Deep Roots recommend plugins

Here’s a short list of plugins we recommend for various administrative tasks. Some of these we recommend for every blog and some for specific scenarios, as noted below:

• WP Super Cache or WP Rocket – caching plugins to improve your site speed for visitors
• Autoptimize – optimizes your site by minifying things like CSS, HTML, and JavaScript in the code (this is unnecessary if you use WP Rocket)
• Imagify or Short Pixel – reduce the size of your images without impacting the quality
• UpdraftPlus – one-click backup and restoration
• Google Analytics by MonsterInsights – a better alternative to Jetpack if you want stats on your dashboard, but any plugin that adds stats to your dashboard will slow it down
• Hubbub– add social sharing buttons and tools to your blog posts and pages provided by NerdPress.

Note: we've previously recommended a few plugins that we now no longer recommend for our environment, since their functionality is either built in to our hosting platform now, or they are better handled via alternate means.

• Stop XML-RPC Attack – this functionality is better handled at the server level; contact us to be sure this is good to remove.
• Move Login – we have better server-level protections against brute-force login attempts, and WPS Hide Login is a good modern plugin that can change your login URL if you do want this functionality.
• Really Simple SSL – SSL is always-on by default on our hosting platform; if you're using this plugin on our hosting and would like to remove it, drop us a line and we can help remove it safely.

WordPress plugins are an incredible way to automate tasks, customize your site, and create a better reader experience. Don’t be afraid to use them, but do proceed carefully before adding a new plugin to your site!