Custom Related Posts

78 Quality Score

Active Installs

16/30

With only 3,000 active installs, this is a niche plugin, but it exceeds the baseline for its category, giving it a strong relative score.

Update Freshness

25/25

Updated May 2026 and tested against WordPress 7.0, the maintenance signal is excellent and suggests an actively maintained codebase.

User Rating

15/15

A 98 out of 100 across 46 ratings is a strong indicator of user satisfaction, even with a modest sample size.

Support Health

8/15

Zero support threads opened is either a sign of a frictionless plugin or low adoption making it hard to judge; the score reflects the absence of evidence either way.

WP Compatibility

15/15

Compatibility is a perfect 100, with a minimum WordPress requirement of 3.5 and verified testing on 7.0, covering an unusually wide range.

Scores higher than 62% of indexed plugins

About

Manual related posts without slowing down your website!

Active Installs 3k+

Rating ★★★★½ 4.9/5

Last Updated 2026-08-19 9:33am GMT

Requires WordPress 3.5+

Tested Up To 7.1

Security History

3 known vulnerabilities, all patched

3 Medium

Most recent: December 25, 2025

View details ▸

What It Does

Custom Related Posts lets you hand-pick which articles, products, or pages appear in a related posts section beneath each entry. Instead of relying on an algorithm to guess related content, the editor chooses exactly what gets shown, then displays it via shortcode or widget. This avoids extra database queries that automated related-posts plugins tend to generate.

Who It's For

This plugin is best for site owners who want complete editorial control over cross-linking, such as publishers, course creators, and agencies managing curated content where automatic suggestions would be inappropriate or inaccurate. It suits sites with a manageable post volume where manual selection stays sustainable.

Who Should Skip It

If you run a large site with hundreds of new posts per month, the manual curation workflow will become a maintenance burden, and an algorithmic solution would save time. Sites that do not care which related posts appear can also skip this entirely and accept the defaults from their theme.

The Bottom Line

Custom Related Posts delivers exactly what it promises: a fast, lightweight way to manually curate related content without slowing your database. Its tiny install base and lack of support threads mean there is limited community knowledge to lean on if something breaks. For editors who value precision over automation, this is a sensible pick, but high-volume sites should look elsewhere.

Related Plugins

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Pick this instead if you want to display Google Reviews rather than manual related posts, as it focuses on social proof widgets.

Rich Showcase for Google Reviews 90/100

Choose this if your goal is showcasing reviews with rich layouts, not curating post relationships.

WP Popular Posts 89/100

Pick this if you would rather automate related content using view counts and algorithmic matching instead of selecting by hand.

Blocksy Companion 86/100

Choose this if you use the Blocksy theme and want broader companion features beyond manual related posts.

Black Studio TinyMCE Widget 86/100

Pick this if your main need is restoring the classic visual editor widget, not managing related content.