The Best WordPress Security Plugins To Lock Out Malicious Threats

Table of Contents

1. WordPress Security Plugins 101
2. Your #1 Priority: Secure Hosting
3. Best WordPress Security Plugins in 2023
4. Best Plugins for All-around Website Protection and Active Monitoring
5. Best To Scan for and Block Malware, Viruses, and Suspicious IPs
6. Best for Spam and Bot Prevention
7. Best for Hiding Files from Intruders
8. Best for Authentication and Login Security
9. Best for Site File Backups
10. Best Plugins for Hack Repairing
11. Best for Running Security Logs
12. Best for Activating an SSL (secure socket layer)

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The initial website investment alone is enough reason to secure your website from the start. Hacks, malware, backdoor attacks, and SEO spam are only a few of the lingering threats waiting to take advantage of your server, visitor data, and website infrastructure.

These security threats endanger future profits, customer trust, and the stability of your entire site. That’s why we made a list of the best WordPress security plugins to lock out all potential intruders.

Using these security plugins on a website is like getting insurance and installing an alarm system. This exciting new investment may require a hefty down payment, inspection fees, and mortgage. Would you not want to protect it to the best of its ability for such a high-value investment? That’s precisely what we’ll explore in this post!

WordPress Security Plugins 101

By default, WordPress core has some security measures in place. But it can constantly be improved with a reputable security plugin. Top WordPress security plugins deliver:

• Active security monitoring
• File scanning
• Malware scanning
• Blocklist monitoring
• Security hardening
• Post-hack actions
• Firewalls
• Brute force attack protection
• Notifications for when a security threat is detected

Some WordPress security plugins throw in even more futures, but the ones listed above are the standout ones.

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Your #1 Priority: Secure Hosting

The security of your site is only as good as the foundation it’s running on. That’s why it’s important, before looking into the best WordPress security plugins, that you choose a WordPress hosting platform that has security measures already in place, such as Kinsta (which provides enterprise-level security enhancements for all users).

Many of these safeguards are done at the server level and can be far more effective without harming performance on your site. You don’t have to spend time fiddling with a bunch of security settings in plugins that you might not even understand.

Here are a few security features that Kinsta offers on all WordPress-managed hosting plans.

• Kinsta detects DDoS attacks, monitors uptime, and automatically bans IPs with more than six failed login attempts in a minute.
• Only encrypted SFTP and SSH connections (no FTP) are supported when accessing your WordPress sites directly (here’s the difference between FTP and SFTP).
• Hardware firewalls and additional active and passive security measures are in place to prevent access to your data.
• Our open_basedir restrictions also don’t allow PHP execution in standard directories prone to malicious scripts.
• Kinsta uses Linux containers (LXC) on top of Google Cloud Platform (GCP), which provides complete isolation for each account and each separate WordPress site. This is a much more secure method than offered by competitors. GCP also employs data encryption at rest.
• Kinsta only runs supported versions of PHP. Unsupported PHP versions are dangerous because they no longer have security updates and are exposed to unpatched security vulnerabilities. Regular updates are your best bet.
• Kinsta provides backups for all sites on its servers, automatically creating two weeks of backups for site owners to restore if needed.
• Two-factor authentication adds another layer of security during the login process.
• All new Kinsta installations are required to generate a solid password to proceed.
• Nothing is ever 100% hack-proof, and that’s why Kinsta provides free hack fixes for all clients.

It’s important to note that many security plugins cause performance issues since they’re always running. That’s why Kinsta bans some (not all) security plugins. Kinsta also utilizes load balancers with Google Cloud Platform, which means in some cases, the IP blocking features of specific security plugins won’t work as intended.

If you’re a Kinsta client, we highly recommend utilizing a solution such as Cloudflare or Sucuri, along with Kinsta, especially if you need extra protection or help to decrease bot and/or proxy traffic. Sucuri is known for its ability to help quickly mitigate DDoS attacks. You can also configure the recommended firewall settings if using Cloudflare.

However, not every host will have as tight of security as Kinsta, and that’s when you can benefit from the best WordPress security plugins.

Keep the bad guys at bay with help from these powerful security plugins 🔒

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Best WordPress Security Plugins in 2023

If you’re in a hurry, feel free to click on the following links to test the security plugins and make your own decisions. If you’d like to see our in-depth analysis, keep reading!

ve a price tag, but a few come with limited functionality for free.

