You should uninstall the Jetpack plugin for WordPress immediately!
Why?! Because it sucks and hated by much of the community:
- Slows down your website—EVEN WITH ALL MODULES OFF.
- You don’t need many of its features.
- Feels like adware, keeps pitching their services.
- I don’t trust it. (More explained in this guide.)
Read on to learn why I don’t recommend Jetpack at all!
1. Jetpack slows down your WordPress site.
It’s bloated and adds a lot of code to your site. Even when you disable all modules, it STILL slows down your site. What the heck is it doing back there? Do your homework and you’ll see tons of sites/experts recommending to just get rid of it. It’s a total resource hog and really doesn’t offer much unique value in return.
Oh and don’t think I haven’t seen the sites that claim “Jetpack isn’t as bad as some make it out to be”. Try it for yourself. I bet it will slow down the average site on an average webhosting plan.
2. You don’t need Jetpack.
Almost every Jetpack feature can be replaced by another plugin or service. Stats, editing, sharing, image optimization, security, etc. I hate that they promote it like some kind of essential WordPress plugin when it’s not. You’ll be totally fine without it.
3. Jetpack feels like adware.
It’s constantly trying to promote their commercial services. Typical business model, right? Offer a free service just to get onto a site, once inside just nag the hell out of users or fool them into thinking they MUST buy something. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not only anti-Jetpack in this sense…I hate the many other companies who do it as well.
4. I don’t trust Jetpack.
Honestly, I just don’t trust many things from Automattic, Matt Mullenweg, and their other associates. I’ll let you guys research for yourself. Secretly, I think they’re steering WordPress more and more away from actual open source mentality and into a commercialized direction. They are gonna cash out on this thing as best as they can. I don’t have any problems with capitalism or commercialism so much; but I do have strong feelings about transparency.
The way they’re promoting this is manipulative—monopolizing their position as the actual WordPress creators, stifling healthy market competition, and just flat out taking advantage of newbies who don’t know any better. They do the same with their “WooCommerce Services” plugin as well, putting scary messages into users sites making them feel it needs to be installed.
If you had to ask me…I think Jetpack is stealing your website information for their own undisclosed use. And they keep adding more features to their plugin to justify you keeping it installed.
How to get rid of Jetpack?
- Go to plugins, deactivate and delete.
- Not necessary but a nice way to be thorough (for techies only!). Clean out your database, it has some entries in the wp_options table and also elsewhere depending on what features you used.
- Explore the vast eco-system of free and paid plugins and use them to replace the features you need.
- Enjoy life!
Still want to keep Jetpack?
I found some useful tips on a FB group by Nate Hoffelder:
I was reading the ongoing discussion of JP, and it occurred to me that some here might not know the secret settings menu for Jetpack.
Go to the JP settings menu, scroll down to the bottom, and select the Debug option. This will take you to the debug page. Look on the Debug page for the link labled “Access the full list of Jetpack modules available on your site” and click it.
You’re now on the menu where you can disable and enable specific JP modules.
Here’s something some may not know: There are JP modules that you can only disable from this menu, including some that are enabled by default.
I wouldn’t delete J until after visiting that menu and making sure that I had disabled the modules I wasn’t using.
Hi, I use it only by photon, it would have another plugin that makes photon in the images
Rainer Brainer
I used to use Jetpak for the same reason until I saw what it did to my images. Sure they loaded quicker but the were on the edge of pixelated.
I do all my images manually through https://compressor.io/
Thanks for sharing, it looks nice. Have you tried ShortPixel? (They have a lifetime deal running on AppSumo right now.)
i’m removing jetpack too
i just dont need it right now
prefer shortpixel rather than that
shortpixel were more lightweight and do better on resizing images
just imho
Jhonny, man I wish I had read your article before installing this super stupid one eyed inbred moron software.
First run after installation, I logged out and now when I log back in, it stops me (the nerve), its master. Stupid dobby. And then it says that to log in, I must access the site admin url through a link that it had sent to my email address. This email contained two options. First was the login and the second one is change password. No matter which one I clicked, it gave me an error ({“error”:”Bad Request”,”message”:”Invalid input.”}) and no further options. This is the crappiest thing I have ever come across coz plugins are there to make life easier and not super frustrating.
I still havent figured out how to get back in but I am trying.
Please share if you have a solution for this.
Sounds like you have some security plugin enabled? Try disabling whatever plugins you want by renaming their plugin directory in wp-content/plugins.
I enjoyed this read as I too have had some speculations about jetpack. I know this is an Old Post but I had some questions. I don’t use any of the functions in jetpack except the cdn, and I was told by a web developer to switch over to cloudflare. So if I do that do I even need jetpack? Also what is your thoughts on WP rocket
Read the title of this post again until you get rid of Jetpack. For my thoughts on WP Rocket, please search my site for the related posts.
I deactivated and deleted the jetpack pluggin but I noticed that if for any reason I reinstall the pluggin my name pops up like an account, how can I deactivate or disable that account.
Sign out?
I deleted my jetpack and site speed went through the roof, both on mobile and desktop! Wish I deleted it earlier. Did much for me than wp rocket, or all the other optimizations I had tried before. It would be nice to have a list of essential substitute plugins to install after deleting (sitemap, hack prevention, etc). Working on that now. Thanks for the encouragement to get rid of jetpack!