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Most And Least Read Posts Widget

by whiletrue on WordPress.org

Provide two widgets, showing lists of the most and reast read posts.

(6)
Sample Widget on site, plain wiew

Sample Widget on site, plain wiew

“Most And Least Read Posts Widget” is a free plugin for WordPress. developed by Giuliano Polverari (WhileTrue.it) to generate lists of the most and least read posts.

The following options are customizable:

  • number of posts to show
  • exclude posts whose title contains certain words
  • show post hits after the title (style customizable via CSS class)
  • exclude posts older than XX days

The plugin starts counting hits once activated, storing them in the “custom_total_hits” custom field without the need of external accounts.

The most popular web crawlers (e.g. Googlebot) are recognized and their hits discarded; also Admin hits are discarded.

Archived post hits are shown in a column inside the backend post list.

The plugin is compatible with multi-language WPML plugin, showing most/least read posts for current language.

Optionally, the number of hits can be shown inside the post content, with:

  • a custom phrase, e.g. “This post has already been read XX times!”
  • a custom position (above the post, below the post, both)
  • a custom CSS style

If you want to show the post hits anywhere inside the template loop, you can the PHP function provided, e.g.:

echo most_and_least_read_posts_get_hits(get_the_ID());

Shortcode

Also, [most_read_posts] a shortcode is available. Use it like this:

[most_read_posts type="most" posts_number="5" show_thumbs="false" date_from="2016-01-01" date_to="2016-04-30"]

Shortcode attributes:

  • type: “most” or “least”
  • posts_number
  • words_excluded
  • title_max_chars
  • excerpt_max_chars
  • show_thumbs: “true” or “false”
  • add_line_break_before_thumbs: “true” or “false”
  • show_hits: “true” or “false”
  • show_hits_text (default: “views”)
  • days_ago
  • date_from and date_to: if set, overwrite the “days_ago” attribute (format: YYYY-MM-DD)

Reference

For more informations: www.whiletrue.it

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Active installations1K+
Weekly downloads
96-11.11%
Version2.5.21
Last updated4/11/2025
WordPress version2.9
Tested up to6.8.1
PHP version7.0
Tags
least readmost readpopular postspostposts