Simple User Listing
Other plugins output paginated lists of users, but I needed to be able to customize and style this list to fit my theme. So I created this plugin to use templates that can be overridden and customized by theme…
Use with caution
Simple User Listing works, but test it on a staging site before relying on it in 2026. It runs on 900+ sites, is rated 5/5 and was last updated 2 years ago, and scores 42/100 on our health check.
- Small user base (900+ active installs)
- No update in over a year
- Only tested up to WordPress 6.7 (latest is 7.1)
How does it stack up?
Side-by-side on installs, updates, ratings & supportDaily downloads
Download spikes usually follow a new release — each site that auto-updates counts as a download.
Rankings
Where Simple User Listing stands todayWordPress.org search rankings
Live position in the plugin search, top 100| Keyword | Position |
|---|---|
| authors | >100 |
| directory | >100 |
| users | >100 |
Version adoption
Share of active sites per release.
Rating breakdown
★★★★★★★★★★ 5 from 17 reviews
About Simple User Listing
From the official readme · v2.0.4Description
Other plugins output paginated lists of users, but I needed to be able to customize and style this list to fit my theme. So I created this plugin to use templates that can be overridden and customized by theme developers.
To customize any of the templates, copy the file from the plugin’s “templates” folder to your themes “simple-user-listing” folder.
Usage
Place this shortcode anywhere you’d like to display a full list of all your blog’s users.
[userlist]
By default the plugin will print out the users based on the “Posts per Page” setting under Settings->Reading, but this and many other settings can be changed via the shortcode’s parameters.
Support
If after reading the FAQ you still need help, support is handled in the WordPress forums. Please note that support is limited and does not cover any custom implementation of the plugin.
Please report any bugs, errors, warnings, code problems to Github
Installation
- Upload the
pluginfolder to the/wp-content/plugins/directory - Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu in WordPress
- Add the shortcode [userlist] anywhere you wish to display a list of users
Frequently asked questions
How Can I Customize the Output?
The whole reason I wrote this was that other similar plugins had too much control over the output. You can style the output anyway you’d like by adding your own template parts to your theme. Copy the files you wish to modify from the simple-user-listing/templates folder of the plugin and paste them into a simple-user-listing folder in the root of your theme (so my-theme/simple-user-listing). Now you can change the markup any way you please. It will be similar to template parts for post loops, except you will have access to each user’s $user object instead of the $post object. For more details…
How Do I Remove the Search Input?
There are two ways to remove the search input. The search is added to a hook by the plugin, so you can remove it by adding the following to your theme’s functions.php file: function remove_SUL_search() { remove_action( 'simple_user_listing_before_loop', 'sul_template_user_search' ); } add_action( 'simple_user_listing_before_loop', 'remove_SUL_search', 5 ); Or you could copy the search-author.php from the plugin’s template folder to a simple-user-listing folder in your theme (so simple-user-listing/searcch-author.php) and remove all the code from it so that it is blank.
Shortcode Paramaters: How Can I Customize the User Query?
Simple User Listing supports most of the parameters of the WP_User_Query class as parameters for the shortcode. For example you can pass it a role defining which type of users you’d like to list. You can also adjust the number of users displayed per page. Roles must be in lowercase. [userlist role="author" number="5"] As of version 1.2 you can now sort the user list by and of the sort parameters supported by WP_User_Query(). For example, the following would list your users based on number of posts written, with the highest first. [userlist orderby="post_count" order="DESC"] As of version 1.4…
How Can I Sort the Users by Last Name?
As of verison 1.5.2 you could simply use the following as your shortcode: [userlist meta_key="last_name" orderby="meta_value" order="ASC"]
How can I search by a meta field? ex: Last Name
While you could modify the search-author.php template, if you are only searching by one field it isn’t really neccessary. You will, however, need to modify the shortcode’s arguments for WP_User_Query. You can do that by filtering sul_user_query_args. Add the following to your theme’s functions.php: /** * Place this in your theme's functions.php file * Or a site-specific plugin * */ // Switch the WP_User_Query args to a meta search function kia_meta_search( $args ) { // This $_GET is the name field of the custom input in search-author.php. $search = ( isset($_GET['as']) ) ?…
How Can I Search By Display Name?
