Collapsing Archives vs Expanding Archives (2026)
Detailed side-by-side comparison of two WordPress plugins, based on real-time data from WordPress.org.
Quick Verdict
As of April 2026, Expanding Archives has a higher user rating (4.7/5 from 6 reviews) while Collapsing Archives leads in active installations (3.0K+ vs 2.0K+). Both are free WordPress plugins. Collapsing Archives has accumulated 146K+ total downloads while Expanding Archives has 22K+.
Detailed Comparison
| Metric | Collapsing Archives | Expanding Archives | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rating | 4.1/5 | ► | 4.7/5 |
| Total Reviews | 21 | ◄ | 6 |
| Active Installs | 3.0K+ | ◄ | 2.0K+ |
| Total Downloads | 146K+ | ◄ | 22K+ |
| Support Resolution | 0% | N/A | |
| Last Updated | 1 month ago | ◄ | 2 years ago |
| First Released | 2008 | 2015 | |
| Age | 18 years | 11 years | |
| WP Requires | 2.8+ | 3.0+ | |
| PHP Requires | false+ | 7.4+ | |
| Business Model | Free | Free | |
| Latest Version | 3.0.8 | 2.1.0 |
Rating Breakdown
Collapsing Archives
Expanding Archives
Download Trends
Over the past 30 days, Collapsing Archives averaged approximately 22 daily downloads while Expanding Archives averaged 10.
Recent Reviews
Collapsing Archives Reviews
This broke my website, unforunately [v. 6.4.3]
I just installed this one single plug-in to my website today and after doing so, immediately, the page the plug-in was set to work on … broke, or was disabled. It was still visible in my raw page lis
Last update broke it
Last update has broke it. Somehow the plugin start working as collapsing categories instead of collapsing archives. This topic was modified 2 years, 2 months ago by petukhovsky.
Author is ignoring PHP 8.0 / 8.1 incompatibility
The author has released several versions since PHP 8.0 release but just ignores existance of PHP 8.0 / 8.1 although that’s pretty easy to fix. I just did it by myself but now all the not working updat
Expanding Archives Reviews
Great plugin, simple yet very flexible
Very useful, lightweight plugin, will go in every theme and is easily customizeable with a bit of CSS
Awesome plugin!
Easy to use and customize.
Nice but could be cleaner
It looks nice if you only have a few posts per month, but I wish you had the option to choose whether the month will appear expanded or collapsed as a default. If you do a post per day, opening the pa
More Archives Worth Comparing
Top alternatives in the same category as Collapsing Archives and Expanding Archives
Disable Author Archives completely removes author archives and makes the web server return status code 404 ('Not Found') instead.
Simple Yearly Archive is a rather neat and simple Wordpress plugin that allows you to display your archives in a year-based list.
Fine grained control of how many of your posts appear on each of the various WordPress archive pages.
Improves your blog's search engine optimization by "noindexing" pages you choose. Now also for page-based (as opposed to date-based) archives.
Displays a smart monthly archive of posts in a more compact form rather than the default long archive widget.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Plugin data sourced from WordPress.org. Comparison and analysis by PluginSift.