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Are you one of over 1 million websites with Jetpack installed?
If you are, then the real question is: Are you getting the most out of this immense and powerful plugin? Or are you missing out on features hidden amongst all the menus?
Jetpack has an epic 42 modules stashed away inside it. Do you know what they all are?
I’d wager that there are many that you may not have realised were even there. As they don’t show up in the Settings menu. Sneaky and confusing right?
What if you had a master list of all the modules with comprehensive details on what each one does? Whether they are enabled by default. How to enable them if they’re not. If it’s a free feature or options are gated behind paid plans. And where to obtain details on the more advanced settings.
Well, keep reading to discover all those valuable details you might have missed out on previously. So you can utilise the benefits of using Jetpack to a jaw-dropping maximum!
Your Hidden Jetpack Modules Page
Let’s start with discovering your Jetpack Modules page! Where you can take a sneak peek at all the modules covered in this master list. To access yours enter the URL below, switching out your-website-url for your own address:
your-website-url/wp-admin/admin.php?page=jetpack_modules
Once you see a page like this, you’ll know you are in the right place.
This is the one central place to enable or disable each module. Including those which are not in the Settings menus. By default they are shown in alphabetical order, which is the order they will be covered here.
Get this: A lot of the modules are now enabled by default. However, if you’ve had Jetpack installed for awhile this may not be the case. Your modules will not suddenly enable themselves to reflect these changes. This makes your module page vital. As you can quickly and simply check what is enabled. What isn’t. And enable or disable modules if you like as we go through each one.
1 – Beautiful Maths (Free)
Enabled by default.
If you use complex mathematical equations or phrases, then this module may be of interest to you. As it let’s you write like this:
Check out how you can write your own here.
2 – Carousel (Free)
Disabled by default. It can be enabled by going to Jetpack > Settings > Writing and under Media switching on Display images and galleries in a gorgeous, full-screen browsing experience
This allows you to transform basic WordPress galleries into full-screen image carousels which support comments from viewers.
You can also enable Exif to appear which will show photo metadata in the carousel like the camera, aperture, focal length etc. Something photographers might find useful.
There is a black version or white version which can be selected depending on your preferences and what goes best with your WordPress theme.
The Title of the image will be used for the bold text under the image. Any caption text will be used in a smaller font underneath the image but above the title text.
The carousel doesn’t support videos.
3 – Comment Likes (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable it go to Jetpack > Settings > Discussion and toggling Enable comment likes
Activating this displays a small blue star with ‘Like’ next to it, under each comment.
Clicking on the blue star is the same as Liking something on Facebook. And will change the blue star to a golden one that says ‘Liked by you’.
It’s an extra way for you to interact with readers in the comments and for them to interact with each other.
If you like this feature in Facebook it’s a straight forward click to enable it on your blogs comments.
4 – Comments (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable go to Jetpack > Settings > Discussion and toggle on Let readers use WordPress.com, Twitter, Facebook or Google+ accounts to comment
This will replace the default WordPress comment system.
It saves your visitors the hassle of having to create another login. They can simply use a login they already have.
The comment section added to your posts are uncluttered and minimalist. Both the Comments heading and colour scheme can be adjusted to suit your site. The colour scheme options are Light, Dark or Transparent.
5 – Contact Form (Free)
Enabled by default.
Allows one simple contact form to be added per Post or Page. It’s a handy way to add a contact form without adding another plugin if you already use Jetpack. It even uses your Themes styles so it doesn’t look at of place.
Check out more details about Jetpack’s Contact Form here. Where it is covered in detail with it’s own blog post.
6 – Custom CSS (Free)
Enabled by default.
This adds more features to the CSS Customizer – a CSS editor in WordPress that allows you to edit the appearance of a theme without creating a child theme.
You can access it through Appearance > Customize > Additional CSS.
The additional settings this module provides are:
Media Width – Overwrites the default size of full-sized images.
Start Fresh – Disables the themes CSS, meaning the custom CSS entered is all that will be applied to the pages. Rather than it being added on.
Preprocessor – Adds support for LESS and Sass.
7 – Custom Content Types (Free)
Enabled by default.
