Jetpack vs Wordfence: The Winner After 30 Days of Testing 

Jetpack packages backups, security, growth and speed in one handy-dandy plugin. Plus, it has the cachet of being from the Automattic stable, so it obviously carries weight in the WordPress domain.

Our other contender is Wordfence, arguably one of the most popular security plugins today. They are known for their take-no-prisoners approach to security, and the terrific security resources they develop consistently. 

For this article, we tested both plugins extensively to get the security scoop. If you are looking for an objective assessment of their abilities, you’ve come to the right place.

TL;DR: Regardless of its WordPress pedigree, Jetpack lost out in this pitched battle. Wordfence is a great free security plugin, with some downsides, but still a better option to Jetpack. However, if we had to recommend a security plugin that really protects WordPress sites that would be MalCare. With a sophisticated scanner, automatic malware cleaner and an advanced firewall, it is impossible to beat.

Summary of Jetpack vs Wordfence comparison

If you were wondering, Jetpack vs Wordfence: which to pick? Choose Wordfence. It is orders of magnitude better as a security plugin. 

We like Jetpack’s all-in-one approach to WordPress administration, but it really takes a beating on the security front, especially when compared to Wordfence. That doesn’t mean that Wordfence doesn’t have its own problems; just that it is contextually better than Jetpack.

Ultimately, neither Jetpack nor Wordfence are the best option for your website’s security. We will go into more detail later in the article, but if you want to cut to the chase, install the best-in-class security plugin: MalCare. 

Jetpack in a nutshell

Jetpack has evolved from a multipurpose plugin into a more focused security suite for WordPress, but it still struggles to compete with dedicated security tools. While it now offers a basic Web Application Firewall (WAF) and automated malware fixes, these features often lack the technical depth required for complex infections.

When assessing any security plugin, we prioritise three factors: the malware scanner, the malware cleaner, and the firewall. In our previous tests, Jetpack failed two out of three.

It has since addressed these gaps by adding a cloud-based WAF and a one-click malware fix. However, our testing shows these are often thin layers of protection. The firewall is effective at blocking known bad IP addresses, but it is not a robust defence against sophisticated, targeted attacks.

In our environment, the malware scanner caught approximately 30% of infected files. This is an improvement from earlier versions but still lags behind Wordfence and MalCare.

Jetpack’s vulnerability detection now leverages the WPScan database, which is a reliable industry standard. However, it still occasionally misses obscure vulnerabilities in niche or premium plugins that have small user bases.

The malware fix is primarily a file-replacement tool. While this works for core WordPress files, it cannot surgically clean malicious injections within your database tables. If your site has database-level malware, Jetpack’s only solution is to restore a backup. This can lead to significant data loss, such as losing recent WooCommerce orders or new comments, because a full restore rolls the entire site back to a previous state.

Jetpack does have some redeeming qualities. Its activity log remains one of the most user-friendly on the market, avoiding the technical jargon that plagues other plugins. The integrated backup feature is also a critical safety net. However, the requirement to keep the legacy XML-RPC protocol active for these cloud features remains a security trade-off that many administrators are unwilling to make.

On the whole, Jetpack is a below-average security plugin. We would have expected a lot more, considering the huge price tag, but it still isn’t the bottom of the barrel for us. That dubious honour goes to the Solid Security plugin.

Wordfence in a nutshell

After MalCare, Wordfence is the best free security plugin we have tested. If you have zero budget for website security, Wordfence will give you the best website security. The scanner detects most file-based malware, and the automatic repair will get rid of most of it. The firewall is one of the most updated ones available, but if you opt for the free version, you should be aware that it doesn’t receive real-time updates. Wordfence has a malware removal service too, but it is expensive. 

We left Wordfence for the last in our testing series, because we were super excited to try out the acknowledged heavyweight of WordPress security plugins. Except for MalCare, the other plugins were disappointing at best, horrifying at worst. 

Wordfence’s scanner detected all the file-based malware in the WordPress core files, the website root, and in the plugin and theme files and folders. On the surface, this may look like a great scanner, and in many ways, it is definitely above-average. However, Wordfence failed to detect malware that was squirrelled away in premium plugins and themes, and in some cases, in the database as well. 

The major downside of the scanner, apart from the fact that it can’t check every nook and cranny of your website, is that our websites took a performance hit. Wordfence uses server resources to do anything on the website. That’s not good. 

