# Yoast/wordpress-seo — health index 98/100 (Exceptional)

> Inspection of the public repository Yoast/wordpress-seo by inspect.software. It holds a health index of 98 out of 100, placing it in the Exceptional band. The index is a signal derived from publicly visible practice, not a warranty, a security audit, or an endorsement, and it is independent of payment.

- Repository: https://github.com/Yoast/wordpress-seo
- Report page: https://inspect.software/software/Yoast/wordpress-seo
- Full JSON report: https://inspect.software/api/repositories/Yoast/wordpress-seo/report
- Badge: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/inspect-software/badges/main/v1/y/Yoast/wordpress-seo.svg
- Inspected: 2026-09-20
- Methodology: metrics 2.10.0, report schema 0.34.0 (https://inspect.software/methodology.md)

## Category summary

| Category | Weight | Index | Band |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vitality | 21% | 96/100 | Exceptional |
| Community & Adoption | 17% | 84/100 | Excellent |
| Sustainability & Governance | 23% | 90/100 | Excellent |
| Engineering Quality | 19% | 94/100 | Exceptional |
| Security | 16% | 68/100 | Good |
| AI Readiness | 4% | 77/100 | Good |

The weighted overall 87 is calibrated to 98 on the published index scale (record calibration 2026-08-02).

## Repository facts

| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Yoast SEO for WordPress |
| Classification | plugin, library, network-service, web-ui |
| Homepage | https://yoast.com/wordpress/plugins/seo/ |
| Primary language | JavaScript |
| Stars | 1,996 |
| Forks | 975 |
| Created | 2012-11-16 |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 |
| Latest release | 28.6-RC2 |
| Commits (last year) | 5,661 |
| Bus factor | 10 |
| Topics | wordpress, php, seo, yoast, plugin, metadata, opengraph, xml-sitemap, yoast-seo, breadcrumbs |

## Published packages

| Registry | Package | Latest | Monthly downloads |
|---|---|---|---|
| packagist | yoast/wordpress-seo | 28.6-RC2 | 41,293 |
| npm | eslint-config-yoast | 6.0.0 | 5,264 |
| npm | @yoast/helpers | 0.17.0-alpha.2 | 1,906 |
| npm | @yoast/components | 3.0.0-alpha.3 | 1,965 |
| npm | @yoast/jest-preset | 1.0.1 | 29 |
| npm | @yoast/babel-preset | 1.1.3 | 55 |
| npm | @yoast/feature-flag | 0.6.0-alpha.2 | 17,116 |
| npm | @yoast/postcss-preset | 1.2.1 | 248 |

## Vitality — 96/100 (Exceptional)

Is the project alive — is code being written and are releases shipping? Weight: 21% of the overall index.

### Development activity — 100/100 (Exceptional)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Push recency | met | 36 / 36 | last push 1 days ago |
| Commit cadence | met | 36 / 36 | 52/52 weeks with commits |
| Commit volume | met | 18 / 18 | 5661 commits in the last year |
| OpenSSF Scorecard: Maintained | met | 10 / 10 | 30 commit(s) and 15 issue activity found in the last 90 days -- score normalized to 10 |

### Release discipline — 90/100 (Excellent)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ships releases | met | 27 / 27 | 100 releases published |
| Release recency | met | 36 / 36 | latest release 1 days ago |
| Release cadence | met | 27 / 27 | a release every ~3.5 days |
| OpenSSF Scorecard: Signed-Releases | not met | 0 / 10 | Project has not signed or included provenance with any releases. |

### Abandonment — 100/100 (Exceptional)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Project is still maintained | met | 100 / 100 | last human commit 1 days ago |

## Community & Adoption — 84/100 (Excellent)

Does the project have users, downloads, attention, and a welcoming setup for contributors? Weight: 17% of the overall index.

### Popularity & adoption — 90/100 (Excellent)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stars | partial | 53.5 / 60 | 1,996 stars |
| Forks | partial | 24.9 / 25 | 975 forks |
| Watchers | partial | 11.9 / 15 | 139 watchers |

### Community health — 86/100 (Excellent)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| README | met | 22.5 / 22.5 | — |
| License | partial | 16.9 / 22.5 | license file present, not a recognized license |
| CONTRIBUTING guide | met | 18 / 18 | — |
| Code of conduct | met | 13.5 / 13.5 | — |
| Issue template | not met | 0 / 7.2 | — |
| PR template | met | 6.3 / 6.3 | — |

### Ecosystem adoption (downloads) — 72/100 (Good)

Excluded from scoring (no data or not applicable): Registry dependents. Remaining weights renormalized.

