As part of the on going analysis of the top websites in the world we are looking here at the two most talked about WordPress Search Engine Optimization plugins.
All in One SEO is the number 1 most downloaded Search Engine Optimization plugin for WordPress, while the upcoming WordPress SEO by Yoast, is perhaps the one with the most buzz. So lets see how they stand up when it comes to numbers.
Examining the download counts
Total Downloads
11,288,958
1,549,831
Downloads for the past week
99,083
72,935
Current rating from WordPress.org
4.7 1751 votes
3.7 1249 votes
These download stats show the popularity of both plugins, All in one SEO has been around for over 5 years, while WordPress SEO is a bit over 1 year old – so this makes the total downloads difficult to compare. Looking at the downloads per week therefore makes more sense, and we can see that WordPress SEO is definitely catching up. One thing to note is that Yoast released a new version just over a week ago; this would have produced a jump in the downloads for the week.
Lets try and get some more definitive data.
Total sites of each Plugin in the Top 1 Million Websites
56,512
14,178
AISEO popularity over the past 5 years has it well and truly entrenched in the top websites. Revisiting these total numbers in 12 months; will be an interesting exercise.
Ok – now lets go further and break down the top 1 million into 100K chunks
Total plugin installs per 100K top websites
This chart shows the total of each plugin within each 100K block of sites from the top 1 million.
There seems to be a slight trend up the top end of the sites. How about if we break it down and show the distribution of the sites by percentage of total installs within the top 1 million.
Percentage of installs against all installs of the plugin for the top 1 million
Looking at these numbers there does appear to be a small trend towards more of the Yoast plugin enabled sites being in the higher trafficked sites. This is not overwhelming and the reasons are likely varied.
I propose that possible explanations for the trend:
1. WordPress SEO is used by audiences who are more focused in their SEO and therefore are achieving higher traffic levels.
2. You can install AIOSEO and leave it to work, while Yoast’s plugin encourages tuning; perhaps this has improved the rankings of those sites.
3. Or maybe it is just works more effectively.
Conclusion
So in conclusion it appears as WordPress SEO is making in roads and even showing signs of a deeper presence at the top end trafficked websites; even though All in One SEO still has the lion’s share of the WordPress Search Optimization install base. However it is a good thing to keep in mind that while a plugin will provide some level of improvements to search engine ranking. Good content and a quality site are what you should focus on; especially when it comes to a site that will be viable in the long term.
So what do you use? Could I have done the statistical analysis in a better way? I am no statistics expert after all, I am far better at breaking into websites. 
