I had a problem I really wanted to solve.
There are incredible plugin developers out there creating amazing tools, and they deserve more users. They pour their hearts into building something useful, something that solves real problems—and then… crickets. Not because their plugins aren’t good, but because nobody can find them.
So I had this idea: what if I changed up the plugins shown in the “Featured” tab regularly? Rotate them out, give different developers exposure, help people discover great tools that were flying under the radar.
I was excited. I sat down to start researching which plugins should go in the featured tab, ready to curate the best hidden gems for users.
And that’s when I hit a wall.
The Discovery That Changed Everything
Trying to find “hidden gems” in the WordPress plugin directory? It’s actually really hard.
Think about it: when you browse the directory, what do you see? The most popular plugins. The ones with millions of installs. Which makes sense—those are battle-tested, widely adopted tools. But here’s the thing: those plugins don’t need more exposure. They’re doing just fine.
I wanted to find the good plugins that nobody knew about yet. The ones with stellar ratings but tiny install counts. The undiscovered gems.
Turns out, the directory isn’t really built for that kind of discovery.
So I did what any developer would do: I turned to my buddy Claude and said, “Help me figure this out.”
Enter: The Hidden Gems Plugin
Together, we built something I’m genuinely excited about. A plugin that does exactly what I couldn’t do manually—surfaces those quality plugins that deserve attention but haven’t gotten it yet.
Here’s the beautiful simplicity of how it works:
The plugin fetches the 500 newest plugins from WordPress.org and asks one key question about each one: “Is this a hidden gem?”
A hidden gem, by our definition, is a plugin that:
- Has good ratings
- BUT has low installation counts
It’s looking for quality over popularity.
Why This Logic Is Brilliant
Think about it in three categories:
Bad plugins with low installs → Not shown (they’re just bad)
Good plugins with high installs → Not shown (they’re already popular)
Good plugins with low installs → 💎 HIDDEN GEM!
Let me give you a real-world example:
- Plugin A: 4 stars, 2 million installs → Too popular, everyone knows about it
- Plugin B: 1 star, 100 installs → Poor quality, there’s a reason it’s unknown
- Plugin C: 4 stars, 500 installs → 🎯 THIS IS WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR!
Plugin C is excellent—people who use it love it—but hardly anyone has discovered it yet.
The Power of Smart Filtering
Once you’ve got a list of hidden gems, you can filter them by:
- Max installs: “Show me only plugins with under 10K installs”
- Quality threshold: “Show me only 4+ star plugins”
- Search terms: “Find gems related to ‘ecommerce’”
This means you can fine-tune your discovery based on exactly what you’re looking for.
Why This Matters
Most people discover plugins the same way:
- Browse the popular plugins (already widely adopted)
- Search for specific keywords (might miss amazing alternatives)
The Hidden Gems plugin flips this approach entirely. It finds the good plugins that nobody knows about yet, giving you a competitive advantage. You get to discover useful tools before they become mainstream.
It’s like finding an incredible restaurant before it gets crowded. You know that feeling? That’s what this is, but for WordPress plugins.
What This Means for Developers
If you’re a plugin developer reading this, here’s what excites me: this creates a pathway for quality to be recognized, even without a massive marketing budget. Your excellent plugin with 500 installs and 4.8 stars? It deserves to be found. And now it can be.
What This Means for Users
If you’re someone who uses WordPress, you’re about to gain access to tools your competitors haven’t discovered yet. Fresh perspectives. Innovative solutions. Quality plugins before they hit the mainstream.
The Bigger Picture
This started as me wanting to help developers get more users. It turned into something bigger—a way to fundamentally change how we discover quality in a sea of options.
And honestly? I couldn’t be more excited about where this goes.
Because somewhere out there, there’s a developer who built something incredible that only 300 people know about. But not for long.
Check it out here.
Ready to discover your next favorite plugin? Check out the Hidden Gems plugin and start finding quality before everyone else does.