Pingchecker
Scans post for links, checks if they are pingeable and sends pingbacks with results returned, improves chances of successful pings!
Consider an alternative
Pingchecker shows warning signs in 2026 — compare the alternatives below before installing. It runs on 10+ sites and was last updated 15 years ago, and scores 23/100 on our health check.
- Small user base (10+ active installs)
- Very few reviews so far
- No update in 15 years
- Only tested up to WordPress 3.1 (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 Pingchecker stands todayWordPress.org search rankings
Live position in the plugin search, top 100| Keyword | Position |
|---|---|
| backlink | >100 |
| ping | >100 |
| pingback | >100 |
| pingchecker | #1 |
| trackback | >100 |
Version adoption
Share of active sites per release.
About Pingchecker
From the official readme · v1.2.0Description
Pingchecker is a free plugin for WordPress that allows you to scan your post’s content for
links, check the pingability of those resources you’ve linked to, and manually ping those
pages. This improves upon the inbuilt fuctionality of WordPress by allowing you to receive
the results of your attempted pings whereas WordPress doesn’t. (With WordPress your ping
either appears in the trackback list or it doesn’t, with no explanation or error codes.)
Also included is a workaround for a bug in the WordPress XML RPC server that prevents many
of your pingbacks from succeeding without you even knowing about it! When you ping another
blogs server, it will check the page you linked, BUT because of this bug, sometimes it can’t
find the link at all. This workaround adds a hidden div to your footer with your links so
they can be found, greatly improving your chances of a successful ping.
Recommended Use
- Before publishing your post, use Pingchecker to check the pingability of the resources
you are linking to. If they aren’t, you may wish to choose alternative similar resources
that are pingable instead. - Then, publish your post and WordPress will attempt to ping the resources automatically
as it normally would. Check the trackback list under your content box to see if your ping
was successful as usual. - If the new trackback/pingback does not appear, use Pingchecker to ping the resource
instead. The results of your attempted pings will be returned in an alert box.
The XML RPC Server Bug Workaround
While working on this plugin I noticed a large occurrence of the pingback fault 17:
“The source URL does not contain a link to the target URL, and so cannot be used as a source.”
A really frustrating message given you are sending a pingback because the source DOES contain
a link to the target, yes? Might I point out that very few WordPress users are aware of this
even happening because nowhere does WordPress actually return you these fault codes..!
Well, after a bit of testing I found the bug seems to be in the XML RPC server code for
Wordpress, specifically the strip_tags function in PHP is just not reliable enough for getting
anchor links on the variety of WordPress templates out there (IMHO). (Line 3422 in WP3.1)
Unfortunately, since the bug is in the server code itself, you can’t fix it on someone elses
blog can you? That’s why this is a workaround instead. The Pingchecker workaround will scan
your post content for links using regex instead, then echo a hidden div element containing
all the links (with an added nofollow tag so you aren’t linking twice) in your blogs footer,
which is picked up much more easily by the strip_tags function in use by the server.
Installation
- Upload ‘pingchecker.php’ to the ‘/wp-content/plugins/’ directory.
- Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu in WordPress.
- Use the Pingchecker box on your post writing screen.
Changelog
Major update to include the new workaround for the XML RPC server bug, improving your ping success rate.
1.2.0
- Added the ability to check for pingback approvals.
1.1.0
- Fixes a major WordPress XML RPC server bug with a workaround. See Note.
1.0.0
- Pingchecker Plugin released. WOOHOO!
For developers
Is this your plugin? Show off the numbers.
Add a live badge to your site, docs or GitHub README. It updates on its own — no account needed.
Best Pingchecker alternatives
All backlink plugins →
FAQ
Pingchecker: quick answers
Straight answers, pulled from live WordPress.org data.
Live data from WordPress.org · checked Sep 30, 2026
Is Pingchecker free?
Yes. Pingchecker is free to download and use from the official WordPress.org plugin directory.
Is Pingchecker safe to use in 2026?
Pingchecker shows warning signs in 2026 — compare the alternatives below before installing. It runs on 10+ sites and was last updated 15 years ago, and scores 23/100 on our health check.
How many websites use Pingchecker?
Pingchecker is active on 10+ WordPress websites and has been downloaded 4,116 times since it launched in April 2011. It was downloaded 40 times in the last 30 days.
Does Pingchecker work with WordPress 7.1?
Pingchecker is officially tested up to WordPress 3.1.4, while the latest release is 7.1.2. It may still work, but try it on a staging site first.
When was Pingchecker last updated?
The latest version, 1.2.0, was released on July 7, 2011 (15 years ago).
Who makes Pingchecker?
Pingchecker is developed and maintained by Tony Hayes.
What are the best alternatives to Pingchecker?
The most popular alternatives to Pingchecker are Backlink Checker (20+ installs), Link Back Badge Widget (10+ installs) and Parent Page Link (10+ installs).
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