WordPress plugin intelligence profile

Banhammer – Monitor Site Traffic, Block Bad Users and Bots

Monitor traffic and ban unwanted visitors. Block any user or IP address so they can't access your site.

WP PlugIndex snapshot

Current directory snapshot

Tested up to WordPress 7.1
Current version3.5.3
WordPress coverageTested up to WordPress 7.1
Minimum stackWP 4.7 · PHP 5.6.20
Directory statusactive
Last directory update9 Aug 20262mo ago
Active installations1K+Adoption metric — not a quality score
WordPress.org rating4.4 / 5 from 19 ratings
Official packageDirect from WordPress.org

Repository metrics are context, not quality scores. Active installations measure adoption and can strongly reflect a plugin’s age and historical popularity. Ratings, recent updates and “Tested up to” metadata also do not guarantee modern code, error-free operation, security, feature completeness or suitability for a particular site. Why active installs don’t tell the whole story →

WP PlugIndex currently records Banhammer – Monitor Site Traffic, Block Bad Users and Bots version 3.5.3 as active, updated 2mo ago and tested up to WordPress 7.1.

Overview

About this plugin

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⚡ Banhammer: Protect your site against enemy hordes!

Banhammer gives you full control over who and what may access your site. Visit the Armory to monitor traffic and review suspicious visitors. If you find some user or bot that is causing problems, you can ban them with a click.

Or, if you just want to keep an eye on someone, you can flag them with a warning. Any banned users will be denied access to your site, until you restore access via the Tower. Check out the video and screenshots to get a better idea of how it works.

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👉 Important: Not yet compatible with WP Multisite!

Core Features

  • Ban or Warn any WP user or IP address
  • Restore access to any banned targets
  • Monitor site traffic in the Armory
  • Monitor logged users in the Admin Area
  • Monitor all visitors on the front-end
  • Manage banned targets in the Tower
  • Complete Ajax-powered navigation
  • Useful tools like jump, sort, search
  • Complete documentation via Help tab
  • Automatically clear logged data
  • Sound effects for Ban, Warn, et al
  • NEW: manually block any IP address

Options Galore

  • Optionally ignore logged-in users
  • Optionally protect Login Page and Admin Area
  • Customize the banned response and status code
  • Display banned message or redirect the request
  • Choose the interval to clear logged data
  • One-click restore plugin default options
  • All collected data may be deleted easily

More Features

  • Easy to use
  • Clean code
  • Fast and secure
  • Built with WP API
  • Lightweight and flexible
  • Regularly updated and “future proof”
  • Works great with any WordPress theme
  • Comprehensive search of all logged data
  • Works great with other WordPress plugins
  • Works with or without Gutenberg Block Editor
  • Focused on usability, performance, and security

Banhammer is perfect for site owners, admins, and developers who want to keep an eye on traffic and block any unwanted visitors. It is a simple, flexible, and powerful security solution. Perfect for the best WordPress sites.

Exclusive Features in Pro Version

  • Ban based on URI request, referrer, or user agent
  • Whitelist any IP address or user agent
  • View cookies, POST data, and FILES data
  • Email Alerts for banned & warned requests
  • Display custom message to each banned target
  • Add private notes to warned/banned targets
  • Customize target strings for user agents, IPs, etc.
  • Disable logging of banned, warned, and whitelisted targets
  • Smart bot detection
  • Paged results in Tower
  • User avatars in Tower

For complete documentation, visit the Help tab on any Banhammer screen.

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⚡ Banhammer Pro now available »

Privacy

User Data: Banhammer collects user data to “do its thing”. The collected data is temporary and automatically deleted every day, or at whatever time interval is specified in the plugin settings. The only time that any data is “remembered” is when you ban something.

For each person/thing that you ban, the plugin stores either the IP address OR the username (never both). At any time, all saved data may be deleted permanently via the plugin settings and Armory Tools.

Cookies: Banhammer does not set any cookies for regular visitors, but does set a few simple cookies for admin-level users. These simple cookies enable dope effects and interactivity in the Armory and Tower UI. But no cookies are set or used for any other visitor/user or purpose.

Services: Banhammer uses a free lookup service for GeoIP information. This happens only for admin-level users when they are viewing data in the Armory or Tower. No other third-party services are used by this plugin.

Banhammer is developed and maintained by Jeff Starr, 15-year WordPress developer and book author.

Support development

I develop and maintain this free plugin with love for the WordPress community. To show support, you can make a donation or purchase one of my books:

  • The Tao of WordPress
  • Digging into WordPress

htaccess made easy

  • WordPress Themes In Depth
  • Wizard’s SQL Recipes for WordPress

And/or purchase one of my premium WordPress plugins:

  • BBQ Pro – Blazing fast WordPress firewall
  • Blackhole Pro – Automatically block bad bots
  • Banhammer Pro – Monitor traffic and ban the bad guys
  • GA Google Analytics Pro – Connect WordPress to Google Analytics
  • Head Meta Pro – Ultimate Meta Tags for WordPress
  • REST Pro Tools – Awesome tools for managing the WP REST API
  • Simple Ajax Chat Pro – Unlimited chat rooms
  • USP Pro – Unlimited front-end forms

Links, tweets and likes also appreciated. Thank you! 🙂

WordPress.org metadata

Plugin tags

Topics listed for this plugin in the WordPress.org directory.

  • ban
  • block
  • bots
  • monitor
  • security
Compatibility & maintenance

Compatibility & maintenance

Tested with WP 7.1

Marked as tested with the current WordPress 7.1 release.

Current WordPress releaseWordPress 7.1
WordPress.org Tested up to7.1
Minimum requirementsWordPress 4.7 · PHP 5.6.20
Update activity9 Aug 20262mo ago

“Tested up to” is directory metadata supplied by the plugin author. WP PlugIndex does not turn an older declaration into a claim that the plugin is incompatible.

Changes recorded by WP PlugIndex

Recent tracked changes

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