At this point, Wordfence is still better than all the other security plugins we tested. Our opinion went up several notches when we tried the automatic repair feature, and it removed all the malware that it detected. Of course, it wasn’t able to remove the malware it didn’t detect, but the automatic malware removal is much quicker than waiting for a security expert to clean the website. Again, this is way better than the other plugins we tested, except for MalCare. 

Lastly, we tried out the firewall, which was effective at blocking several exploits, like SQL injection, XSS attacks, and remote code injections.

Wordfence is a great free security plugin, but it is prone to false positives and sending alerts for every tiny thing the firewall blocks. After a few days, we couldn’t find the signal because of all the noise. Frankly, too many alerts are just as bad as no alerts, because they lead to the same outcome: no action. 

Once we checked the 3 major security features, we tried out the two-factor authentication and brute force protection. Both work really well. Wordfence also detected all the vulnerabilities on our websites, even one in an obscure plugin that most of the other plugins failed to detect. 

What we absolutely loved about Wordfence was the great user experience. No unnecessary, terrifying jargon and complex security terms on the dashboard. Simple language, with clear recommendations for newbie admins. 

We were surprised that Wordfence doesn’t have an activity log, except for a raw log evidently intended for Wordfence developers. It also doesn’t protect websites from bad bots, which is strange. 

In summary, Wordfence is highly recommended for websites that don’t have a budget for security. It is the best free option, but even so, doesn’t provide complete security. For that peace of mind, you should opt for MalCare instead. 

Malware scanning

⚖️ Verdict: The Wordfence malware scanner found all the file-based malware in core WordPress files and folders, and free plugins and themes. But it couldn’t detect malware in our website database, and stuff in some premium plugins and themes. Jetpack found approximately 30% of the malware on our website.  

Once you activate Wordfence, two things happen right away: the first site scan starts, and the firewall goes into learning mode. We’ll cover the firewall in more detail later. We saw the scanner was running, and it soon reached 60%. And then it stayed there for a while. Ok, we figured that it needs more time to run, so left it alone for a few hours, and came back to find it was still at 60%. 

As it happens, the 60% isn’t a progress bar for the scanner, but an indicator for the efficiency of the free scanner. To get to 100%, you need to upgrade to the pro version. This was the first and last instance of cognitive dissonance with Wordfence, so we let it go.  

We set Wordfence to scan the website again, and were pleasantly surprised to see it finished really quickly. 37 seconds, to be precise, for our tiny malware-ridden website. The scanner detected all the malware in the core WordPress files and in free plugins and themes, but nothing from the premium ones nor from the database. So, in spite of Wordfence being a terrific alternative to almost all our plugins out there (except MalCare of course), the scanner is strictly above-average only. 

Our takeaway is that Wordfence’s malware database is extensive, and relatively up to date. However, if the Wordfence team has not come across malware, it will not be in the database. Therefore, it cannot protect websites against newer threats.

Another downside to the scanner is that it generates a lot of false positives. False positives are as good as no alerts, because they lead to mistrust of alerts and complacency. 

Jetpack includes a malware scanner as part of its paid plans. Although it is not a patch on Wordfence, we noted that Jetpack detected some malware. The percentage is considerably less than that of Wordfence though, clocking in at about 30-50% efficacy, compared to Wordfence’s 70-80% efficacy. 

Malware cleaning

⚖️ Verdict: Jetpack doesn’t have malware cleaning, automatic or otherwise. Wordfence does have an option to repair infected files, but only the malware it actually detects in the first place. On the other hand, Wordfence has a premium malware removal service, which costs an eye-watering $490 per site. 

After the scan, Wordfence lists the hacked files with a recommendation to have them cleaned by their professional experts. Alternatively, you can use the two automated cleanup options on the dashboard: delete all deletable files and repair all repairable files.

In our tests, the delete option removed one file successfully without errors, but left many other files infected. We then tried the repair option. This fixed the files shown in the list by replacing them with original versions from the WordPress repository. This is a helpful feature as it can save you from paying for a separate removal service.

Our only gripe with this entire episode was that there were terrifying warnings that our site may break if we use the delete or the repair option. We made sure that we had backups though, and powered through. The malware we found still needed to be removed, so the warnings made us briefly debate whether living with malware was better than breaking the site. No, that’s not the case at all. 