We’ll talk about the pricing, but it’s more important to understand what each plugin will do for you. Ultimately, it’s all about figuring out the best way to keep the bad guys away from your investment — sometimes, that means spending a little money.

Best Plugins for All-around Website Protection and Active Monitoring

1. Sucuri Security – Auditing, Malware Scanner and Security Hardening

The Sucuri Security plugin offers both free and paid versions, yet most websites should be fine with the free plugin. For instance, the website firewall requires you to pay for a Sucuri plan, but not every webadmin feels like they need that type of security.

As for the free features, the plugin comes with security activity auditing to see how well the plugin is protecting your website.

It has file integrity monitoring, blocklist monitoring, security notifications, and security hardening. The premium plans open up customer service channels and more frequent scans. For instance, you might want a scan completed every 12 hours.

Pricing

Sucuri offers a free plan and a 30-day moneyback guarantee if you upgrade and don’t like it.

Here are the premium plans:

• Basic Firewall: $9.99 per month
• Pro Firewall: $19.98 per month
• Basic Platform (cleanups, scans, firewall, and CDN): $199.99 per month
• Pro Platform: $299.99 per month
• Business Platform: $499.99 per month

Features That Make Sucuri Security a Great Choice:

• It offers multiple variations of SSL certificates. You have to pay for these, but they’re available in the packages.
• Customer service is available in the form of 24/7/365 chat, email, and a ticketing system.
• You receive instant notifications when something is wrong with your website.
• Advanced DDoS protection is available through some plans.
• If you don’t want to pay any money, you still receive valuable tools for blocklist monitoring, malware scanning, file integrity monitoring, and security hardening.
• The premium platform offers post-cleanup reports, SLA to remove hardware, blocklist monitoring, hack patching, and more.

Further reading: How to Set up Sucuri Firewall (WAF) on Your WordPress Site

2. iThemes Security

The iThemes Security plugin (previously known as Better WP Security) is one of the more impressive ways to protect your website, with over 30 offerings to prevent things like hacks and unwanted intruders.

It has a strong focus on recognizing plugin vulnerabilities, obsolete software, and weak passwords, making iThemes an all-encompassing security plugin for all types of WordPress sites.

Although some basic security features are included with the free version, we highly recommend upgrading to iThemes Security Pro. This provides ticketed support, one year of plugin updates, and support for two websites. If you’d like to protect more sites, you can upgrade to a more expensive plan.

As for the primary features in the pro version, iThemes Security Pro provides strong password enforcement, the locking out of bad users, database backups, and two-factor authentication.

These are only a few ways to protect your site with this WordPress security plugin. You can activate 30 full security measures, making iThemes Security Pro a great value.

Pricing

The iThemes Security Pro security suite starts at $80 per year. Pricing increases if you need to secure more sites. There’s also a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Here are the iThemes Security Pro plans:

• Blogger: $80 per year
• Freelancer: $127 per year
• Gold: $199 per year
• Plugin Suite: $499 per year

Enjoy peace of mind with our Google Cloud Firewall and hack fix guarantee. Try Kinsta for Free.

Features That Make iThemes Security a Great Choice:

• The security plugin offers file change detection, which is vital since most webadmins don’t notice when a file is messed with.
• Add an extra layer of protection to your login by using the Google reCAPTCHA integration and two-factor authentication.
• The plugin compares your WordPress core files with the current version of WordPress, helping you understand if anything malicious is placed in those files.
• Update your WordPress salts and keys to add an extra layer of complexity to your authentication keys.
• You can set an “Away Mode” for when you’re not making constant updates to your site and want to lock your WordPress dashboard from all users completely.
• Other essentials like 404 error detection, brute force protection, and strong password enforcement.
• You can ban users and prevent brute force attacks.
• The plugin offers partial website backups and the enforcement of SSL.

3. Wordfence Security

Wordfence Security is one of the most popular WordPress security plugins, and for a good reason. This gem pairs simplicity with powerful protection tools, such as the robust login security features and the security incident recovery tools. One of the main advantages of Wordfence is that you can gain insight into overall traffic trends and hack attempts.

