Hi, I use some/most of these on each new website I build: WordPress SEO by Yoast - Improve on page SEO Akismet - Prevent comment spam BackWPup - Backup everything Google XML Sitemaps - Create a sitemap for search engines Wordfence Security - Secure your blog from hackers Google Analytics Dashboard for WP - Add Google Analytics to all pages and see reports inside your dashboard W3 Total Cache - Improve the loading speed of your blog by caching your pages Contact Form 7 - Add a Contact form to your blog AddToAny Share Buttons - Add social share buttons to your blog Yet Another Related Posts Plugin - Keep the visitors on your site by showing them other related articles Mailpoet Newsletters - Collect emails and send newsletters directly from WordPress Jetpack - Add a suite of powerful features for your WordPress site Disqus - Better WordPress comments Simple 301 Redirects - Use pretty redirects for your affiliate links WooCommerce - eCommerce plugin with good free features Shortcodes Ultimate - Make everything easier with shortcodes TablePress - Adding tables to WordPress used to be a pain, not anymore Duplicator - Move or duplicate a whole WordPress installation easily - super useful when creating multiple sites Broken Link Checker - Find broken links and images on your WordPress website
Good list of WP plugins, I use most of them, although I don't agree that Disqus is the best commenting platform.
Oh don't get me wrong I think Disqus has its benefits but also substantial drawbacks, The benefits I find: The back-end functionality and customization. The reduced loading times when loading a page with many comments. The built-in notification features bring people back to the site. Though you can add these with other plugins. You also get occasional visits from users who find your site on Disqus profiles. But it does come at the expense of ease of use and does result in fewer comments. So it's a trade-off. Do you prefer the default comments or another plugin?
Yeah I prefer the default comments. It's easier to leave comments for visitors, and easier to manage comments as the admin. If loading times are an issue, you can look into a caching plugin to speed up the site.
Some of my favourites: Widget options - defines which page or post any widget can appear. Similar to the core 'block' module in Drupal. As a bonus, it gives you additional CSS id or classes for theme customization if you need ones. Loginizer - security; prevent brute force attack. It is not in par with Wordfence (as in features), in fact it does only one job and does it nicely: prevent brute force attack. Child Theme Configurator - create child theme / copy files from parent without having to go to file manager or FTP. Unfortunately the free version doesn't allow you to create a new file or rename an existing file from within WP Dashboard. Useful for a few lines edit in the child theme. Counterize - Doesn't provide many useful thing to your site, but it gives you an interesting overview of your site visits: from which IP, which device, which OS, most visited URL, exit URL, etc.
Thrive Visual Editor plugin is golden Ad Inserter is a must WP Guru is a must WPeMatico is very useful to have Quick Featured Images is very useful to have WP Delete Tags is nice tool to have WP Mass Delete is nice tool to have Categories to Tags Converter Importer is nice tool to have