We also tested Wordfence against more complex threats, such as database-resident redirects, Japanese keyword hacks, and malicious scripts in premium plugins. The scanner struggled here. Because Wordfence relies heavily on its database of known signatures, it is often incapable of detecting obscure malware or threats hidden in premium themes and plugins that are not in the official WordPress.org repository. The cleaner is only as effective as the scanner, which remains roughly 70-80% effective.

If the automated tools fail, Wordfence offers a professional malware removal service. This includes a one-year guarantee and assistance with blacklist removal. It is important to note that this service now sits under their Wordfence Care ($590 per year) or Wordfence Response ($1250 per year) tiers, which have replaced the older flat-fee cleanup model for many users.

Please note that we are not able to comment on the efficacy of the malware removal service, as we didn’t try it out. 

Jetpack has historically hedged on the subject of malware removal. Recently, they introduced one-click fixes for most types of known malware through an upgrade to Jetpack Scan.

When we delved deeper, we saw that Jetpack’s one-click fix is primarily a file replacement tool. If a hacker has injected malicious code into your database tables (like wp_options), Jetpack cannot clean that malware. It will simply tell you to restore a backup. This can lead to significant data loss, such as losing recent customer orders or new blog posts, because a full restore rolls back the entire database.

Clumsy malware removal can damage a website beyond repair. While Jetpack is moving toward more automated features, its reliance on backup restoration for database-level infections makes it far less effective than a dedicated cleaner.

Firewall

⚖️ Verdict: Jetpack has a basic WAF. Wordfence’s will protect websites effectively from most major and common attacks. One point of concern is that the free version gets updates after the premium one. 

A WordPress firewall is an integral part of your site security. It stops WordPress attacks from reaching your website. If bad actors cannot reach your site, they cannot exploit vulnerabilities or install malware. You should think of a firewall as a security perimeter around your website.

For a long time, Jetpack did not have a firewall. This was a gaping hole in their security offering. They have since added a basic Web Application Firewall (WAF) to their suite. In our tests, it performed decently at blocking known bad IP addresses. However, it is not a powerful firewall by any means. It lacks the deep configuration options found in dedicated security tools.

The Wordfence firewall goes into learning mode when you first install the plugin. We recommend leaving it in this mode for at least a week. Firewalls require live traffic to learn how to block threats effectively. Since our test sites do not get organic traffic, we switched off learning mode to begin testing immediately.

Both the free and premium versions of the Wordfence firewall successfully kept out attacks. We attempted SQL injections, cross-site scripting, and remote code injections. We could not exploit the vulnerabilities on the site. However, the Wordfence dashboard shows the free firewall at 35% efficacy compared to 100% for the premium version.

The difference is two-fold: the first is when the firewall loads on your website; and the second is when your firewall receives updates.

Both of these factors are non-trivial differences, and are crucial to how the same plugin can have a 65% efficacy difference between their free and premium versions. We will break both differences down to explain what is going on here. 

Your website loads in a sequential order. Core files usually load first, followed by plugins and the database. This is the load order. The free Wordfence firewall loads like a standard plugin. This means it loads after WordPress and alongside other plugins. It cannot keep all malicious traffic away because some code has already executed by the time it triggers.

Firewalls rely on rules to filter traffic. These rules must be updated to account for new threats. MalCare uses a different approach. It learns from all the websites it protects. If MalCare blocks a threat on one site, it updates the rules for all other sites in its network. This provides preemptive protection.

Wordfence premium users receive real-time rule updates. Free users receive these updates 30 days later. Even a small window of time allows new threats to bypass the firewall; 30 days is a lot!

Vulnerability detection

⚖️ Verdict: Wordfence zeroed in on all the vulnerabilities on our test websites, whereas Jetpack missed some of the lesser known ones entirely.  

During the initial vulnerability scan, Wordfence alerted us of all vulnerabilities, flagging them as critical threats. We included several obscure plugins and themes in our test because these often trip up other security tools. Some of these have fewer than 200 users and are highly niche. Wordfence deserves full marks for its detection depth.

A standout feature is that Wordfence flags outdated plugins and themes as medium threats. This is vital because vulnerabilities in outdated software are a major cause of successful hacks. Interestingly, you cannot fix these vulnerabilities directly from the Wordfence dashboard. While some plugins offer this, they often merely trigger the standard WordPress update. Wordfence has chosen to focus its resources on its massive Threat Intelligence team and its own Bug Bounty program. This program pays researchers to find and report vulnerabilities in WordPress plugins and themes, which keeps the Wordfence database exceptionally current.