Wordfence is one of the more impressive free security solutions, with everything from firewall blocks to protection from brute force attacks.

Pricing

There’s a free version and a premium option starting at $99 per year for one site.

The plugin creators also make it cheaper for developers, providing steep discounts when you sign up for multiple site keys. For instance, if you buy 15+ licenses, you’ll get 25% off or $74.25 per license.

It pays to consider Wordfence if you’re developing multiple websites and want to protect them all.

Here’s the entire discount structure:

• 1 site license: $99 per year
• 2-4 site licenses: $89.10 per year (10% discount)
• 5-9 site licenses: $84.15 (15% discount)
• 10-14 site licenses: $79.20 (20% discount)
• 15+ site licenses: $74.25 (25% discount)

Features That Make WordFence Security a Great Choice:

• The free version is powerful enough for smaller websites.
• Developers can save tons of money when signing up for multiple site keys.
• It has a full firewall suite with tools for country blocking, manual blocking, brute force protection, real-time threat defense, and a web application firewall.
• The scan portion of the plugin fights off malware, real-time threats, and spam. It scans all your files for malware, not just WordPress files.
• The plugin monitors live traffic by viewing things like Google crawl activity, logins and logouts, human visitors, and bots.
• You gain access to some unique tools like the option to sign in with your cell phone and audit your website.
• The comment spam filter removes the need to install a separate plugin.
• It monitors your plugins and lets you know if they have been removed from the WordPress plugin repository (usually due to being unsafe or hacked), are no longer being updated, or have been abandoned.

4. All In One WP Security & Firewall

As one of the most feature-packed free security plugins, All In One WP Security & Firewall provides an intuitive interface and decent customer support with no price tag.

This is a highly visual security plugin with graphs to explain beginner metrics like security strength and what needs to be done to make your site stronger.

The features are broken down into three categories: Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced. Therefore, you can still use the plugin if you’re a more advanced developer.

This plugin mainly works by protecting your user accounts, blocking forceful attempts on your login, and enhancing user registration security. Database and file security is also packaged into the plugin.

Pricing

Free

Features That Make All In One WP Security & Firewall a Great Choice:

• The WordPress security plugin has a blocklist tool where you can set specific requirements to block a user.
• You can backup .htaccess and .wp-config files. There’s also a tool to restore them if anything goes wrong.
• The plugin shows one graph to specify how strong your website is and another graph that points to particular problem areas of your site. It’s one of the best features for the average user to visualize what’s going on with the security of a site.
• There’s a temporary lockdown button for emergencies.
• You can export and import certain security features.
• Block other sites from displaying your site content with the use of iframes.
• You can hide website information from bots and other intruders.
• The plugin is free without any upsells along the way.

5. BulletProof Security

The BulletProof Security plugin is actively developed, updated, and seems to contain more features than most other security plugins on the market. You receive features for quarantines, email alerting, anti-spam, auto-restore, and more.

It works rather well as an all-around WordPress security plugin, especially considering it handles database backups and login security.

We suggest you try out the free plugin first since it offers the following tools:

• Login security and monitoring.
• Database backups and restoring.
• MScan Malware Scanner.
• Anti-spam and anti-hacking tools.
• A security log.
• Hidden plugin folders.
• Maintenance mode.
• A complete setup wizard.

It’s not the most beginner-friendly WordPress security plugin. Still, it does the job for advanced developers who want to take advantage of unique settings and features like the anti-exploit guard and the FTP file locking. It also has a setup wizard auto-fix feature to help make it a little easier.

Pricing

BulletProof Security has both a free and premium version. The paid option sells for a one-time payment of $69.95 and provides a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Features That Make BulletProof Security a Great Choice:

• It has some unique advanced security tools on the market, with features like BPS Pro ARQ Intrusion Detection and Prevention System (ARQ IDPS) encrypting solutions and scheduled cron cURL scans, folder locking, and more.
• The free version is packed with enough features for the average website.
• The database backups are provided in the free version.
• You can hide individual plugin folders.
• The maintenance mode functionality is not something you would find in most other security plugins.
• The security and HTTP error logging keeps an eye on vulnerabilities.
• The plugin forces you to make strong passwords.
• You receive reminders when a theme or plugin update is available.