14 of the Most Popular Joomla Plugins – 2013

Joomla is a popular content management system (CMS) that is used by millions worldwide. Much like WordPress, it is open source and is freely available to any who wishes to use it. Also like its famous counterpart, it utilizes plugins to increase its functionality. Here are 14 of the most popular Joomla plugins to utilize in 2013:

Paradigm Slider Joomla jQuery Plugin

1. Paradigm Slider Joomla jQuery Plugin

This premium slider gallery offers a stunning combination of excellent features, cross compatibility with browsers and support for YouTube and Vimeo. Paradigm Slider offers a state-of-the-art slider with text animations and parallax effect. It also comes available with touch swipe capability for iOS and Android mobile devices. Other features include a component for slides data and a module for view output. It is easy to customize this plugin to your liking thanks to its easy-to-edit HTML and CSS. Enjoy unlimited slides and caption layers with this flexible slider plugin.

Facebook Traffic Pop

2. Facebook Traffic Pop for Joomla

Traffic pops are designed to encourage visitors to like your webpage on Facebook before proceeding on to other content. Facebook Traffic Pop for Joomla is a seamless and professional way of accomplishing this with relative ease. This module temporarily locks outpace functionality behind the pop-up for a predetermined amount of time. The optional delay timer allows you to adjust how long users must wait before the page becomes functional again. Other features include cookies that remember previous visitors, configurable URLs for the Like button and optional close on Escape key. You can even change the background opacity and other options right from your Joomla admin panel. It only takes minutes to install and it works on all sites.

Lof SlidingCaption Module

3. Lof SlidingCaption Module

This module is an excellent way of displaying images that are attached to content components or k2 components on your Joomla site. These images are displayed in a sensible and clean grid-based layout. Lof SlidingCaption Module is capable of auto-detecting and pulling images from articles and k2 items. It can even crop those photos to conform into attractive boxes on your website, as needed. This module gives you plenty of customization features, including the ability to display or hide item titles and descriptions within the sliding or fading overlays. This is one module you should keep an eye on if you’re looking for a functional and attractive gallery.

Lof Content Flash Accordion Module

4. Lof Content Flash Accordion Module

Here is a useful Flash-driven horizontal accordion gallery that offers plenty of functionality with a professional look. This module allows you to display all of your content in a space efficient accordion gallery and image rotator. Not only does it feature smooth animations, it is also relatively easy to install and embed on any Joomla site. It also features a nifty timer clock that tells users when the next slide will appear. This module is compatible with Joomla versions 1.5 through 1.7.

Live Broadcast Countdown Module

5. Live Broadcast Countdown Module

Let your users know when special events draw near with this one-of-a-kind countdown module. Based on jQuery, this module displays a timer counting down the days, hours, minutes and seconds to practically any event you choose. This is ideal for sites that host live broadcasts, content unveilings and other special events. Live Broadcast Countdown Module allows you to display messages upon expiration of the timer, allowing visitors to stay abreast of the latest developments. You can also set the time zone as well as create your own module style. Live Broadcast Countdown Module works on all major browsers.

Dropdown Mega Menu

6. Dropdown Mega Menu

Dropdown Mega Menu gives you the power to offer your visitors plenty of choices when it comes to navigation. This module offers a sleek and sophisticated look that fits in well with any template, especially with the ability to switch between multiple layouts and colors. You also get support for multiple menus on a single page as well as compatibility for most major web browsers and mobile browsers. Flexible configuration is one of the many reasons developers turn to Dropdown Mega Menu when it comes to mega menu modules.

DZS Ken Burns Gallery w Admin Panel - For Joomla

7. DZS Ken Burns Gallery /w Admin Panel – For Joomla

The Ken Burns effect is a well-known technique used by the famous documentarian in his Civil War documentaries. This style has caught on in many areas, including web design and development. DZS offers a simple and effective way of replicating this effect within a functional image gallery. You can choose between using the Ken Burns effect for your images or you can turn it off and transform the gallery into a simple slider. CMS panel options give you plenty of powerful management and modification tools at your disposal. You can even get free upgrades and free support after you download this program.

Smart SEO - Joomla Plugin

8. Smart SEO – Joomla Plugin

Search engine optimization is practically the backbone of any successful website. Smart SEO gives you the opportunity to successfully optimize your Joomla site for Google, Yahoo, Bing and other top-tier search engines. Smart SEO helps you improve upon your web content by searching for primary keywords within your content while measuring keyword density. It also features provisions for autochecks and SEO checks. Smart SEO is remarkably easy to install and easy-to-use.

Joomla Social Bar Plugin

9. Joomla Social Bar Plugin

This program allows you to install a series of clean and elegant social media icons onto your Joomla page. There are over 20 social icons included along with two distinct color styles (clear and dark). PSD files are also included for designers who want to create and extend their own social media icons. The social bar itself fits in with just about any site, with easy installation and cross browser support being among its many attributes. The Joomla Social Bar Plugin operates on the powerful jQuery Framework, ensuring lightning fast and reliable performance. Documentation is available upon download.

Simple Joomla Newsletter Extension

10. Simple Joomla Newsletter Extension

Here is a simple and effective newsletter extension that is intended for use with the old Joomla 1.6. This module provides plenty of spectacular features that make bulk emailing a breeze. It is not just the ability to send e-mails to existing subscribers that makes this extension powerful. It also comes with a variety of other features, including the ability to create newsletters from templates, enable automatic unsubscribe links in each e-mail and the ability to edit the HTML template in Adobe Dreamweaver prior to delivery. Simple Joomla Newsletter Extension also features UTF -8 support for newsletters in multiple languages.

Joomla Smart Social Pop Up Plugin

11. Joomla Smart Social Pop Up Plugin

Smart Social Pop Up is another traffic pop that is designed to drive up your popularity on Facebook, Twitter and Google. The installation process for this plugin is relatively straightforward. Once everything is up and running, you have the option of changing any value on the traffic pop, including the text dialog on the pop up itself in addition to the time for pop up timeout. The Smart Social Pop Up sits in the center of the page, locking out other content until users either click one of several social media icons or wait for the specified amount of time.

Infinity Upload

12. Infinity Upload

Project collaboration doesn’t get any better than with Infinity Upload. This Infinity module allows authorized users to upload files directly onto your Joomla site. Infinity Upload is written in lightweight AJAX for the best performance possible without reloads. All you have to do is select one or more files and press a button to upload. Users can see a confirmation or error screen depending on what they’ve uploaded. This module also provides convenient e-mail notifications whenever someone uploads any file onto the server. Infinity Upload is easy to configure and comes with its own documentation.

Joomla Viral Marketing - Viral Payment Pack

13. Joomla Viral Marketing & Viral Payment Pack

With the Viral Marketing & Viral Payment Pack, you’ll be able to promote your company and its products at little to no cost. Whether you’re trying to get music files, product catalogs, discount coupons or software into the hands of potential customers, this outstanding module has exactly what you need to get the word out fast. This simple viral marketing system module prompts visitors to post your advertising message to their social media networks before downloading your product. Thanks to the power of friend recommendations, your company and its products will spread like wildfire. You can easily customize your messages and modify other aspects of this useful module. It also features full file control and best of all, it doesn’t need any advertising pop ups.

Social Feedr

14. Joomla Social Feedr

All of social media feeds come together in a simple and smartly designed package. Social Feedr allows you to fetch your posts, videos, images and status from a variety of social media networks, including Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and more. This plugin offers simple customization features that make it a breeze to work with, along with cross browser support and multi-language translation. It also comes with plenty of documentation for developers