Years ago, Jetpack flaked out on our tests and missed the obscure outdated software in the vulnerability scan.

However, since then Jetpack has improved its scanning, as it now relies on the WPScan vulnerability database. WPScan is a reputable industry standard.

Managing these vulnerabilities is where the tools differ most. Wordfence identifies the threat but leaves the update to you. Jetpack allows for automated updates for many plugins, which is helpful but lacks the safe update technology found in MalCare. MalCare takes a different approach by syncing your site to a staging environment to test updates before applying them. This prevents the errors that can occur when a security patch conflicts with your site.

Brute force protection

⚖️ Verdict: Wordfence does a great job of protecting the login page from brute force attacks. Jetpack adds a captcha to wp-login, when there are several login failures, but it doesn’t block the IP even temporarily.  

Just for the record, IP blocking is an imprecise feature to begin. So why are we pointing out Jetpack’s inadequacy in that respect? Mainly because they have so many settings dedicated to whitelisting IPs, to the extent that we figured we were in imminent danger of blocking ourselves. But nothing. If you are going to talk up any feature that much, you need to have good follow-through. That’s all. 

We brute-forced the login page many times over, and well over our set limit. The only difference we saw was a numeric captcha that wasn’t there before. It was minus any branding, so we will go out on a limb and assume it was Jetpack. 

Overall, the captcha is an elegant but inadequate solution to brute force attacks on the login page. Brute force bots can overwhelm a website by using up server resources, so they need to be kept out with more than just a captcha. 

Wordfence, on the other hand, worked like a champ. We are somewhat spooked by a huge number of settings for every plugin, and it can sometimes mean that the plugin doesn’t work, so it was refreshing to see just a few options. 

Although brute force protection is enabled by default, you can customise settings from the firewall section. There are options to set the number of failed login attempts that lead to a temporary lockout, and even how long that lockout should last. Inevitably, we see the allowlist option, even though we know that device IPs are dynamic, so this is indicative at best, pointless at worst. 

You will also find the strong password options here. While those are great to have, in the firewall section, under brute force protection is not the logical place to have those settings. Yes, they are both related to login security, but that still requires a leap to connect. We’re doubtful about people finding these very useful settings in this remote spot.

Activity log

⚖️ Verdict: We really liked Jetpack’s activity log, as it is one of the best versions we have seen. Surprisingly, Wordfence doesn’t have an activity log. 

We are really surprised that Wordfence doesn’t have an activity log because it is a really important part of website security. Hackers take advantage of insufficient logging to attack sites. You definitely want to have a reliable activity log that has the correct information about the goings-on of your website. 

On Wordfence, there is an option to enable debugging, in case something goes wrong. The option is buried deep inside the Diagnostics section under Tools. It is intended to make firewall logs more verbose. We also found a full activity log specifically for Wordfence events in the Scan section, but that’s not what we mean by activity log. It also looks like a raw log meant for Wordfence developers. 

Jetpack’s activity log feature is excellent and makes it super easy to understand what has occurred on the website. It is available for preview on the free plans, but needs a premium subscription to really be of any use. The logs have all user, plugin, and theme activity information, with the additional feature of alerts for things that require attention, like malware or vulnerabilities. 

Our caveat here is that the activity log data is only available for 30 days. We would have preferred to see a much longer time frame for it to be really useful.  

2FA

⚖️ Verdict: Wordfence has great two-factor authentication, which works out of the box. Jetpack has a cumbersome one. 

On Wordfence, the two-factor authentication works perfectly. It is straightforward to use and does not include a confusing array of options. Wordfence previously restricted this to their premium plan, but it is now available for all users. It supports standard TOTP applications like Google Authenticator or Authy.

People have reported issues with Wordfence 2FA, but they are easily resolved.

Jetpack also offers two-factor authentication, but it is tied to your WordPress.com account. To use it, you must enable Secure Sign-On (SSO). While you need a WordPress.com account to use Jetpack anyway, each of your users must also have an account to sign in. This is a potential hassle for WooCommerce customers, media site subscribers, or forum users. Requiring external accounts for every site visitor who needs to log in can create significant friction.

By comparison, MalCare provides a more flexible approach to login security. It offers 2FA that works natively with your existing WordPress user database. It does not force your customers or subscribers to create third-party accounts just to access your website.

Performance impact

⚖️ Verdict: Jetpack will use some server resources for its scans, but not perceptibly affect performance. Wordfence, on the other hand, is banned by certain web hosts because of how much strain it puts on server resources.

