{"id":128961,"date":"2022-04-18T10:23:45","date_gmt":"2022-04-18T15:23:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wpengine.com\/?p=128961"},"modified":"2025-05-14T13:33:24","modified_gmt":"2025-05-14T18:33:24","slug":"yet-another-related-posts-plugin-now-supported-wp-engine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wpengine.com\/case-studies\/yet-another-related-posts-plugin-now-supported-wp-engine\/","title":{"rendered":"YARPP\u2014Yet Another Related Posts Plugin\u2014Now Supported On WP Engine"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WP Engine is thrilled to announce that after outstanding performance optimizations to the YARPP\u2014Yet Another Related Posts Plugin<\/a>, it has officially been removed from our disallowed plugins list<\/a> and is now available for use by all WP Engine customers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Plugins remain <\/strong>one of WordPress\u2019 most widely-used features, and for good reason. With nearly 60,000 free plugins to choose from in the WordPress plugin repository<\/a> alone, plugins make it possible for you to extend your WordPress site with just about any type of functionality imaginable. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

YARPP is a great example of this extended functionality, offering users a highly customizable, performant, and feature-rich framework for improving customer engagement and data collection abilities. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Using a customizable algorithm, the plugin scans post titles, content, tags, categories, and custom taxonomies to find the most relevant, related content across your site, making it readily available to your visitors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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YARPP is a WordPress plugin that pulls the most relevant, related content from across your site to keep visitors engaged<\/em>
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The plugin is widely used and extremely popular, with hundreds of five-star reviews on WordPress.org<\/a>, and it\u2019s seeing an uptick in downloads as an increasing number of site owners look to the plugin as a great way to boost engagement, time on site, and additional SEO metrics. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A recent user review for YARPP left on <\/em>wordpress.org<\/em><\/a>
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As noted above, YARPP is also now fully available to use with WP Engine customer sites, as our list of disallowed plugins was recently updated to reflect impressive optimizations the YARPP team has made to the plugin. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While we encourage customers to tap into the expansive library<\/a> of WordPress plugins, WP Engine also maintains a list of plugins<\/a> that are disallowed on our platform to better ensure the security and overall performance of our customers\u2019 sites\u2014and to prevent customers from installing plugins that may be harmful to performance or might conflict with our platform optimizations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Removing YARPP From the Disallowed List<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

YARPP was initially launched in 2007, and after many years of use, the plugin was briefly delisted from the WordPress repository in 2019 due to an issue with email addresses<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That issue was soon resolved with YARPP version 4.5, which was released after the plugin was purchased by Jay Meattle and a team of dedicated developers with deep expertise in content recommendations and 10+ years of experience developing popular plugins used by over 100,000 websites.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to being delisted from the plugin repository at that time, YARPP was also included on the list of disallowed plugins for WP Engine customer sites due to the plugin\u2019s previous, resource-heavy configurations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Outside of YARPP, Meattle and his team have been long-time WP Engine partners through their work managing and maintaining Shareaholic<\/a>, a WP Engine<\/a>-recommended solution that provides social share buttons, related posts, and analytics functionality alongside a suite of advanced audience growth and engagement tools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To bring YARRP up to speed, and ensure it was removed from WP Engine\u2019s disallowed list, Meattle and his team made numerous improvements to documentation and support as well as major investments in the plugin\u2019s features, code modernization, and performance capabilities, ensuring it would benefit a wider audience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhile we had focused on getting YARPP relisted on WordPress.org as the first order of business, ensuring WP Engine users could also benefit from the plugin was another top priority,\u201d Meattle said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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 As seen on <\/em>starwars.com<\/em><\/a>, YARPP is a popular plugin that is widely used to display related content under the current article or page a visitor is viewing<\/em> <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Optimizing for Performance and Efficiency <\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

While earlier versions of the plugin relied on more database-intensive processes that could have impacted site performance, Meattle and his team focused on updating those processes as well, ultimately creating a new, advanced inbuilt caching system to provide plugin users with a more scalable experience.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

With that work complete, Meattle notified WP Engine, and security and dev teams on the WP Engine side reviewed documentation and performed necessary testing to ensure optimal compatibility before clearing the plugin for customer use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur laser-focus on fixing YARPP\u2019s resource-intensive processes has resulted in more efficient and faster database queries\u2014according to our own tests and WP Engine\u2019s tests of the plugin,\u201d Meattle said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLong gone are the days when YARPP was a resource-heavy plugin. Today, YARPP works well on large sites, and it\u2019s become even more effective at surfacing relevant results.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to working on the plugin itself, Meattle and his team provide outstanding, ongoing user support, which includes deep experience serving the needs of enterprises.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now that YARPP has been officially removed from the disallowed list, existing YARPP users can easily migrate to WP Engine without losing access to the plugin or their preferred settings. And, current WP Engine customers can download the plugin and start using it today! Check out the section below to get started.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Start Using YARPP Today<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Ready to take YARPP for a spin? You can download<\/a> and install the plugin right now for a closer look at all the great features this plugin includes. Use this helpful guide<\/a> for a step-by-step walkthrough of plugin installation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once YARPP is installed and running on your site, you can configure the plugin to match your preferences. Here are a few of the most popular options YARPP makes available: <\/p>\n\n\n\n