Adds several custom post types to WordPress.
Portfolio – see examples and how to implement here.
Testimonials – more info here.
Simple Food Menus – helps with making online menus, check here for detailed instructions.
Comics – want to post comics then consider trying out Jetpacks Comic Post Type.
8 – Enhanced Distribution (Free)
Enabled by default.
Submits your blog to WordPress.com’s Firehose which is a feed of thousands of new posts and comments hourly.
It can be utilised by search engines and third parties. Getting your content in front of their audiences. Which in turn can help promote your content and extend its reach.
9 – Extra Sidebar Widgets (Free)
Enabled by default.
Adds a variety of new widgets that you can add to your sidebar.
A few of these are:-
- Social Media Icons
- Twitter Timeline
- Gravatar Profile
- Google+ Badge
- Top Posts & Pages
- RSS Links
- MailChimp Subscriber Popup
For a full list check here.
10 – Gravatar Hovercards (Free)
Gravatar is a popular avatar service that lets you link a profile and avatar image to any website that supports it. This helps significantly reduce the amount of different profiles you have to manage for different services.
Gravatars are automatically included in all WordPress.com sites.
Hovercards simply add another layer to Gravatars by showing the Gravatar users profile when hovering over their image.
11 – Infinite Scroll (Free)
Disabled by default. Enable it by going to Jetpack > Settings and toggle on Load more posts as the reader scrolls down
It requires your Theme to support it. If it doesn’t you may see this in the Settings.
If you theme doesn’t support it then it may be possible to edit it, but it requires some code editing to acheive it. Check out this for details.
12 – JSON API (Free)
This is one is mostly for the serious JavaScript code developers. It allows authorization for software and services to access you blog.
13 – Lazy Images (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable it go to Jetpack > Settings > Writing and within the Speed up your site section toggle on the Lazy load images.
Lazy images are designed to improve your websites load speed by only loading images just before you scroll them into view.
It is mostly aimed at improving mobile users experience by boosting page load speeds and reducing bandwidth depending on how many images they actually see.
Which is significant when you consider how many people use their phones to browse the internet.
14 – Likes (Free)
Disabled by default. To activate it go to Jetpack > Settings > Sharing and scroll to the Likes section to toggle on the option.
Similar to Comment Likes it is possible to add a Like button to your Post allowing visitors to easily show when they like a particular post.
In order for this to show you will also need to make sure you have the Sharing module enabled as well.
15 – Markdown (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable go to Settings > Writing > Composing and toggle on Write posts or pages in plain-text Markdown syntax.
If you are familiar with Trello and Markdown it is essentially the same thing. For a quick reference of the the most frequently used Markdown formatting check here.
Markdown is a language that will allow you to format Posts and Pages using the syntax. It is a quick and easy way to format text by flowing with the regular routine of typing.
You can even give your visitors the benefits of being able to format their own comments by enabling Markdown through Jetpack > Discussion and under the Comments section toggling on Enable Markdown use for comments.
16 – Mobile Theme (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable you’ll need to go to Jetpack > Settings > Writing and within the Theme Enhancements section toggle on the Enable the Jetpack Mobile Theme.
This is an option you can use if your current website or theme isn’t mobile friendly. Or if perhaps you don’t like your current theme’s mobile version.
Having a mobile-optimized version of your theme is imperative for giving mobile users a satisfying experience. No one likes menus that don’t work or links that are difficult to click on. Not to mention pages that take forever to load and eat up your data allowance right?
Make sure you check out your website thoroughly both before and after you enable the Jetpack Mobile Theme to ensure it works as expected.
You can discover further advanced customisation and options here.
17 – Monitor (Free)
Enabled by default.
Jetpack will periodically send ping requests to your homepage to check if it is down. If everything is fine it will check again in 5minutes.
But, if it does detect the site might be down it will carry out 3 other tests from separate sever locations to verify. If these also come back indicating your website is down then Jetpack will email you through the email that you used to register with.
Now you can rest a bit easier knowing that Jetpack will give you a heads up if your website stops responding!
18 – Notifications (Free)
Enabled by default.