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly downloads | partial | 57.6 / 80 | 21,042 downloads/month across npm |
| Registry dependents | excluded | 0 / 20 | not reported by this ecosystem |

## Sustainability & Governance — 90/100 (Excellent)

Will the project survive its people — bus factor, responsiveness, who backs it, and package upkeep? Weight: 23% of the overall index.

### Maintainer resilience (bus factor) — 98/100 (Exceptional)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bus factor | met | 54 / 54 | 10 contributor(s) cover half of all commits |
| Commit distribution | partial | 20.9 / 22.5 | top contributor authored 7% of commits |
| Contributor breadth | met | 13.5 / 13.5 | 99 contributors |
| OpenSSF Scorecard: Contributors | met | 10 / 10 | project has 16 contributing companies or organizations |

### Issue & PR responsiveness — 77/100 (Good)

Excluded from scoring (no data or not applicable): Newcomer PR acceptance. Remaining weights renormalized.

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Issue resolution | partial | 38.8 / 42 | 92% of issues closed |
| PR acceptance | partial | 26.5 / 30 | 9074/10259 decided PRs merged |
| Newcomer PR acceptance | excluded | 0 / 13 | no first-time contributor's PR decided in 30d |
| OpenSSF Scorecard: Code-Review | partial | 1.5 / 15 | Found 2/17 approved changesets -- score normalized to 1 |

### Ownership & stewardship — 91/100 (Excellent)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ownership backing | met | 30 / 30 | organization-owned |
| Verified domain | met | 20 / 20 | — |
| Owner reach | partial | 16.3 / 25 | 185 followers of Yoast |
| Track record | met | 25 / 25 | 77 public repos, account ~13 yr old |

### Package maintenance — 91/100 (Excellent)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Published & resolvable | met | 25 / 25 | 6 package(s) on npm |
| Publish recency | partial | 26 / 35 | latest publish 311 days ago |
| Version history | met | 20 / 20 | 102 published versions |
| Not deprecated | met | 20 / 20 | active, not deprecated or yanked |

## Engineering Quality — 94/100 (Exceptional)

Are baseline engineering and documentation practices in place? Weight: 19% of the overall index.

### Engineering practices — 90/100 (Excellent)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| CI workflows | met | 24 / 24 | 20 workflow(s) |
| Tests present | met | 24 / 24 | — |
| Linter config | met | 16 / 16 | .eslintrc, eslint.config.mjs |
| Pre-commit hooks | not met | 0 / 9.6 | — |
| .editorconfig | met | 6.4 / 6.4 | — |
| OpenSSF Scorecard: CI-Tests | met | 20 / 20 | 9 out of 9 merged PRs checked by a CI test -- score normalized to 10 |

### Documentation — 100/100 (Exceptional)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| README | met | 30 / 30 | — |
| Documentation directory | met | 25 / 25 | — |
| Documentation / homepage site | met | 15 / 15 | https://yoast.com/wordpress/plugins/seo/ |
| Repository description | met | 10 / 10 | — |
| Topics | met | 10 / 10 | 10 topics |
| Wiki | met | 10 / 10 | — |

## Security — 68/100 (Good)

Are visible security and supply-chain practices strong, with no malicious dependency and no unresolved high-risk jurisdiction exposure? Weight: 16% of the overall index.

### Security posture — 60/100 (Moderate)

Excluded from scoring (no data or not applicable): Branch-Protection. Remaining weights renormalized.

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Binary-Artifacts | met | 7.5 / 7.5 | no binaries found in the repo |
| Branch-Protection | excluded | 0 / 7.5 | internal error: error during branchesHandler.setup: internal error: some github tokens can't read classic branch protection rules: https://github.com/ossf/scorecard-action/blob/main/docs/authentication/fine-grained-auth-token.md |
| CI-Tests | met | 2.5 / 2.5 | 9 out of 9 merged PRs checked by a CI test -- score normalized to 10 |
| CII-Best-Practices | not met | 0 / 2.5 | no effort to earn an OpenSSF best practices badge detected |
| Code-Review | partial | 0.8 / 7.5 | Found 2/17 approved changesets -- score normalized to 1 |
| Contributors | met | 2.5 / 2.5 | project has 16 contributing companies or organizations |
| Dangerous-Workflow | met | 10 / 10 | no dangerous workflow patterns detected |
| Dependency-Update-Tool | met | 7.5 / 7.5 | update tool detected |
| Fuzzing | not met | 0 / 5 | project is not fuzzed |
| License | partial | 2.2 / 2.5 | license file detected |
| Maintained | met | 7.5 / 7.5 | 30 commit(s) and 15 issue activity found in the last 90 days -- score normalized to 10 |
| Packaging | met | 5 / 5 | packaging workflow detected |
| Pinned-Dependencies | partial | 4.5 / 5 | dependency not pinned by hash detected -- score normalized to 9 |
| SAST | partial | 3.5 / 5 | SAST tool detected but not run on all commits |
| Security-Policy | met | 5 / 5 | security policy file detected |
| Signed-Releases | not met | 0 / 7.5 | Project has not signed or included provenance with any releases. |
| Token-Permissions | not met | 0 / 7.5 | detected GitHub workflow tokens with excessive permissions |
| Vulnerabilities | not met | 0 / 7.5 | 181 existing vulnerabilities detected |

### Dependency advisories — 100/100 (Exceptional)

Excluded from scoring (no data or not applicable): No advisories left outstanding. Remaining weights renormalized. Matched the npm:eslint-config-yoast@6.0.0 runtime dependency closure — what installing the published package pulls in — 4 packages. Reachability is not analyzed.

