Top 8 Best Thumbnail Related Posts Plugins for WordPress

Posted on March 2nd, 2025 by Quertime Team in WordPress

Thumbnails play a crucial role in attracting visitors and increasing engagement on a WordPress website. A well-designed thumbnail not only enhances the visual appeal but also encourages users to explore related content. Thumbnail-related posts plugins for WordPress help improve user experience by displaying visually appealing related posts with thumbnails, keeping visitors engaged and reducing bounce rates. These plugins automatically fetch and showcase relevant posts based on categories, tags, or custom settings, ensuring seamless content discovery.

Whether you’re a blogger, news publisher, or content marketer, integrating a thumbnail-related posts plugin can significantly boost page views and session durations. Some plugins offer advanced customization, allowing you to tailor the layout, design, and relevance criteria to match your website’s aesthetics. In this article, we will explore the best thumbnail-related posts plugins for WordPress, highlighting their features, benefits, and how they can help enhance user engagement and content navigation.

Related Posts Thumbnails is a powerful plugin that displays related posts with thumbnails at the end of each article. It enhances user engagement by showcasing visually appealing post suggestions based on categories, tags, or other criteria. The plugin allows customization of thumbnail sizes, layout styles, and text settings, making it easy to match your website’s design. It also supports automatic thumbnail generation from post images, featured images, or external URLs. With flexible display settings, widget support, and caching options, this plugin improves site navigation and reduces bounce rates by keeping visitors engaged with relevant content.

2. YARPP – Yet Another Related Posts Plugin

YARPP is one of the most popular related posts plugins for WordPress, using an advanced algorithm to suggest highly relevant content. It supports both thumbnail and text-based displays, allowing full customization to match your site’s aesthetics. YARPP offers multiple filtering options, including category and tag exclusions, to ensure only the most relevant posts appear. Its templating system allows developers to create custom layouts, while built-in caching optimizes performance. With its ability to boost page views and engagement, YARPP is a reliable choice for WordPress users looking to improve content discovery and internal linking.

3. Contextual Related Posts

Contextual Related Posts automatically displays relevant posts based on the content of the current article. Unlike other plugins that rely on categories or tags, this plugin analyzes the post’s title and content for contextual relevance. It supports both text-based and thumbnail layouts, allowing users to customize the design to match their site’s theme. The plugin is lightweight and performance-optimized, with built-in caching to minimize database queries. It also provides widget support and shortcode functionality, making it easy to place related posts anywhere on your site. With its intelligent matching system, it enhances user engagement and site navigation.

4. Shareaholic

Shareaholic is a feature-rich plugin that offers social sharing, related posts, and monetization tools in one package. Its related posts feature displays visually engaging post suggestions with customizable thumbnails and layouts. It supports both automatic and manual placement, allowing users to fine-tune how related content appears. Additionally, Shareaholic integrates with Google Analytics for performance tracking and includes ad monetization options to generate revenue from recommendations. With its user-friendly interface and advanced customization options, Shareaholic is an excellent choice for websites looking to improve engagement, boost traffic, and add social sharing features alongside related posts.

5. JetEngine

JetEngine is a powerful plugin designed for advanced website customization, including related posts with thumbnails. Unlike traditional related post plugins, JetEngine provides dynamic content creation tools, allowing users to build custom post relations and display related content in unique ways. With support for Elementor and Gutenberg, users can design visually appealing related post sections without coding. It includes custom query builder options, advanced filtering, and dynamic listing grids, making it perfect for websites that require a tailored approach. While it offers extensive functionality beyond related posts, its flexibility makes it a strong choice for advanced WordPress users.

6. Inline Related Posts

Inline Related Posts is a unique related posts plugin that inserts post recommendations directly within the content, rather than at the end. This strategy improves user engagement by capturing readers’ attention while they are still consuming the article. The plugin allows customization of styling, placement, and behavior, ensuring seamless integration with your website’s design. It also supports responsive layouts and performance optimizations to ensure fast loading times. With its eye-catching in-content display, Inline Related Posts is an excellent tool for bloggers and publishers looking to keep visitors engaged without disrupting the reading experience.

7. Related Posts for WordPress

Related Posts for WordPress is a performance-optimized plugin that displays related posts using thumbnails and text. Unlike many other plugins, it stores related post data in a separate table to reduce database load and improve site speed. It features a user-friendly interface for customizing layouts, thumbnail sizes, and display styles. Users can manually select related posts or allow the plugin’s algorithm to suggest relevant content. With support for caching, shortcode placement, and widget integration, this plugin provides an efficient way to boost user engagement while keeping website performance intact.

8. Custom Related Posts

Custom Related Posts is a simple yet effective plugin that allows manual selection of related posts. Unlike automated plugins, it gives full control over which posts appear as related content, making it ideal for curated recommendations. The plugin supports both thumbnails and text-based displays, with customization options for styling and layout. It includes widget support, shortcode functionality, and compatibility with block editors like Gutenberg. Since it does not rely on complex algorithms, it is lightweight and fast, ensuring minimal impact on website performance. This makes it a great choice for users who prefer a hands-on approach to related posts management.