Which WordPress Blog Plugins Are A Must?

very more Plugins!Must:+Bookmark Me – Supports bookmarking to many international sites including German, Dutch, Lithuanian and more.
+(Social Networking Plugins)ComplexLife – Allows you to set up a page on your WordPress blog to track a large number of social services. Will also will track comments left on other blogs and forums.

The 2 that I always use are Google XML Sitemaps and All in One SEO Pack.

Google XML Sitemaps will automatically update your sitemap every time you add a new post or page.

All in One SEO Pack allows you to easily page each page or post SEO features.

It's good to have an SEO plugin like the "All-in-One SEO" plugin as well as social media plugins for things like Twitter, Facebook, and so on. Blogs are interactive now, so they look for stuff like that. It's also good to keep your comments open, but you need to monitor them. Throw in a contact form as well.

Joey

Google XML Sitemaps
All In One SEO
cbnet Ping Optimizer
Chennai Central
Broken Link Checker
WP Super Cache

For me, it depends on the kind of site you're setting up. Google XML Sitemaps and All in One SEO Pack mentioned by dexter315 are both very good.
For IMers, wpinsert can be pretty handy (It lets you insert ads/html in many places.)
I like WP Stealth for cloaking affiliate links.
Akismet is great at detecting spam comments.
Easy Privacy Policy does what it says.
PC Robots.txt for your robots.text file.
Flexi Pages Widget lets you list pages and subpages on the sidebar.
GTranslate - 58 language translations.
SEO Friendly Images
WPtouch - makes your site mobile touch ready.
Yet Another Related Posts Plugin helps bring relevant posts to site visitors.
If I remember correctly, these are all free plugins. I have some paid ones I like, and some that are more specific to my needs that I chose not to list here.
I hope some of these are helpful to you.

Jim Waller

I totally agree with the others!

Google XML Sitemaps & All In One SEO are 2 essential plugins.

The thing to remember is that it is not necessary to use too many plugins. Too many plugins can actually be a distraction. You can waste a lot of time if you try to learn about so many plugins out there.

All the best,
David Loi

Pretty Link Lite is pretty awesome, not just for creating prettier URLs, but also for tracking clicks.

Akismet
All in One SEO Pack
Easy Privacy Policy
Google XML Sitemaps

Pretty link- if you are doing any online marketing. I`m not mentioning the ones been repeated like all in one seo, etc. This should be already considered due to # of downloads.

All in One SEO Something I always recommend .. It is so easy to use and the Meta Data and Title is displayed perfectly

Simple facebook like is a good one for getting likes to your pages

All in one SEO Pack
WangGuard
WP Minify
Sitewide Newsletters

BWP Google XML Sitemaps
Contextual Related Posts
NoSpamNX

I'd say must haves are:
- All In One SEO:- Nice and simple plugin for adding SEO titles, meta descriptions and meta keywords.
- Dynamic Content Gallery:- If you've got a regularly update, content blog this one's a great way to feature your most recent posts with a large rotating image gallery.
- Feedburner Feedsmith:- Simple solution for managing your feeds through Feedburner.
- Google XML Sitemaps:- Automated solution for generating Google Sitemaps.
- WP Minify:- Minifies JS and CSS to make your blog load faster.
- WP Smush.it:- Reduces the size of images to improve blog load times.
- WP Super Cache:- Caches your WordPress files and improves your blog load times.

Those plugins sort out your blog load times, RSS feeds and SEO data and make managing these three areas MUCH easier. I wouldn't start any WordPress blog without them and for me they are an absolute must.

I'd also recommend the following plugins but they're not an absolute must - just very nice to have:
- Fast Secure Contact Form:- Great way to add a contact form to your WordPress blog with a CAPTCHA code for security.
- GD Star Rating:- Allows users to rate your blog posts and then you can display the top rated posts in your sidebar.
- Quick Adsense:- If you have an Adsense blog this one is a nice, simple solution for inserting Adsense code within and around your post content.
- Related Post Thumbnails:- Visually pleasing way to display relevant blog posts with images at the bottom of each post.
- Shareaholic:- Visually pleasing way to display social bookmarking buttons.
- Social Media Widget:- Simple solution for linking to your social profiles.
- Subscribe to Comments:- Allows readers to subscribe to comments and get notified by email when a new comment is made.
- Ultimate Google Analytics:- Nice and simple solution for adding Google Analytics tracking code to your blog.
- Wordpress Thread Comment:- Threads comments so that the original comment and its replies are grouped together.

Hope this helps,

Tom

I personally think StatePress is cool. It helps you to track the traffic in your site (besides Google Analytics).

I agree with many of the above.

I personally would substute All in One SEO with Yoast SEO..but either one is very good.

I also like to use one of the onpage SEO scorers, such as Easy WP SEO, SEO Pressor, or Clickbump.

They arent really mandatory, but I find they are quite helpful.

Akisme
Yoast wordpress seo
Broken Link Checker
WP Super Cache
Yet Another Related Posts Plugin
Pretty Link
Easy Wp Seo or SEO Smart Links

Wordpress SEO
Google XML Sitemaps
Akismet
Broken Link Checker
WP Super Cache
Roo Link Directory

WP Subscribers
All in one SEO
SEOPressor

Not one plugin is essential if you don't need it to reach the goal you have set for your site. Confusing? Thought so.

Honestly, there are about 4 plugins I use on practically all my blogs, all the rest depends on what I want to do with my blog. I always use All in one SEO (or you could use Platinum SEO pack, both help improve the on site SEO), then I have the Simple Google Sitemap plugin, the Easy Contact plugin ('cause I always want a contact page) and the WP Syndicator plugin ('cause I'm too lazy to build my own backlinks LOL).

Besides those it depends, do I want a page with youtube videos in my niche, I'll use Tubepress, if I need a privacy policy, I'll use Easy Privacy Policy, but I'll delete the plugin once the page is created.

The one rule I have is this: I ask myself the question "Am I adding this plugin because I want it or because I need it?". If I only want it, I usually don't get it, if I need it, I'll add it.

The same for my clients. I have a list of plugins I mention in my salespage, but if they don't need them all, I'll tell them so and don't add them. No need to slow down the blog for nothing.

Leslie