By default the WordPress search relies on username, though wih the search_columns parameter can be made to search the user’s email or ID. Frankly, I think this is weird, but that’s how WordPress works. It is much more useful to search by the user’s display name, however this requires some trickery via the pre_user_query hook. Similar to pre_get_posts this is your last chance to change the WP_User_Query query before it is executed. I’ve built in a query_id variable so that you don’t go willy-nilly filtering all user queries which could have some unintended side effects. // Switch user search…
How to create very complex user queries | How to query multiple meta keys
It isn’t worth the effort to get the shortcode parameters to handle complex arrays. And in the end it isn’t necessary as there are several filters in place to permit you to run a complex query. The key will be using the query_id parameter. For example you could pass a specific ID via shortcode: [userlist query_id="my_custom_meta_query"] And then in your theme’s functions.php or a site-specific plugin, you could filter the user query args: add_filter( 'sul_user_query_args', 'sul_custom_meta_query', 10, 2 ); function sul_custom_meta_query( $args, $query_id ) { // Checking the query ID allows us…
Does Simple User Listing work with WP_Pagenavi?
Yes! WP Pagenavi supports pagination for WP_User_Query and I configured the navigation-author.php template to automatically use WP Pagenavi if it is installed and activated.
I can’t get the search users to work?
The search form will not work with the default permalinks. Try changing your permalinks to some other structure. The reason is form submits via the GET method and so adding those parameters to the URL seem to clash with the parameters already on the URL from the default permalink setup.
S2 Member Conflicts | The search doesn’t respect the shortcode parameters
Likely you are experiencing a conflict with another plugin, specifically one that is filtering pre_user_query to modify all user queries. The S2 Member plugin is a known culprit of this. To disable S2 Member’s modifications on all Simple User Listing lists, add the following to your theme’s functions.php or to a site-specific plugin. Ensure you are using at least SUL 1.5.3. function kia_protect_sul_from_s2() { remove_action('pre_user_query', 'c_ws_plugin__s2member_users_list::users_list_query'); } add_action( 'simple_user_listing_before_loop', 'kia_protect_sul_from_s2' ); function…
Changelog
2.0.4
- New: Introduce
sul_author_avatar_sizefilter.
2.0.3
- Fix: No plugin changes. Fix SVN chaos caused by autodeploy scripts.
2.0.2
- New: Bump tested WordPress version to 6.5
- Fix: Try deploy one more time :/
2.0.1
- Fix: Deploy build routine failure :/
2.0.0
- New: Introduce first pass at block editor support. Supports relatively simple queries only. Complex queries (including based on user meta) will still need to use the shortcode.
1.9.3
- Fix: Additional sanitization/security fixes. Props @WPprodigy.
For developers
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Best Simple User Listing alternatives
All authors plugins →FAQ
Simple User Listing: quick answers
Straight answers, pulled from live WordPress.org data.
Live data from WordPress.org · checked Sep 27, 2026
Is Simple User Listing free?
Yes. Simple User Listing is free to download and use from the official WordPress.org plugin directory.
Is Simple User Listing safe to use in 2026?
Simple User Listing works, but test it on a staging site before relying on it in 2026. It runs on 900+ sites, is rated 5/5 and was last updated 2 years ago, and scores 42/100 on our health check.
How many websites use Simple User Listing?
Simple User Listing is active on 900+ WordPress websites and has been downloaded 48,930 times since it launched in January 2013. It was downloaded 183 times in the last 30 days.
Does Simple User Listing work with WordPress 7.1?
Simple User Listing is officially tested up to WordPress 6.7.0, while the latest release is 7.1.2. It may still work, but try it on a staging site first.
When was Simple User Listing last updated?
The latest version, 2.0.4, was released on February 21, 2025 (2 years ago).
Who makes Simple User Listing?
Simple User Listing is developed and maintained by HelgaTheViking.
What are the best alternatives to Simple User Listing?
The most popular alternatives to Simple User Listing are Co-Authors, Multiple Author… (20K+ installs), Co-Authors Plus (20K+ installs) and Smart User Slug Hider (3K+ installs).
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