Jetpack will give you notifications on new comments and likes on your site. These can be sent to your WordPress admin bar, desktop or mobile.
These can be handy for keep up with responding to comments and moderating.
Browser Notifications
To enable notifications in Firefox or Chrome you’ll need to be logged into WordPress and browse to here.
At the top of the screen you should see a Browser Notifications section with a button to Enable. Click on it.
Make sure to Allow Notifications when prompted in the browser.
You’ll start getting any Jetpack notifications through your browser even when you are not directly on WordPress.com.
Mobile Notifications
To enable Jetpacks notifications on your mobile, you will need the notifications enabled in Jetpack. As well as the WordPress Mobile app installed on your smartphone.
Once you’ve signed into the app, you’ll start getting notifications to your phone.
19 – Image CDN / Photon (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable go to Jetpack > Settings and scroll down the section for Speed up your site. Toggle on Serve images from our servers.
Jetpack is one of a few places where you can get your images onto a CDN for free to improve your page load speeds. They currently only support images in posts, pages and the featured images.
Which can make it limited in how much of an improvement you can get. Every little bit counts. But if you want something more dedicated and comprehensive you’ll need to look into a paid CDN service.
20 – Post by Email (Free)
Disabled by default. It can be enabled by going to Jetpack > Settings > Writing and under Post by email toggling on Publish posts by sending an email.
Personally, this is a rather niche module. Most people will find using the WordPress app on a smart device much easier to use.
It’s worth knowing this is a feature Jetpack can provide. If you do have a use for it then a more detailed view of the approach can be found here.
21 – Progressive Web Apps (Free)
My searches weren’t able to dig up any documentation of this module at all.
What I do know is that Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) are related to the shift in more people using mobiles to browse the web over the desktop. The problems that come with this and a collection of web standards which aim to further improve the performance of websites on mobile devices.
Due to the lack of information, I ended up sending a request to Jetpack’s support to ask them the question. They got back to me fairly quickly (within 4 hours).
The response was this:
“It’s not quite a module yet. It’s currently the framework that controls Photon (the image CDN) and Lazy Images. Eventually, it will replace both of those, but currently it’s a placeholder.”
So, if you are using the Image CDN (Photon) or Lazy Images you will want to have this enabled.
22 – Protect (Free)
Disabled by default. Enable it by going to Jetpack > Settings > Security and toggling on Block suspicious-looking sign in activity.
Protect helps to protect your WordPress site by blocking malicious login attempts that come from brute force or distributed brute force attacks.
It can even auto-detect your current IP and gives you the option to whitelist it so Jetpack never blocks it.
23 – Publicize (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable go to Jetpack > Settings > Sharing and toggle on the option under Publicize connections.
The Publicize module in Jetpack automatically shares newly published posts to social media networks. The timing is in sync with the post being published.
If you want to use Publicize to share already published content or set a specific time for content to be shared then these are features locked behind the Premium and Professional plans.
Once the module has been enabled you’ll need to connect your social media profiles to it.
You can do this by clicking on Connect your social media accounts which is underneath the toggle you used to enable the module.
From the next page, you can click on Connect for the social network you want to share on. You can only connect to the social media networks shown in the below screenshot.
Sign into the account and authorize access.
Once you have social networks connected you should Publicize under the Publish settings in any new posts you create.
Note: Clicking on Edit will allow you to turn off any profiles on a post-by-post basis, you can even add a custom message. However, this will be the same for all networks.
24 – Related Posts (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable go to Jetpack > Settings > Traffic and under Related posts toggle on Show related content after posts.
Related Posts adds links to other posts on your website. Jetpack tries to analyze and determine the most related content to share at the end of an article.
The biggest advantage of using Jetpack to generate your related posts is that they do the analysis on their own servers. Which lets you keep what could become a heavy processing load off your own servers.
It’s worth noting, however, that Jetpacks related posts will only show if they can locate 3 good results.
More advanced options are a little tricky to implement as they often require editing your theme’s function file, check here if you are interested to find out more.
25 – Sharing (Free)
Disabled by default. You can enable by going to Jetpack > Settings > Sharing and under the Sharing buttons section toggle on Add sharing buttons to your posts.