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Direct dependencies free of known advisories | met | 35 / 35 | no direct dependency carries a known advisory |
| Indirect dependencies free of known advisories | met | 25 / 25 | no indirect dependency carries a known advisory |
| No advisories left outstanding | excluded | 0 / 40 | no advisory carries a publication date |

### Malicious dependencies — 100/100 (Exceptional)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| No dependency reported as a malicious package | met | 100 / 100 | no dependency is reported as a malicious package |

### High-Risk Jurisdiction Exposure — 100/100 (Exceptional)

Only high-confidence self-published location evidence affects this multiplier. Ambiguous matches are review-only; country evidence is not proof of nationality, citizenship, legal registration, malicious intent, or sanctions status.

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Policy exposure multiplier | met | 100 / 100 | no confirmed policy-scope location match |

## AI Readiness — 77/100 (Good)

How well is the repo equipped to be developed and maintained with AI coding agents? Carries a deliberately small weight: agent tooling is a real maintenance signal, but its absence must never gate the top of the scale (calibration saturates at raw 91, so 100/100 remains reachable with AI Readiness at zero).

### Agent context & guidance — 87/100 (Excellent)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agent instructions | met | 45 / 45 | .cursor/rules/agents.mdc, .cursor/rules/create-pr.mdc, .github/copilot-instructions.md, AGENTS.md, CLAUDE.md |
| Machine-readable docs (llms.txt) | met | 15 / 15 | llms.txt served by the project website (https://yoast.com/llms.txt) |
| Legible commit history | partial | 27 / 40 | 46 of 91 human commits state their intent (structured subject or explanatory body) |

### Verify loop (build / test / typecheck) — 81/100 (Excellent)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| One-command bootstrap | not met | 0 / 18 | — |
| Automated tests | met | 22 / 22 | — |
| Lint / format config | met | 11 / 11 | .eslintrc, eslint.config.mjs |
| Static type checking | met | 11 / 11 | packages/yoastseo/tsconfig.json |
| Reproducible environment | met | 10 / 10 | lockfile |
| Demonstrated agent practice | met | 10 / 10 | 14 of the last 100 commits agent-authored or agent-credited |
| Automated maintenance | met | 8 / 8 | 9 of the last 100 commits are automated dependency updates |
| OpenSSF Scorecard: Pinned-Dependencies | partial | 9 / 10 | dependency not pinned by hash detected -- score normalized to 9 |

### Code legibility for models — 82/100 (Excellent)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type-checkable code | partial | 27 / 45 | JavaScript with type-check config (packages/yoastseo/tsconfig.json) |
| Manageable file sizes | partial | 54.9 / 55 | 17/6561 source files over 60KB |

### Machine-readable interfaces — 40/100 (Weak)

| Criterion | Status | Points | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| API schema (OpenAPI/GraphQL/proto) | not met | 0 / 40 | — |
| MCP server | not met | 0 / 20 | — |
| Runnable examples | met | 40 / 40 | examples |

## Collection warnings

- Star history unavailable: GitHub GraphQL error: Resource not accessible by personal access token
- packagist package 'yoast/wordpress-seo' points at a different repository (https://github.com/Yoast-dist/wordpress-seo); excluded from ecosystem scoring
- npm package 'eslint-config-yoast' points at a different repository (https://github.com/Yoast/javascript); excluded from ecosystem scoring
- Could not fetch npm package '@yoast/e2e-tests' from its registry
- Resolved dependency list truncated to 3000 of 5294 packages (counts remain complete)

## What this report is

inspect.software measures public repositories against a single published, versioned methodology and reports the result as a 1–100 health index. Findings are signals derived from what is visible in public repository data — they are not a security audit, a warranty, or an endorsement, and no result depends on payment.

- Methodology, formulas and weights: https://inspect.software/methodology.md
- What a result does and does not claim: https://inspect.software/wiki/signals-not-warranties.md
- Rating bands: https://inspect.software/wiki/scoring-bands.md
- Corrections: https://inspect.software/contact.md
- Index of all documents: https://inspect.software/llms.txt