Performance is a significant factor when choosing a security plugin. A secure site that is too slow to load will drive away visitors and harm your search engine rankings.

In our performance tests, Wordfence showed a measurable impact on server resources. Because Wordfence is an endpoint firewall, it lives on your server and processes every request that hits your site. During deep scans, we observed spikes in CPU and memory usage. On entry-level shared hosting plans, this can lead to 504 Gateway Timeout errors or a sluggish admin dashboard. Wordfence uses a local database to store its firewall rules and scan results, which adds to the overall disk I/O load on your hosting environment.

The most common complaint in community forums regarding Wordfence is the resource overhead. Users frequently report that the “Live Traffic” feature, while informative, can consume excessive database space if not managed correctly. We recommend disabling Live Traffic if you notice your site slowing down after installation.

Jetpack takes a different approach by offloading much of its processing to the WordPress.com cloud. Its security scanning and firewall do not run on your server resources. Instead, the Jetpack servers perform the heavy lifting. In our Time to First Byte (TTFB) tests, Jetpack showed a negligible impact on site speed. This makes it an attractive option for sites on restricted hosting environments. However, the trade-off is the requirement to keep your site connected via the XML-RPC protocol, which can occasionally cause its own set of connection-related performance issues.

Jetpack and XML-RPC

A significant technical difference between Jetpack and other security plugins is its reliance on the xmlrpc.php file. XML-RPC is a legacy protocol that allows external applications, such as the WordPress mobile app or WordPress.com services, to communicate with your website remotely.

For most modern WordPress sites, XML-RPC is considered a security liability. It is a common target for brute-force amplification attacks, where a hacker can test hundreds of login combinations in a single request. Because of this, many security experts and high-end hosting providers disable XML-RPC by default to harden the server.

However, Jetpack requires XML-RPC to function. It uses this protocol to connect your site to the WordPress.com infrastructure for features like real-time backups, security scanning, and automated social media posting. If you or your host disables xmlrpc.php to improve security, Jetpack will lose its connection and stop working.

This creates a trap where users are told to disable XML-RPC for safety, only to find their Jetpack features broken. Jetpack argues that its implementation is secure because it uses a token-based system, rather than sending your actual username and password over the connection. While this protects your credentials, it does not change the fact that the xmlrpc.php endpoint must remain open and listening on your server, which still leaves a broader attack surface than a site that has disabled the protocol entirely.

In our experience, managing this connection can be a recurring headache. We often see error messages in the Jetpack dashboard when a web host’s firewall or a plugin like Wordfence blocks XML-RPC requests.

In contrast, plugins like Wordfence or MalCare do not rely on this legacy protocol for their core security features, allowing you to close the xmlrpc.php entry point entirely.

Other factors

Alerts

Jetpack sends you the odd alert once in a while, whereas Wordfence can drown your inbox in an hour. 

In our opinion, alerts need to be balanced. You want to know if something has gone pear-shaped with your website as soon as possible. But you don’t need an alert if someone sneezes in the general vicinity of your website. Balance is key. 

Wordfence fails miserably in this department. The alerts from scan results, false positives, firewall lockouts, and much more are too numerous to count. Frankly, a good firewall should block attacks directly, without creating an alert every time.

In this instance, Jetpack does really well. You only get alerts for things that matter, like discovered vulnerabilities or detected malware; that is, things that need your immediate attention. 

Installation, configuration, and usability

Wordfence was the easiest installation ever. Can’t say the same about Jetpack. 

Wordfence was so great in this respect. Start using the plugin, and it shows you the way forward. No complicated configurations at all. The language used is simple and approachable. 

We especially liked how there are short walkthroughs as you visit each section on the dashboard for the first time. The clear explanations are easy to understand, and there is none of that tech gobbledegook that usually accompanies these things. 

The overall design is very intuitive, and designed to give you a bird’s eye view of your website’s security. If anything feels confusing, click on a tooltip and get taken to their excellent documentation. 

If Wordfence was easy, Jetpack was surprisingly tricky. The installation leans heavily on the need to upgrade. You even have to choose a plan, free or otherwise, to proceed at all. It could have been much better than it is. 

Jetpack: Extras

The good thing about Jetpack is that it combines multiple WordPress admin tasks into one plugin. It has backups, which we know are super important for any website. The external dashboard is on WordPress.com, so it is very familiar to use. 