Once enabled you need to select which social media network buttons show.
To do this click on the Configure your sharing buttons just under the button you used to toggle the module on.
In the configuration screen, you can change the header by clicking Edit label text.
You can click + Add sharing buttons to choose which social media buttons to show.
To change the order of the buttons you will need to click Reorder to drag and drop the buttons.
Clicking + Add “More” button adds an extra button which you can use to hide less popular buttons into a submenu.
There’s also a few different button styles, and the Like button.
Make sure to Save changes you want to keep.
26 – Shortcode Embeds (Free)
Enabled by default.
Shortcode Embeds allow you to easily insert media into your Posts and Pages. Such as Youtube, Twitchtv, Soundcloud, Spotify, Google Docs, etc.
For a full list of supported Shortcodes check here.
27 – Single Sign On (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable go to Jetpack > Settings > Security and toggle it on under the WordPress.com log in.
This basically allows people to use the same login for WordPress to log into your website.
28 – Site Stats (Free)
Enabled by default.
Provides easy but also basic stats about your WordPress site including the number of visitors, post and page popularity.
You should be able to see the stats through Dashboard > Home.
If however you don’t, you may need to click on Screen Options in the top right-hand corner of the dashboard and tick Site Stats.
Once everything is set up you’ll see a bar chart on your WordPress Dashboard.
29 – Site Verification (Free)
Enabled by default.
This can be used to insert code provided by Google Search Console, Bing Webmaster Center, Pinterest Site Verification and Yandex.Webmaster, so you can verify your website with their services.
It is not required to get your site indexed by search engines.
If you need to add different verification codes to your website like Adsense or Bloglovin’ then I recommend you check out How to Edit Your Header Using 5 Alternative Ways.
30 – Sitemaps (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable go to Jetpack > Settings > Traffic and scroll to Sitemaps, toggle on Generate XML sitemaps.
You can access the sitemaps generated by Jetpack via yoursiteURL.com/sitemap.xml
Having a sitemap is beneficial for all websites as it makes it easier for Google and other search engines to index your site.
If your website is new you can also use it to submit to search engines to get your pages indexed quicker as it can take awhile if you wait for it to be done automatically.
Beware: You do not want to enable this if you are using any other tool to generate an XML Sitemap for example SEO Yoast can do this if enabled.
31 – Spelling and Grammar (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable go to Jetpack > Settings > Writing and under the section Composing toggle on Check your spelling, style, and grammar.
This module has several options to make proofreading easier and tries to improve grammar and style by highlighting certain issues.
There is also an option to add phrases that you want to be ignored.
I like to use this to proofread my text once and then use Grammarly to do a second proofing, followed by a manual one.
32 – Subscriptions (Free)
Enabled by default.
This will add the options to subscribe to comments or posts for your visitors.
It’s also possible to add a Widget for it into your sidebar if you prefer. More details here.
33 – Tiled Galleries (Free)
Enabled by default. Also requires enabling Serve images from our servers via Jetpack > Settings > Writing and under Speed up your site.
In the Post Editor if you click Add Media and then select from the left-hand menu Create Gallery. You can select several images to Create a new gallery.
Several Gallery options will appear, which you can use to customize the look.
Tiled Galleries specifically gives you extra Type options – such as Tiled Mosaic, Square Tiles, Circles etc.
Here’s an example of what Tiled Mosaic looks like:
Play around with the settings to get the appearance you prefer. This also works in combination with the Carousel module.
34 – WP.me Shortlinks (Free)
Enabled by default.
A similar option to link shorteners like TinyURL. This is a WordPress specific one that will supposedly be permanent so long as WordPress.com is around. These links are only for Posts and Pages though!
If you’ve been using Goo.gl to shorten your links for your WordPress Posts and Pages, you may have also heard that their service is shutting down completely a year after March 2018. Perhaps WP.me would be a convenient alternative?
So long as you enable WP.me Shortlinks and then Jetpacks Sharing buttons. The sharing buttons will use the WP.me Shortlinks instead of numerical permalinks.
