Are you looking for the best WordPress news plugins?
If you run a news site or any other website, then you can use a plugin to display your news articles, add social sharing buttons, or newsletter signup forms. This can help promote your site to different audiences and increase website traffic.
In this article, we will show you the best WordPress news plugins on the market.
Note: In this article, we will be reviewing WordPress news plugins. If you are looking for a newsletter plugin instead, then please see our guide to the best WordPress newsletter plugins.
Why Use News Plugins on Your WordPress Site?
If you have just started a newspaper website, then you can use a WordPress news plugin to display news articles. Other types of blogs and business websites can also use news plugins in many ways.
Some of the most common features of different news plugins include:
- News Importer: You can use these plugins to import and showcase news from different sources, including RSS feeds, social media, and other websites.
- News Ticker: Create news tickers that act as scrollers and inform users about your site’s popular and new posts, adding a more professional touch.
- Newsletters: Allow users to sign up for your newsletter so you can share your latest content and updates with them.
- Social Sharing Buttons: Add social sharing buttons to your posts so that readers can share your new content across the web.
- SEO: Optimize your content for Google News and other search engines to increase website rankings.
Having said that, let’s take a look at the best WordPress news plugins on the market. We have reviewed plugins for all kinds of different use cases so you can find the tool that best fits your needs.
1. All-in-One SEO (For News SEO)
All in One SEO for WordPress (AIOSEO) is the best WordPress SEO plugin on the market that comes with a Google News Sitemaps extension.
This addon helps Google discover and index your news content, making it more likely to rank higher in Google News.
With AIOSEO, you can easily submit a custom news post type to Google News without needing to write a single line of code. For detailed instructions, you can see our tutorial on how to submit your WordPress site to Google News.
Other than that, AIOSEO also comes with a schema markup feature that automatically adds structured data markup to your news articles, leading to better search results and click-through rates.
The plugin even lets you create dedicated news post types and customizes how your articles are indexed, including setting the publication date, author information, and other relevant details.
AIOSEO also comes with a headline analyzer tool that can help you write catchy and attractive headings for your news articles.
Pros
- AIOSEO has a free plan.
- It optimizes your articles for social media by adding social sharing buttons and meta descriptions for social media platforms.
- It sends you notifications once your articles are picked up by Google News.
- AIOSEO can dramatically increase your news site’s rankings in Google News and attract more traffic.
- Its other features include an FAQs block, XML sitemaps, link assistant, on-page SEO analysis, rich snippets, keyword rank tracking, and more.
Cons
- Some of the more advanced features of the plugin can only be unlocked in the paid plan.
Why we recommend AIOSEO: Overall, AIOSEO is the best WordPress news plugin because it lets you easily submit your website to Google News. This helps improve your website rankings and reach different audiences, which can increase your traffic.
Other than that, AIOSEO also optimizes your articles for social media, lets you add schema markup, and helps you write attractive headlines for your content.
For more details, just see our complete AIOSEO review.
2. OptinMonster (For Newsletter Subscription Popups)
OptinMonster is the best WordPress lead generation and conversion optimization tool that can be used to convert visitors into subscribers and share news with your users.
It comes with a drag-and-drop builder and numerous premade templates that you can use to make newsletter subscription popups, banners, floating bars, slide-ins, and more.
You can also add social sharing buttons and information about your latest articles in the popups to intrigue visitors and encourage them to sign up for your newsletter.
Other than that, OptinMonster can be used to create optin forms that capture user data, gamified spin the wheels, and much more.
Pros
- OptinMonster has powerful targeting features that allow you to target your popups to specific sections or visitors based on their behavior, location, and device.
- It offers conditional logic that you can use to showcase your newsletter signup popups or banners on a specific post or page.
- It has A/B testing and exit intent technology to catch abandoning visitors.
- OptinMonster can easily integrate with powerful email marketing services like Constant Contact or Brevo. This can help you launch email campaigns to promote your website.
- It has detailed analytics and reporting to track the performance of your popups.
Cons
- OptinMonster is a premium software. However, its connecting plugin is free.
Why we recommend OptinMonster: We recommend this tool if you want to launch a marketing campaign to capture email addresses for your newsletters. OptinMonster can help build you an email list in no time and improve site engagement.
Plus, you can also use OptinMonster’s popups and banners to showcase the latest content on your website.
