authors who provide a ‘freemium’ versions on the WordPress Repository, which then allows me the opportunity to check out their product and their support claims before committing a project to their software.

    I think the folk who manage the repository should not overlook this very important aspect of reputation, in the buying process.

    What do you think?

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    • yafred says:
      August 13, 2015 at 2:44 AM

      You used the word ‘customer’ 5 times … the repository is not a market place.

      What you describe is not going to happen (at least not in the official repository): the work would be massive (nearly 40000 plugins …remember), the result would not be worth the effort if you ask me.

      I agree with you that reputation is a big thing.

      You can have a feeling of developer’s reputation just by reading their support threads (on the repository and on their personal sites).

      This means you have to invest some time on each of them. You can even share your results. I am sure a lot of plugins/themes developer would love some exposure: this is the thing there are lacking the most on the official repository.

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      • nero of Intuitive Design says:
        August 13, 2015 at 8:00 AM

        Perfectly answered. I feel the same way as I am both a user of the plugins and a developer of some plugins.
        The thing is, some plugin developers are great with support while others aren’t. In the developers defense; I have given and gotten good marks from people (by more people using my plugin and giving it adequate stars); while I have had a couple that hated my support. Of course, I believe it was their own misunderstanding and lack of technical skills that made the use of my plugin fail for them.
        Additionally, many plugins have paid support options. I think this is brilliant for both users and developers. It allows developers to make more money doing their job (developing); while giving minimal support to persons that feel the products should be free.

        T

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      • Terence Milbourn says:
        August 13, 2015 at 12:38 PM

        Absolutely agree. I am all for Authors providing paid support. We all have to make a living. Which is why I call them “customers”, not “users”.

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        • Jan Dembowski says:
          August 13, 2015 at 1:33 PM

          Absolutely ~ that’s why I used the word “customer”, and not “user”.

          On the WordPress.org support forums they’re not customers, they are users. When someone has that conversation with their customer there they are politely asked to take it somewhere else.

          It’s an important distinction because the expectations are different.

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