Archive pages offer a more convenient means for your website visitors to browse through your website in a chronological fashion. It also increases content discoverability, user engagement levels, which ultimately leads to better SEO scores. However, default archive page functionality with WordPress is very lackluster. This is why, for the purpose of this read, we have put together a list going over the best free archive WordPress plugins.
Why Use A Top Free Archive WordPress Plugin
Even though having a proper archive page can help boost engagement levels and expose your users to more of your content, it is still not properly utilized by most webmasters. One of the main reasons behind this might be because the default archive feature has a very lackluster design and barebone functionality.
This is why we have put together a list of the best free archive WordPress plugins to help you out. Using these plugins you will be able to display your archive posts in unique ways, and it will blend seamlessly with your overall design. You can even showcase them using widgets without forcing the users to visit any dedicated page.
Also, since it’s not a big must-have feature, we have only kept it limited to free plugins. Therefore, if try out the plugins it won’t hurt your pocket but it might increase your user engagement levels and the overall SEO score.
So if all this has got you interested, here is our list of the best free archive WordPress plugins.
Best Free Archive WordPress Plugins
1. Annual Archive
Starting off our list of the best free archive WordPress plugins we have Annual Archive. It introduces additional functionalities to the default WordPress archive functionality with support for shortcodes and widgets. This means you can place the archive list almost anywhere on your WordPress website.
It can also help you list the archives on a daily, weekly, monthly or yearly basis. The plugin will group the lists for each decade and allow users to filter through them by post type.
Features:
- Support for shortcodes and widgets to showcase archive list on pages, posts, and sidebar.
- Option to list archives based on days, weeks, months, or years.
- The archive list can be grouped together. Users can filter through them based on post types.
And much more.
2. Simple Yearly Archive
Next up, we have the Simple Yearly Archive WordPress plugin. As the name implies, it lets you display your archives in a year-based list.
The plugin is designed to work flawlessly with the default WP archive, but can also display published posts separating them by the year of publication.
Features:
- Allows you to display archives in a year-based list.
- Option to restrict output to certain categories only.
- Can display post excerpt if available.
- Shows post count for each year.
And much more.
3. Easy Custom Auto Excerpt
Easy Custom Auto Excerpt isn’t specifically an archive WordPress plugin but can help you display excerpts from your posts straight on your home page, search page, or archive page.
It also comes with options that let you customize how the excerpts look. You can change the “read more” button text, add a thumbnail image, and so on. A pro version of the plugin is also available which introduces many more awesome functionalities into the mix.
Features:
- Allows you to cut/excerpt your post based on a custom character length.
- You can choose to excerpt your posts straight on the home page, search page, or archive pages.
- Option to preserve any image if present on the excerpt.
- Customize “read more” button text that comes with the excerpt.
- Access to 40+ read more button themes. (pro)
And much more.
4. Compact Archives
Compact Archives comes from WPBeginners – the popular WordPress blog. It helps you set up a unique archive display where you can showcase your monthly archive of posts in a compact form factor (instead of the default list format).
The plugin gives you various options on how you want to display the month – full month name, show the first letters, or month numbers. Once you have picked a format, you can embed it to your sidebar or footer using the provided widget.
Features:
- Allows you to create and display a monthly archive of all your posts.
- Different design options to showcase months, either with name or number.
- Compatible with Gutenberg editor.
- Widget support.
And much more.
5. Expanding Archives
As the name implies, Expanding Archives helps you add a widget to showcase your archive posts in an expandable/collapsible format. The plugin will neatly categorize all your posts into respective year and month of publication so users can expand posts from a particular month.
It comes with minimal CSS styling which allows it to easily blend in with your theme’s design. You can also add custom CSS for your customization needs.
Features:
- Allows you to show your archives in an expandable/collapsible format.
- Archive posts are organized based on the month and year of publication.
- Support for CSS styling.
- Widget support.
And much more.
6. Archive Control
Archive Control is a flexible plugin that can help you customize archive pages as well as pages with lists of your custom post types, categories, custom taxonomy terms, and tags. It even helps you add custom content before or after each list along with a featured image.
The plugin also helps set up the order and pagination for the archive page without affecting the style of your other website pages which can be really helpful while creating a custom user experience.
Features:
- Helps you customize the archive pages as well as custom post types, categories, custom taxonomy terms, and tags.
- Option to add custom content as well as a featured image before or after each list.
- Set up exclusive order and pagination style for the archive pages.
- Custom CSS and JS support giving you complete customization control.
And much more.
7. Post Type Archive Descriptions
Post Type Archive Descriptions plugin helps you create an editable description for a post type that you can display at the top of your post type archive page. It can be useful for users looking for deep customization potential over their website.
It uses the default archive description function which means it will be compatible with all your themes.
Features:
- Allows you to create and add an editable description for a post type that will be displayed at the top of the post type archive page.
And much more.
8. Collapsed Archives
And now for the final entry in our list of the best free archive WordPress plugins, we have Collapsed Archives. As you might have guessed by the name, it is a simple plugin that helps you showcase your archives inside a collapsible list.
The plugin uses widgets which you can add to your sidebar or footer. Users can click it to expand or collapse a list of all your archive posts.
Features:
- Offers a widget to help you add a collapsible archive posts list.
- Comes with a +/- button to help expand and collapse the list.
- The collapsing functionality is done using CSS only. No JS.
- Option to showcase archive links in chronological or reverse chronological order.
And much more.
In Conclusion
So these were our picks for the best free archive WordPress plugins. Do let us know if you found the read to be useful and whether it helped you find the perfect plugin to make your archive page more interesting and engaging.
Now, as we said, very few webmasters take advantage of having an archive. So if any of you experienced users have used them to boost engagement levels or website navigation, then do share your stories in the comment section. Your insights are highly appreciated and it might even help a fellow reader properly implement archive pages on their website.
That’s it! For next, you may also want to add a custom search bar in WordPress to make content more discoverable.