For details, please see our complete OptinMonster review.
3. Feedzy (For Fetching Content From RSS Feeds)
Feedzy is a popular RSS feed plugin that lets you fetch content from different RSS feeds and display them on your website.
With this plugin, you can collect fresh news content from unlimited RSS feeds via bulk import. Once you do that, the plugin will convert the data into WordPress posts, pages, and custom post types.
You can then edit the content, add or remove feature images, and then publish the news articles on your WordPress blog. You are also able to add social sharing buttons to these blog posts so that users can share the content with their followers.
Pros
- With Feedzy, you can create a news ticker that scrolls across your website and provides the latest news to users.
- The plugin can be used to create a newsletter signup form.
- Feedzy can aggregate RSS feeds from a variety of sources and uses shortcodes to add feeds to posts or pages.
- It sends you an email notification when new articles are published by one of the websites that you have subscribed to.
Cons
- Feedzy relies on RSS feeds to collect content, restricting the range of news sources you can aggregate.
- Its free plan has limited features.
- Feedzy cannot handle dynamic content like live updates or real-time data feeds effectively.
Why we recommend Feedzy: If you want to add news content to your site using RSS feeds from other sources, then Feedzy is the best choice. It also lets you add newsletter signup forms and a news ticker to show the latest news to your site visitors.
4. Ditty (For News Tickers)
Ditty is a free WordPress plugin that displays news tickers on your website’s front end.
With this plugin, you can create sliders, grids, and news tickers that showcase your news articles or custom text.
Additionally, Ditty also offers premium extensions that you can use to showcase news pieces from RSS feeds, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and more.
Pros
- The plugin offers customization options for news tickers, and you can also use HTML or CSS for further styling.
- It is compatible with most website builders, including Elementor, Divi, and Beaver Builder.
- Ditty lets you mix and match different types of content within your grids, sliders, and news tickers. This means you can show your news articles, RSS feeds, and social media posts within the same news ticker.
- The plugin is optimized for SEO.
Cons
- Ditty offers limited control over RSS feeds.
- It provides basic analytics for content views and clicks but doesn’t offer in-depth analytics and reporting like some of the other plugins on this list.
- Ditty’s sliders, grids, and news tickers are not always mobile-responsive.
Why we recommend Ditty: Ditty is the ideal plugin if you are looking to add tickers and sliders that tell users about the latest news on your WordPress site.
5. PushEngage (For Sharing News)
PushEngage is the best web push notification software on the market. You can use it to notify your users about the latest news or content on your website.
For instance, whenever you have a new piece of content or an announcement, you can send a push notification to bring users back to your website. This can help drive more website traffic and increase engagement.
PushEngage can also automatically generate push notifications from your RSS feeds, ensuring your subscribers are always up-to-date on the most recent news.
Pros
- The software lets you create targeted push notifications based on user interest, location, device, and browsing behavior.
- It lets you create automated notifications like welcome notifications or article publication notifications.
- You can add images, videos, and CTAs to the push notifications.
- Some of PushEngage’s other features include A/B testing, detailed analytics, user segmentation, drip campaigns, and more.
Cons
- PushEngage’s free plan offers limited features.
- PushEngage does not optimize your news articles for SEO.
Why we recommend PushEngage: If you want to send a notification to your users and share the latest news from your website with them, then PushEngage is the ideal choice.
For details, see our PushEngage review.
6. PublishPress (For Managing the Editorial Workflow)
PublishPress is a suite of WordPress plugins that help manage the editorial workflow of your news website.
The plugin lets you create custom post types for news articles, categories, and tags and comes with an editorial calendar to provide an overview of the publishing schedule.
If you have multiple authors on your news site, then you can also use PublishPress for access control, media library permissions, navigation menu restrictions, and to hide admin area menu tabs.
Pros
- You can create reusable content templates, schedule your news articles to be automatically published, and track your content performance with the plugin.
- It lets you manage multiple WordPress sites from the same dashboard.
- PublishPress Series lets you create magazines and newsletters with multiple articles and also groups similar content to create a series.
- Its widget lets you display a series of news articles together.
Cons
- The advanced features of the plugin are only in the paid plan.
- PublishPress does not let you create a news ticker or newsletter form.
Why we recommend PublishPress: We recommend using this plugin to manage the editorial workflow of your news website. It comes with a content calendar, widgets for displaying news articles, and lets you schedule your posts to be published automatically.
