6 Best WordPress Security Plugins, Compared

18 and a half million websites are infected with malware and breached by hackers every week, and the average website can come under attack up to 44 times a day! Whether a WordPress or non-WordPress site, securing your website should always be a top priority. A hacked website can have extremely severe consequences. Our top 6 WordPress plugins will hopefully help you secure your website and improve your website’s ability to fend off attacks.

Building a robust website requires a balanced suite of tools to handle everything from performance to backups. While selecting the right defensive tools is paramount for keeping hackers at bay, making sure you have mapped out the broader 10 essential plugins for your WordPress site will give your platform a well-rounded operational foundation.

So, let’s have a look! 

1: Sucuri 

Sucuri is probably the industry leader in WordPress Plugin security. Sucuri offers a free plan which gives a basic protection plan and puts up preliminary walls against online hackers and potential malware by scanning for common threats. However, their paid plans come with top-of-the-line firewalls and filters, able to block more complex hacks and the clever malware that is out there in the world today. Jessie Evans, a business writer at 1Day2Write and Write My X, noted that, “As well as bulking up security, Sucuri’s plug-in actually enhances website performance and overall speed. In addition to this, Sucuri’s paid plans include cleaning if your website is ever affected by malware.” 

2: WordFence 

WordFence is also a popular option for both WordPress and other sites. Similar to Sucuri, they offer a free plug-in that contains many helpful preliminary features to get you started. These free versions give you a good idea of how the plug-in works before potentially upgrading to a paid plan. The paid version comes with enhanced features and alerts if there is any breach alongside instructions to fix the breach. Though WordFence does come with a firewall, it is not as effective in protecting from malware as Sucuri’s.

Relying strictly on an automated plugin to protect your asset isn’t a silver bullet; security requires proactive digital hygiene across your entire stack. Merging your plugin settings with foundational best practices on how to protect your website from cyber attacks
ensures that weak passwords or unpatched themes don’t bypass your firewall. Combining these configurations with the 5 best ways to ensure your website is hack-proof will build an impenetrable perimeter for your brand.

3: iThemes Security 

iThemes Security probably stakes its popularity mostly on its user-friendly interface and ease of use for those not well-versed in plug-in technology. However, its user-friendly nature lacks the integrity and strength of our more complicated options for plug-ins, such as Sucuri. It includes basic integrity checks, security checks, and login limits; but does not have a website firewall or its own malware scanner. 

4: All in One WordPress Security 

All in One WordPress Security plugin is one of the most powerful options available in WordPress plug-ins. Its system contains an advanced level of security auditing, monitoring, and a top-notch firewall plugin. All in One contains an impressive basic firewall and blocking software for detected potential threats. 

5: Anti-Malware Security 

Anti-Malware Security is another useful WordPress anti-malware and security plugin. Its effective malware scanner allows an easy scan of all files and data on and around your site to scan for malicious attacks. Rachel Terry, a web developer at Britstudent and NextCoursework, commented that “Anti-Malware Security’s plugin offers a free account on their plugin’s website, allowing access to the latest software available; and gives you the option to adopt some of their premium features like brute force prevention.” The only major downside of this option is its over-effectiveness in scanning for threats often means that a large number of false positives are encountered when scans are done.

Many top-tier security plugins offer deep, application-level scanning to detect malicious code patterns injected into your database. However, if you want a server-level security guard that proactively patches vulnerabilities and blocks scrapers before they even hit your application layer, getting a malware attack report on your website with SiteLock provides a powerful external shield that works hand-in-hand with your dashboard tools.

6: WPScan Security 

WPScan is a well-known and standout WordPress security plugin due to its manually curated WordPress vulnerability database, which is constantly updated with the newest technology and improvements, in order to keep it from becoming stale or obsolete. As a WPScan Security customer, you are able to schedule daily checks and scans; getting immediate email notification of the results as soon as it is complete. 

Any security breach on your WordPress website has the potential to cause serious and potentially lasting damage to both you and your business. Hackers and the malware that they plant can steal confidential data from you, your website, and your users. A compromised website can not only affect your website’s operation but also decrease your customer’s faith in you, and the likelihood of potential partners and investors trusting your website. You could have data stolen or even lose it completely; get locked out of your website, or have data held hostage or used as blackmail in the worst-case scenario. To avoid being hacked, you need to follow security best practices to protect your website. Hopefully, our top 6 options for effective website security plug-ins will give you and your website a leg up!

Installing a defensive plugin today ensures you are actively monitoring your files against future vulnerabilities. If you are reading this comparison because you suspect your data has already been compromised by an active exploit, step back from plugin setup and immediately follow our crisis manual on what to do if your WordPress site gets hacked to clean your code and regain administrative control.