by Syed Balkhi 5 (9 reviews)

Compact Archives

Name: Compact Archives
Rating: 5.0 (9 reviews)
Author: Syed Balkhi

Displays a smart monthly archive of posts in a more compact form rather than the default long archive widget.

Compact Archives ranks #5,033 among WordPress.org plugins with 2,000+ active installations, is #685 of 8,848 in the Customization category, a 5/5 rating from 9 reviews, and was last updated Feb 17, 2026. Data from WordPress.org, refreshed twice daily — see methodology.

Tested up to WP 6.9.11 (Current: 7.1.4)

v4.1.1 Current Version v4.1.1

Updated 8 months ago Last Update on 17 Feb, 2026

Refreshed 6 days ago Last Refreshed on

#685 of 8,848 in Customization Top 10% by installs Downloads -35.2% this week

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Rank

#5,033

— No change

Active Installs

2K+

-28.4%

KW Avg Position

8.8

0.3 worse

Downloads

56.8K

+1 today

Support Resolved

— No change

Rating

100%

Review 5 out of 5

5 (9 reviews)

Next Milestone 3K

Total Progress 78.9%

2K+ 3K+

850

Ranks to Climb

Growth Needed

8,000,000

Active Installs

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Rank Changes

Current #5,033

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Active Installs Growth

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Active Installs 0,000,000+

Growth +0.0%

Peak 0,000,000

Downloads Growth

Downloads

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Peak

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Reviews & Ratings

5.0

9 reviews

Overall 100%

9 (100%)

0 (0%)

Security History

Source: WPVulnerability

1 known vulnerability on record · 1 in the last 24 months · checked 3 months ago

Sep 22, 2025

Compact Archives [compact-archives] < 4.1.1

CVE-2025-58001 · Fixed in v4.1.1

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Plugin Details

Version: 4.1.1
Last Updated: Feb 17, 2026
Requires WP: 4.8+
Tested Up To: 6.9.11
PHP Version: 5.6 or higher
Author: Syed Balkhi

Support & Rating

Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 5
Reviews: 9
Support Threads: 0
Resolved: 0%

Keywords

archive archives monthly archive widget yearly archive

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TL;DR

AI summary of the plugin's readme

This plugin is for owners of established WordPress blogs who want a neater archives display than the default widget. It condenses the monthly post archive into a compact list instead of the usual long archive widget.

Compact monthly archive display
Multiple display formats (full, abbreviated, numeric)
Sidebar widget support
Works with Gutenberg Block Editor
Works with Classic Editor
Suitable for archives page body

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about Compact Archives

The template tag, compact_archive, has some parameters: compact_archive($style='initial', $before='<li>', $after='</li>'); If $style == 'initial' (the default) the display will fit into a sidebar: 2009: J F M A M J J A S O N D 2008: J F M A M J J A S O N D 2007: J F M A M J J A S O N D If $style == 'block' the display will be wide enough to fill the main column of a page: 2009: Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec 2008: Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec 2007: Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec If $style == 'numeric' the display will use month numbers: 2009: 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 2008: 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 2007: 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 $before and $after wrap each line of output. The default values make each line of the archive into a list item: <ul> <?php compact_archive(); ?> </ul>

The shortcode [compact_archive] works just like the template tag. It accepts the following parameters: style - Display format: initial (default), block, or numeric before - Wrapper tag: li (default), p, div, or span. Can be written with or without angle brackets. classname - Custom CSS class(es) to add to the container Examples: [compact_archive style="block"] - Display archives in block format. [compact_archive style="numeric" before="p"] - Display in numeric form, wrapped in paragraph tags. [compact_archive before="div" classname="my-archive custom-class"] - Wrap each line in a div with custom CSS classes.

Compact Archive comes with a sidebar widget located Appearance -> Widgets. Drag and drop Compact Archives Widget to your sidebar. The widget has three option fields. You can provide your widget a title if you want or leave it blank. You can choose a display layout from Select the Style option. It has three layout choices to choose from which are initials, block, and numeric. Tansform text option can be left to No Transformation or you can tansform text style to UPPERCASE or Capitalize.

The year links at the start of each line are wrapped in tags while months with no posts are wrapped with so you can differentiate them visually using your style sheet. You can also use the classname attribute in the shortcode to add custom CSS classes: [compact_archive classname="my-custom-archive"]

The plugin chooses month names and abbreviations according to the language locale, WPLANG, set in wp-config.php. Compact Archives also honours whatever kind of permalink pattern you have set.