If you need to get the WP.me shortlink for a post or page, then you can get it from the Editor page.
Click on Get Shortlink button next to your post or pages permalink.
A new dialogue will appear showing the WP.me URL which you can copy and paste to where you need it.
35 – Widget Visibility (Free)
Enabled by default.
Want to have a Widget only appear on certain pages and hidden on others? This module aims to do just that!
To adjust the visibility of your Widgets using Jetpack you will need to go to Appearance > Customize > Widgets.
From here you can expand the section that your widgets are used in. Like the Primary Sidebar.
Don’t see your widget area? It might not be used on your homepage which is what opens by default. If you browse to a page that uses different widget sections the list will change.
For example, my home page doesn’t use the Primary Sidebar widget, so I had to browse to a post using the preview on the right. Once I did this the Primary Sidebar widget appeared.
Once you select a widget section, it will show you a list of any widgets that have been added.
If you click the downward triangle to the right side of the widget, it will expand to show the current settings for it.
In the bottom right corner there will be a Visibility button.
Clicking on it will show the Visibility options you can use to create rules specific to the widget.
You can control the visibility of a widget using Category, Author, User, Role, Tag, Date and Page values.
Click Apply once done to save any settings.
36 – WordPress.com Toolbar (Free)
Disabled by default. To enable go to Jetpack > Settings > Writing and toggle on the option under WordPress.com toolbar.
This makes the toolbar that appears at the top of the screen when logged in to WordPress.com change to a different version. This is mostly a matter of preference.
So try toggling it on to try for yourself and if you don’t like it you can switch back easily. I personally prefer not to have this toggled on.
37 – Ads (Paid)
For 9$ per month on Jetpacks Premium Plan you can get access to their Ad Networks which include brands like Amazon, Yahoo, Google etc.
However, based on other users and reviews the Ad Revenue you can earn varies a lot and is unpredictable. Unless you have “hundreds of thousands of pageviews” it’s arguably not worth it.
38 – Data Backups (Paid)
For $3.50 per month on Jetpack’s Personal Plan will give you access to their basic backup system. Which will automatically take a daily backup of your website and keep an archive of backups for the last 30 days.
If you want features like Real-time automated backups and access to an unlimited archive of backups you’ll need to upgrade to their Professional Plan at a much more pricey cost of $29 per month.
39 – Google Analytics (Paid)
Part of their Premium Plan for $9 per month. You basically get more stats and reports as Jetpack can pull details from Google Analytics. If you already use Google Analytics then this is just a way to view Jetpack and Google site stats in one place.
Considering Google Analytics is free and you can get much more info out of it. I definitely do not recommend getting a Premium Plan just for this.
40 – SEO Tools (Paid)
Also, included in their Premium Plan. It adds features to help with optimizing your SEO. Including features like customizing titles, meta-descriptions and live previews of what your content will look like on Google, Facebook, Twitter and WordPress.com.
Most of which, the free version of Yoast SEO will do for you, plus more.
41 – Search (Paid)
Only available on the most expensive Professional Plan at $29 per month. This gives you access to a more powerful search to replace the default WordPress one. It aims to provide more relevant search results almost instantly regardless of your website size.
Only recommended if you have a large website and rely heavily on visitors ability to search your site.
42 – VideoPress (Paid)
Unlimited video hosting for Premium Plans and above, but it is mostly aimed at videos 1GB and under.
Supports MP4, WMV, AVI, OGG, 3GPP and 3GPP2 file types.
Is Jetpack Worth it?
Paid vs Free
Many of the free modules of Jetpack are well worth the install. Related Posts, Image CDN, and all of the security improvements. Anything you don’t want to use you can turn off so it doesn’t load for your site.
The paid features are limited to niche uses though. Unless you have a website that strongly relies on videos or internal searches the more expensive paid plans don’t offer much in terms of value.
The most valuable Plans are the Personal Plan at $3.50 per month to get access to the backups and the Premium Plans ($9 per month) for better security features like automated malware scans and security fixes (these don’t seem to have their own modules).
It’s worth noting that there is basic support for free accounts. Paid accounts get priority support though.