ClusterIQ works on any WordPress site with PHP 8.0 or newer. The free version has no limit on articles.
1. Install and activate
Install the plugin under Plugins → Add New and activate it. A ClusterIQ menu appears in wp-admin, and every ClusterIQ page has the same bar at the top: the pages on the left (those that don’t fit go under More), search in the middle and Scan on the right.
2. Choose your clusters
The first time you open ClusterIQ, it suggests clusters from your largest categories. Change the choice any time in Cluster Admin: categories, tags, any other taxonomy your theme or plugins add, your own custom clusters of hand-picked articles — and pages as clusters, for sites where pages point to a parent page through ACF fields (an island and its areas, say). Leave out very broad or technical terms (“Uncategorized”, “Featured”), and set the smallest number of articles a cluster needs.
3. Scan
Scan reads every published article — words, headings, images, SEO title and description and the links between articles — then builds the clusters and works out every score, role and health figure. The text is read in seconds; the published pages are read in the background afterwards, so links your theme adds count too. A progress pill next to Scan shows how far it has got.
Click Scan again after publishing or editing a batch of articles. Everything you change inside ClusterIQ — a link, a pillar, an SEO field — updates the figures straight away.
4. Where to start
- Dashboard — the Site map shows every cluster at once, and Focus next the three where a few links matter most. See Dashboard.
- Cluster Inspector — open a cluster and follow Improve this cluster. See Cluster Inspector.
- Article Inspector — a to-do list for any single article. See Article Inspector.
- Text Match — turn existing mentions into links. See Text Match.
- SEO Titles — every SEO title and meta description on one page. See SEO Titles.
ClusterIQ never changes your content by itself: links, SEO fields and pillars only change when you click Apply or choose them, and links and SEO fields can be undone for 30 minutes. The Help page in the plugin walks through the same steps.
New to clusters? Start with the guide Topic clusters.