Nofollow Case by Case
For unmodified links Nofollow Case by Case works like a (do)follow plugin for WordPress. It simply removes rel=”nofollow” from your comment links.
Consider an alternative
Nofollow Case by Case shows warning signs in 2026 — compare the alternatives below before installing. It runs on 200+ sites, is rated 5/5 and was last updated 13 years ago, and scores 33/100 on our health check.
- Small user base (200+ active installs)
- Very few reviews so far
- No update in 12 years
- Only tested up to WordPress 3.7 (latest is 7.1)
How does it stack up?
Side-by-side on installs, updates, ratings & support
Daily downloads
Download spikes usually follow a new release — each site that auto-updates counts as a download.
Rankings
Where Nofollow Case by Case stands todayWordPress.org search rankings
Live position in the plugin search, top 100| Keyword | Position |
|---|---|
| administration | >100 |
| comments | >100 |
| dofollow | #45 |
| links | >100 |
| nofollow | >100 |
Version adoption
Share of active sites per release.
Rating breakdown
★★★★★★★★★★ 5 from 2 reviews
About Nofollow Case by Case
From the official readme · v1.5.6Description
For unmodified links Nofollow Case by Case works like a (do)follow plugin for WordPress. It simply removes rel=”nofollow” from your comment links.
Whenever you get the feeling that one of your comment links might be able to harm your own website reputation, if you think about SEO and found a link that looks a bit like spam but should not be deleted, you can replace nofollow to every single comment link at any time. If you want to replace nofollow for a link like that you simply add /dontfollow at the end of the link. You can do this for author links in comments as well as for the links you find in the text.
This is what the plugin will do automatically:
1. Clean up some code:
It tries to remove all variants of rel=”nofollow”, target=”blank” and rel=”external” from comment author links and other links in comments first. A link will become a “real link” no matter if it is a pingback, a trackback or a “real comment”.
2. Fix semantical incorrectness:
The plugin now applies rel=”external” – but ONLY for external links!
3. jQuery functions of Nofollow Case by Case:
a) The plugin detects rel=”external” in comments and opens those links in a new window.
No need for target=”_blank” which would not validate in XMTML. jQuery replacement does.
b) The plugin tries to correct author urls that could not be fully replaced before.
This has something to do with template development. Find more information on this within the FAQ.
Add on
You can try this NFCBC SEO Plugin ADD-on for easier comment management. The plugin is an old one using javascript but still works. I currently do not have the time to rebuild it. A new version should later support Ajax and nonces and on the other hand will not support old versions of WordPress anymore.
Alternative Tool
NFCBC SEO Light could be used alternatively. It suggests “follow” or “nofollow” or “no link” automatically, depending on comments length. This plugin might be updated soon. I personally prefer Nofollow Case by Case.
Need more information?
I have updated the FAQ for Nofollow Case by Case and the German description can be found at the old place as well:
Contact
For further information please send me an email.
Installation
Simply search for this plugin from the plugins section of your blog admin, use automatic install and activate Nofollow Case by Case.
OR
- Download the plugin here.
- Unzip the plugin folder.
- Put the complete folder into your plugin folder of WordPress (e.g. into the
/wp-content/plugins/directory). - Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu in WordPress.
Changelog
1.5.6
- Plugin compatibility check for WordPress 3.8 (RC2).
1.5.5
- Bug fix for WordPress versions between 3.5 and 3.6 (3.5.1 and 3.5.2).
1.5.4
- Added support for WordPress 3.6 (Sorry for being late with this. I have been informed about issues with line breakes in WP 3.6 today. Fixed it asap.)
1.5.3
- Added support for avatar links of the Hybrid Theme Framework
1.5.2
- This is mainly a performance update. I changed the callback (regex) for two reasons:
- Allow upper and lower case letters in URL replacements (for better compatibility with upper case configurations) and
- allow optimization of the included callback function used to replace rel=”external” (because str_replace seems to do the job up to two times faster than preg_replace here).
- Pushed back rel=”external” to the end of link anchors by the way and cleaned up some more code.
- Included deeper support for the mix of single and double quotes in link replacements, depending on WordPress functions used. The plugin now fills in rel=’external’ for single quoted links (if it is an external link) and rel=”external” for links that originally were prepared with double quotes.
1.5.1
- Minimalistic update for people who might have rel=’nofollow external’ in use.
Screenshots
For developers
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FAQ
Nofollow Case by Case: quick answers
Straight answers, pulled from live WordPress.org data.
Live data from WordPress.org · checked Oct 2, 2026
Is Nofollow Case by Case free?
Yes. Nofollow Case by Case is free to download and use from the official WordPress.org plugin directory.
Is Nofollow Case by Case safe to use in 2026?
Nofollow Case by Case shows warning signs in 2026 — compare the alternatives below before installing. It runs on 200+ sites, is rated 5/5 and was last updated 13 years ago, and scores 33/100 on our health check.
How many websites use Nofollow Case by Case?
Nofollow Case by Case is active on 200+ WordPress websites and has been downloaded 39,020 times since it launched in March 2007. It was downloaded 87 times in the last 30 days.
Does Nofollow Case by Case work with WordPress 7.1?
Nofollow Case by Case is officially tested up to WordPress 3.7.41, while the latest release is 7.1.2. It may still work, but try it on a staging site first.
When was Nofollow Case by Case last updated?
The latest version, 1.5.6, was released on December 10, 2013 (13 years ago).
Who makes Nofollow Case by Case?
Nofollow Case by Case is developed and maintained by fob.
What are the best alternatives to Nofollow Case by Case?
The most popular alternatives to Nofollow Case by Case are Adminimize (200K+ installs), Remove Dashboard Access (30K+ installs) and Error Log Monitor (20K+ installs).
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