WordPress Plugin Directory Scraper

WordPress agencies and plugin researchers get structured plugin data, version, ratings, active installs and compatibility, from the official directory, instead of scraping wordpress.org pages by hand. Search by keyword or browse curated listings (popular, new, updated, featured) and get the same fields every time.

Get structured plugin metadata, ratings and install stats from WordPress.org as JSON, CSV or Excel, or call it as a tool from Claude, Cursor, ChatGPT or any MCP client. Built on the official API that powers the WordPress.org plugin directory and the "Add Plugins" screen inside WordPress itself, so it does not break when the website changes. Pay only for the plugins you receive.

What you get

One record per plugin with the fields people actually use: name, slug and link, version, plain-text author name, required and tested-up-to WordPress versions, required PHP version, rating (0 to 100) and number of ratings, the 1 to 5 star rating breakdown, support thread counts and how many are resolved, active installs, total downloads, last updated and added dates, homepage, a plain-text short description, the download link, tags, donate link and icons. Optionally include the full plain-text description.

Every result is a flat record with stable field names, so it drops straight into a spreadsheet, a database or an AI agent's context.

Why use this instead of the website

• Search by keyword or browse popular, new, recently updated or featured plugins, filtered by tag or author
• Pagination handled for you, with automatic retries and polite rate limiting
• HTML stripped from author names and descriptions so fields are clean plain text
• Results in JSON, CSV, Excel or via API, or piped into Zapier, Make, n8n and Google Sheets
• Works as an MCP tool, so AI agents can look up plugin data on demand
• No browser, no proxies, no personal data: fast runs and a tiny cost per result

Input

Field	Type	Default	Meaning
mode	string	search	search for a keyword search, browse for a curated listing
search	string		Keyword to search plugin names, descriptions and tags for (mode search)
browse	string	popular	popular, new, updated or featured (mode browse)
tag	string		Only plugins with this tag slug, e.g. "e-commerce"
author	string		Only plugins by this WordPress.org author username
includeDescription	boolean	false	Include the full plain-text description (larger records)
maxResults	integer	100	Cap on plugins saved. You are charged per plugin, so this caps your cost.

Example input:

{
  "mode": "search",
  "search": "seo",
  "maxResults": 30
}

Output

Sample rows from a live run:

name	version	rating	active installs
Rank Math SEO – AI SEO Tools to Dominat…	1.0.278	96	4000000
Yoast SEO – Advanced SEO with rea…	28.5	96	10000000
All in One SEO – AI SEO Plugin to Boost…	5.0.1.1	94	2000000

Full example result:

{
  "name": "Yoast SEO",
  "slug": "wordpress-seo",
  "url": "https://wordpress.org/plugins/wordpress-seo/",
  "version": "23.0",
  "author": "Team Yoast",
  "requires": "6.3",
  "tested": "6.6.2",
  "requiresPhp": "7.2.5",
  "rating": 84,
  "numRatings": 3200,
  "ratings": { "1": 100, "2": 20, "3": 40, "4": 200, "5": 2840 },
  "supportThreads": 50,
  "supportThreadsResolved": 40,
  "activeInstalls": 5000000,
  "downloaded": 400000000,
  "lastUpdated": "2026-09-01 3:00pm GMT",
  "added": "2008-08-25",
  "homepage": "https://yoast.com/wordpress/plugins/seo/",
  "shortDescription": "Improve your WordPress SEO: write better content with the Yoast SEO plugin.",
  "downloadLink": "https://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/wordpress-seo.23.0.zip",
  "tags": ["SEO", "sitemap"],
  "donateLink": "https://yoast.com/donate/",
  "icons": { "1x": "https://ps.w.org/wordpress-seo/assets/icon.svg" }
}

Field reference: name, slug, url, version, author, requires, tested, requiresPhp, rating, numRatings, ratings (object keyed 1 to 5), supportThreads, supportThreadsResolved, activeInstalls, downloaded, lastUpdated, added, homepage, shortDescription, downloadLink, tags[], donateLink, icons, and description (plain text, only when includeDescription is true).

Pricing

Pay per event. You are charged $1.00 per 1,000 plugins saved to the dataset, plus a fraction of a cent per run start. Nothing is charged for results you do not receive. Set "Max total charge per run" in the run options to cap spending on any run. When a run reaches your cap it stops cleanly and keeps everything it already saved.

Rough guide: 1,000 plugins cost $1.00 and take about 6 seconds.

Use it from an AI agent (MCP)

This Actor is available as an MCP tool through the Apify MCP server. Add it to your client, then ask the agent for the data in plain language.

Claude Desktop, Claude Code or Cursor (mcp.json / claude_desktop_config.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "apify": {
      "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?actors=brightpath-data/wordpress-plugin-directory",
      "headers": { "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN" }
    }
  }
}

ChatGPT and other clients that support remote MCP servers: add https://mcp.apify.com/?actors=brightpath-data/wordpress-plugin-directory as a connector with your Apify token.

Example prompt once connected: "Find the 20 most popular WordPress SEO plugins and list their active installs and rating."

Use it from code

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/brightpath-data~wordpress-plugin-directory/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"mode":"search","search":"seo","maxResults":30}'

Python:

from apify_client import ApifyClient
client = ApifyClient("YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("brightpath-data/wordpress-plugin-directory").call(run_input={"mode": "search", "search": "seo", "maxResults": 30})
items = client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).list_items().items

Limits and fair use

• Up to 10,000 plugins per run. For larger exports, split by tag, author or search term.
• Requests are paced at one every 300 milliseconds to stay well within the API's informal limits.
• The plugin directory does not expose personal reviewer data through this endpoint; only the plugin author's public display name is included, with markup stripped.
• includeDescription adds the long description to every record, which increases dataset size; leave it off for a leaner export.

Data source and legal

Data comes from the official WordPress.org Plugin API (api.wordpress.org/plugins/info/1.2/), the same public, unauthenticated API that WordPress itself uses for its "Add Plugins" screen. Plugin listings are public and non-personal. This Actor collects public, non-personal data only and does not bypass logins, paywalls or access controls. You are responsible for how you use the data.

Support

Found a problem or need a field added? Open an issue on the Actor's Issues tab. Fixes for broken runs are prioritized.