If you have a WordPress blog or are have just set it up, you will soon see comments being bombarded by spammers as well as scammers trying to post malicious and spammy links on your site. This might become a moderation nightmare unless you have any anti-spam WordPress plugins. If you don’t take any action, these comments can easily lower the credibility of your site both for users as well as for search engines.
To fight the unwanted comment spammers, we can install a WordPress comment anti-spam plugin. Installing an anti-spam plugin for your site is one of the must do step in WordPress setup checklist.
In this article, we will explore the best free anti-spam plugins available for WordPress that will help you fight comment spam effectively. Some of these plugins can also help you protect contact forms and other form submissions on your site. Most of these plugins are completely free and provide basic protection right out of the box with minimal or no configuration required from your side.
1. Akismet Anti-Spam
Akismet is an anti-spam WordPress plugin by the company behind WordPress. It checks your comments and contact form submissions against a global database of spam to protect your site from malicious content. It allows you to check the comments that were marked as spam so that you can take action if they were wrongly caught. A discard feature is also available which lets you block the spam comments entirely.
Do note that in order to use this plugin, you will need to get an Akismet.com API key. These keys are free only for personal blogs and require paid subscription if you are a business or running a commercial site with WordPress.
2. WPBruiser {no- Captcha anti-Spam}
WPBruiser is a powerful antispam plugin for WordPress. It is able to block spam comments and bots on your site without requiring captcha images. The plugin does behind the scene checks using an algorithm to check if the behavior of the user is suspicious and blocks spam-bot signups, spam comments as well as brute force login attacks.
The plugin removes the spam comments into a separate dataset and automatically deletes them after a certain period thereby saving disk space and head-ache of manually deleting them. The good news is that all the basic powerful spam comment and bot detection features are offered for free in this plugin. You can protect your Jetpack contact forms too or disable XM-RPC attacks with this free plugin.
Premium version of this plugin is also available which provides integration with advanced plugins such as Contact Forms, membership forms, e-commerce, subscription forms etc.
3. Titan Anti-spam & Security
Titan anti-spam and security started as a comment spam prevention plugin, however it has turned into a full security plugin. It not only blocks spam comments but can also provide firewall, security audit, malware scanning as well as real-time IP-blacklist. It also has support for taking site backups and providing 2-factor authentications on your WordPress site.
Some users find this plugin to be quite overwhelming when it comes to spam-prevention as it offers many other security features too. Many advanced features are available only in Pro-version, however the basic feature of comment spam blocking without captcha is free.
4. Stop Spammers
When it comes to stopping all kinds of spammers, this plugin does a good job of keeping them out of reach of your comments and registration. It is able to block bots based on suspicious behavior and based on their public blacklist IPs that are known to submit spam. You can also block spam words, disposable e-mails, URL shortening services, TLDs or even countries from using your comment form.
With premium add-ons, you can add the spam blocking feature to your Contact Form 7 or built-in contact forms. Do keep an eye on some of the legitimate comments that may also get blocked when using any auto-block spam plugin.
5. Antispam Bee
Antispam Bee is a plugin which strives to fight comment and trackback spam-fighting. It blocks spam comments and trackbacks without captchas or sending personal information to third-party. Apart from being completely free, the plugin also claims to be 100% GDPR compliant.
With this plugin, you can set to approve commenters with a gravatar or comments that are only in a certain language. You can block or allow commenters based on countries or treat BBCode (generally used to insert links) in comments as spam. The plugin is also capable of auto-deleting spam comments after few days.
6. WP Armour – Honeypot Anti Spam
WP Armour is a honeypot based anti spam filter that blocks spam bots on a WordPress site. Honeypot is a security mechanism which uses Javascript to detect spam bots. This technique is used by many other plugins listed on this page that don’t require a captcha. The plugin works by inserting additional fields in the forms that only bots can see and fill, which helps mark them as spam.
The WP Armour plugin works with Contact Form 7, Gravity Forms, Ninja Forms, Formidable Forms and many other WordPress plugins that allow form submission on your site. An extended version of this free plugin is also available which offers adding extra level of anti spam filters based on IP.
7. WordPress Zero Spam
WordPress Zero Spam is a plugin made for blocking spam & malicious visitors on your WordPress powered site. The plugin claims to stop malicious bots as well as hackers by using AI in combination with proven spam detection techniques and a database of known malicious IPs from around the world.
The plugin works out of the box and is able to block spam submission without captcha or moderation queues. Without requiring any configuration, the plugin can also enhance your site’s security by blocking malicious IPs from reaching your site. Charts and statistics are available to do spam analytics on your site. The plugin is also able to protect other plugins such as Contact Form 7, BuddyPress, WPForms etc.
8. Spam protection, AntiSpam, FireWall by CleanTalk
Spam protection by CleanTalk is able to spam comments, registrations and contact emails on your site. The plugin also works with your WooCommerce section and can stop spam in orders, bookings, subscriptions, polls etc.
Using this plugin, you can also check and remove your existing comments and users for spam. Compatible with GDPR, this plugin is able to block disposable emails, search form spam as well as completely disable comments if needed. Do note that the plugin has a paid cloud subscription service for its spam filtering to work, however it offers a free trial for the same.
9. NoSpamNX WordPress plugin
NoSpamNX is an automated spam plugin that does not rely on captcha. It does not even require JavaScript, cookies or sessions for working. It adds hidden fields in the comment form that can catch spambot submissions.
The plugin claims to work best with WordPress default theme and is compatible with bbPress, WPtouch (mobile theme) as well as with WordPress multi-site.
10. Cerber Security, Anti-spam & Malware Scan
Cerber Security provides protection against hacker attacks and bots. It has built-in malware scanner & integrity checker. Using this plugin, you can monitor user activity log, add antispam reCAPTCHA and limit login attempts on your WordPress site.
The plugin is capable of automatically detecting and moving spam comments to trash or denying them completely. Additionally you can use the advanced features to make your WordPress more secure. It is also able to monitor file changes in your WordPress installation and send email notification in case changes are detected.
We hope to have covered all major anti-spam plugins for WordPress. Be advised that depending on the other plugins you have installed, the plugins listed above may or may not work correctly. For example, if you have Jetpack or Disqus comments enabled then most of the plugins listed above will not work. Nonetheless, if you have the default commenting of WordPress on your site, you will find these plugins working fine with a need to keep an eye on wrongly marked spam comments.
Comments on your content can add value to the users, but spam comments can easily degrade the experience. Spam bots try to insert malicious links in the comment section of your site and need to be blocked. The free plugins listed above should help you in moderating the inflow of comments on your WordPress site. Having these essential WordPress plugins which can block spam comments is a must for anyone having a WordPress blog with comments enabled.
Great article
Sorry but Akismet Anti-Spam is not free.