7. TopNewsWP (For News Tickers and RSS Feeds)
TopNewsWP is a free WordPress plugin that allows you to display news from multiple sources, including 128 popular news websites and 54 countries.
Other than that, it also lets you create and manage your news articles and display your news as a grid, list, or news ticker.
TopNewsWP also offers other features like zooming in on news images, controlling the news title length, and displaying sources for each news article.
Pros
- It can be used as a widget to display news in the sidebar.
- TopNewsWP has an easy-to-use interface, making it a great choice for beginners.
- The plugin is fully mobile responsive.
Cons
- It has limited support for internal news management.
- TopNewWP lacks advanced features like analytics and reporting, newsletter forms, and more.
- It offers limited support.
Why we recommend TopNewsWP: It is a great plugin if you have just started your news site and are on a tight budget. This is because the plugin is super easy to use, lets you add a news ticker, and is completely free.
8. MonsterInsights (For Displaying Popular Posts)
MonsterInsights is the best analytics solution for WordPress that also comes with a Popular Posts widget.
This widget automatically displays your most popular posts based on page views or social shares, allowing you to place your most successful news pieces all over your website.
You can also customize the layout, background color, title color, and theme for the widget according to your liking.
Other than that, you can use MonsterInsights to identify top-performing content, track emerging trends and breaking news stories, understand audience preferences, and much more.
Pros
- You can include blog posts from specific post types or categories in the widget.
- MonsterInsights is the best analytics solution that gives you instant visibility into your website traffic, including page views, visitors, and top referrers.
- It has an SEO addon that tracks keyword rankings, organic traffic, and other SEO-related metrics to improve your search engine rankings.
Cons
- Some of the advanced features can only be unlocked in the paid plan.
- It does not let you create custom post types for news or create news tickers.
Why we recommend MonsterInsights: MonsterInsights is the perfect tool if you want to display your most popular news pieces on your website.
It also helps you understand user preferences and focus on creating news content that your audience will be interested in. Plus, the tool also runs analytics on real-time user engagement and search patterns to help you make sure that your news site is covering the most relevant and timely issues.
Which Is the Best WordPress News Plugin?
In our expert opinion, All in One SEO is the best WordPress news plugin because it allows you to easily create Google News sitemaps.
The plugin helps Google index your news content to increase search engine rankings, add schema for news, write attractive headings and meta descriptions, and optimize your news articles for social media.
However, if you want to launch a marketing campaign, create a newsletter, and build an email list for your news site, then OptinMonster is the ideal solution.
Similarly, to fetch content from the RSS feeds of other news sites, Feedzy should be your go-to plugin.
You can also add news tickers with Ditty and manage your news site’s editorial workflow with PublishPress.
Frequently Asked Questions About News Plugins
Here is a list of some questions frequently asked by our readers about news websites and plugins:
Is WordPress good for news websites?
Yes, WordPress is a good choice for news websites. It is the best website builder on the market used by over 43% of the websites on the internet. It is free, easy to use, versatile, and customizable, making it the best choice for a news publication.
Note: There are two types of WordPress: WordPress.com which is a self-hosted platform, while WordPress.org is open-source. We recommend using WordPress.org for your news site.
For details, you may want to see our comparison between WordPress.com vs. WordPress.org.
What should I look for in a WordPress news plugin?
Here are some of the features that you should look for when choosing a news plugin:
- News Importer: A plugin should have a news importer that allows you to import news pieces from different sources, including RSS feeds, social media, and other websites.
- News Ticker: It should let you display the latest news content on your site in a news ticker.
- SEO: The plugin should be able to optimize your news content for SEO to improve search engine rankings.
Other than that, you should also look at the plugin pricing, ease of use, newsletter forms, and customizable layouts before making a decision.
Best WordPress Guides for News Websites
- How to Add a Scrolling News Ticker in WordPress
- Best News Aggregator Websites (+ How to Build Your Own)
- How to Allow Users to Submit News / Posts to Your WordPress Site
- Best WordPress Magazine Themes [FREE + PAID]
- How to Add Your WordPress Blog to Apple News
- Best WordPress Newsletter Plugins (Easy to Use + Powerful)
- Best Related Posts Plugins for WordPress (Compared)
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The post 8 Best WordPress News Plugins (Expert Pick) first appeared on WPBeginner.