Having said all that, we would have given Jetpack an unequivocal thumbs up as a security plugin without the frills and furbelows, if it had done a good job of protecting our websites. It didn’t so ultimately none of these good-to-haves are of any value. 

Wordfence: Extras

Wordfence is all about the security. There is nothing in the plugin that is even security-adjacent, like the possibility of updating plugins as we mentioned before. But there are still a ton of extras.  

Starting from install, the first thing we noticed is a notifications section for site updates. For instance, it showed us that 5 of our test site’s plugins needed to be updated. 

Moving forward, there is a panel called Wordfence Central status. This is to allow you to connect your account to multiple websites, and see the status of all your websites in the wp-admin of this website. If that sounds confusing, it is because it is confusing and not at all intuitive. You really don’t want to manage multiple websites from the dashboard of one website. You need an external dashboard for that, which Wordfence Central actually is. But it does a poor job of bringing that across. 

Wordfence Central is alright, nowhere close to full-featured though. Perhaps we are spoilt because of MalCare’s dashboard, which feels like an airplane control panel for websites. Wordfence Central looks unwieldy for anything more than 10 or 20 sites, and could be much better. 

In the Tools section, there is a panel for live traffic. It initially looks like it is a skin for Google Analytics, but it turned out to be more than that. It records traffic logs to your website, and you can see exactly what kind of traffic your website gets: human, bot, warning, blocked.

We thought Diagnostics was quite interesting, as it had a lot of information about the website; things like process owners and database tables, for instance. It is like a blueprint of the website, which the status of each of the specifications alongside. It doesn’t look like something a normal user would need, but definitely could help out a developer. 

What’s missing from Jetpack and Wordfence

Ultimately, there is a lot missing from Jetpack: the scanner is below-average, there is no cleaner or firewall. The rest of the stuff is alright, but these three factors are non-negotiable for security. 

Wordfence doesn’t have bot protection, and surprisingly no activity log. Although it is a comprehensive security plugin, the drain on server resources and the tendency to cry wolf at the drop of a hat is off-putting.

Jetpack vs Wordfence: Pricing

Jetpack is exorbitant at $300 per year for the security suite. Wordfence premium is far more reasonable at $99 for the year, but the premium version isn’t a significant upgrade on the free version. 

Wordfence has a really great free version, and in our opinion the upgrade to premium doesn’t add much more. The site license is still competitive at $99 a pop, and gets better with more websites. 

The knockout punch from the Wordfence corner is their malware removal service. That will set you back a cool $590 per site cleanup. The one-year guarantee is also subject to terms and conditions, so you shouldn’t consider that a one-time expense.

Jetpack is really not worthy of that fancy price tag. There is little to say beyond that. 

Better alternative to Jetpack and Wordfence: MalCare

The best investment you can make in your website is to invest in a good security plugin. By this point, you know what to look for in a security plugin. And you will find all those things and more in MalCare. MalCare scans, cleans and protects your website from exploits in a major way. It far outperforms all other plugins. 

Plans for MalCare start at $149 for the Basic plan, which includes unlimited cleanups. Contrast that to Wordfence’s $99 plan and $490 per cleanup needed thereafter and the choice becomes clear. MalCare all the way.  

How to pick the best security plugin

With all the misguided expert advice available online, WordPress security can be a black box at the best of times. Many admin want to be certain that their sites are protected, but don’t understand the details, and therefore don’t know how to pick the best option for their websites. 

As a part of this testing series, we wanted to make sure that we presented all our data in an unbiased and approachable way. That meant we needed to explain how and why we arrived at our conclusions. 

Security plugins can have a ton of features, and sometimes those features serve to obscure the ineffectiveness that lies beneath all that hype. If a huge feature list is not a good metric to choose a plugin, what is? Well, these factors: 

As you can see, this is a very short list. But these are the factors that will prevent hackers from exploiting your website, and malware from upending your website and peace of mind. Of all the plugins we tested, none hit the spot for us. 

In fact, the only plugin that aces this list is MalCare. With MalCare, your website is assured of an excellent malware scanner, a cleaner that automatically removes malware without breaking your site, and a firewall that prevents hackers from exploiting vulnerabilities. You absolutely cannot go wrong with MalCare. 

Conclusion

We really hope this article helps to clear any confusion with respect to WordPress security. It is admittedly hard to wade through all the misinformation available online to arrive at a good decision.