Guest Author

77 Quality Score

Active Installs

17/30

With roughly 5,000 active installs the user base is small, well below the 90,000-install alternatives in the same space, which limits the breadth of community feedback.

Update Freshness

25/25

The plugin was updated on 2026-05-05 and is tested against WordPress 7.0, signalling an actively maintained codebase that keeps pace with core releases.

User Rating

13/15

The 84 out of 100 rating from 14 reviewers is strong, but the small sample size means the score carries less statistical weight than plugins with hundreds of reviews.

Support Health

8/15

There are zero support threads and zero resolutions, so the author has not yet had to demonstrate responsiveness on the WordPress.org forums.

WP Compatibility

15/15

It requires only WordPress 4.6 and PHP 5.2.4, making it compatible with virtually every modern hosting environment and tested against the latest 7.0 release.

Scores higher than 53% of indexed plugins

About

Add a guest author to any post without needing to register the guest author as a user on your site.

Active Installs 5k+

Rating ★★★★ 4.2/5

Last Updated 2026-08-16 1:26pm GMT

Requires WordPress 4.6+

Tested Up To 7.1

Requires PHP 5.2.4+

Security History

2 known vulnerabilities, all patched

2 Medium

Most recent: December 4, 2023

View details ▸

What It Does

Guest Author lets you credit a non-registered writer on any post by attaching a guest author profile with name, bio, and avatar, bypassing the need to create a full WordPress user account. It adds a custom meta box to the post editor where you input and manage guest author details, then displays that byline on the front end.

Who It's For

This plugin is a fit for multi-author blogs, magazines, content agencies, and podcast sites that regularly publish posts written by people outside their registered contributor list. It works well for editorial teams that want clean author archives and bylines for interviewees, guest lecturers, or freelance writers without cluttering the user database.

Who Should Skip It

If you only occasionally publish a guest post or already have a dedicated user role for external contributors, the extra meta box adds friction you do not need. Sites that require guest authors to log in, submit revisions, or be tracked in the WordPress user system should look at a full membership or co-author solution instead.

The Bottom Line

Guest Author delivers a focused, lightweight solution for attributing posts to writers who are not WordPress users, with strong maintenance and a solid rating from a small reviewer pool. The biggest caveat is the zero support thread history, so buyers should be comfortable working with the plugin's existing documentation rather than relying on forum responses. Overall Quality Score: 76.67/100.

Related Plugins

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User Submitted Posts 80/100

Pick this when guest contributors should submit posts from the front end instead of being credited via the editor.

Molongui Authorship 80/100

Choose this for a fuller guest author and co-author ecosystem that includes byline, archive pages, and author boxes out of the box.

WP Custom Author URL 79/100

Pick this when you only need to redirect the author archive link and not manage a separate guest author profile.