GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) compliance is an EU cookie law, and your site must adhere to it. It ensures that your visitors’ privacy is protected. If you want to create a website or make your current one GDPR and CPPA compliant, you may want to look for the best cookie consent plugin WordPress offers.
A WordPress cookie plugin on your website makes the site GDPR and CCPA compliant. You don’t have to start reading about such privacy adherence laws. However, it wouldn’t hurt to learn a thing or two about cookies.
What is a Cookie?
A cookie is a piece of data that a site stores within the web browser of a computer or mobile device and uses to identify your device. The website can retrieve the cookie later to recall something about your device when you visit the site again.
What is the EU Cookie Law?
The EU Cookie Law or the ePrivacy Directive came to being in 2012. It is meant to guard the users’ privacy. It demands that you get your users’ consent before your website deploys cookies.
Nonadherence to this law attracts penalties. However, as long as you have explicit or implied consent, you are safe. Explicit consent is acquired when your users have to accept cookies to be used. On the other hand, implied consent means simply notifying the users that you have cookies on your site, and if they keep browsing, they will have implied that they’re fine with it.
Best Free Cookies Plugin WordPress Has to Offer
One of the reasons why WordPress is so popular is that it has a directory full of free plugins. Cookie consent plugins are no exception; many cookie WordPress plugins are available. Here are the best cookie consent plugins that should put your mind at ease:
1. Cookie Notice & Compliance by Hu-manity.co
Cookie Notice & Compliance is a WordPress cookie plugin that’s quite popular, with a high rating and almost 3,000 reviews. It has two parts to it, Cookie Notice and Cookie Compliance. The former is fully self-reliant within the plugin. On the other hand, Cookie Compliance forces you to connect to the Hu-manity.co web application.
Cookie Notice, which offers a straightforward site banner for acquiring cookie consent. Cookie Compliance is a comprehensive consent management platform that adheres to the guidelines of over 100 countries. It lets users allow some cookies and reject others. You can even choose to use the features of Cookie Notice only.
Among the web application features that you access via Cookie Compliance are the following:
- Automatic script blocking
- Consent record storage
- Consent analytics dashboard
- Default configurations
- Multiple domain management
- Multilingual support
WordPress privacy page synchronization. The banner of this plugin has a customizable notice message, so you can choose to assume consent upon clicking, scrolling, or closing. You can work with multiple cookie expiry options. The banner has a custom link to the privacy policy page.
The banner features are quite extensive as well. The intentional consent feature comes with 3 equal buttons that enable users to accept all, some, or none of the packaged cookie choices. These packages or Data Access Levels raise consent conversion. Other banner features include the following:
- Consent metrics (a record of visitors’ consent data)
- Cookie purpose categories (visitors customizing consent by categories)
- Cookie duration selector (how long consent remains valid)
- Configurable privacy contact (access to data privacy resources for sharing with business’ data privacy admins)
- Customizable privacy paper (breakdown of risks and benefits, for visitors, to sharing their data)
The design of Cookie Compliance is aimed at eliminating dark patterns. Dark patterns are procedures that user interfaces employ that they would otherwise not make. The most common one is the lack of a reject all button on the first layer of the cookie consent notice banner. Dark patterns are outrightly banned by GDPR and other data protection laws.
2. CookieYes
CookieYes is another brilliant WordPress cookie consent and compliance notice plugin. It effectively activates a cookie notice with accept and reject options. You can scan and categorize your site’s cookies with a single click with this plugin.
With CookieYes, you can use a shortcode to showcase the list of cookies you have on your cookie policy page. When you install it, this plugin brings a very subtle cookie banner and you can choose whether it goes to the header or footer. CookieYes lets you choose whether the cookie notice bar disappears after a few seconds or accept all cookies upon scrolling.
The cookie notice style in CookieYes is fully customizable so you can blend it with your site’s branding. You can change the fonts, colors, and style. If you want to appear on a specific part of your page and the behavior of the notice when you click accept, you can work on customizing that.
CookieYes has cookie audit module for displaying the cookies on your site on your Privacy and Cookies Policy page. You can configure the plugin to let your users take the Do Not Sell My Personal Information cookie notice option. CookieYes adheres to the data protection laws of France and South Africa.
Top CookieYes Feature Highlights
- Fully customizable
- Option to put cookie bar in footer or header
- And the following optional settings:
- Accept cookie policy when user scrolls
- Close cookie notice bar automatically after a certain delay (you get to configure the length of the delay)
- You can permanently dismiss or access the cookie banner via a show again bar
- You can customize the show again tab extensively including its style and position on page
- It is shortcode compatible with a cookie audit shortcode that gives you a beautiful Privacy and Cookie Policy
- Compatible with WPML, qTranslate and Polylang support
3. Complianz
Complianz is a cookie consent plugin by Really Simple Plugins. This helps you migrate your site from HTTP to HTTPS easily. It allows you to configure your cookie notice to worldwide or whichever and subregion (for specific cookie consent) region you want.
The Conditional Cookie Notice and Cookie Consent of Complianz have Custom CSS coding and customizable template to boot. It also supports CCPA, GDPR, and other consent regulations. The banner templates that this WordPress cookie plugin offers have dismiss on scroll and time on page options. Other options include:
- Consent per service
- Consent per category
- Accept/Dismiss
- GDPR-friendly cookie wall
Complianz has excellent consent management that blocks 3rd party cookies from sources like Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, ReCAPTCHA, Google maps and others. It blocks iFrames from different video servers like YouTube. Complianz has a script center feature for controlling scripts, iFrames, and plugins for each service or category.
Proof of Consent keeps track of user consent registration in adherence to GDPR data minimization provision. Complianz carries out a periodical scan for possible changes in cookies, plugins, and 3rd party services. The plugin detects if you need a cookie banner. It will even make personal data anonymous for the sake of integrated statistic tools.
Complianz Key Features
- Cookie policy generator
- Configuration of a single cookie consent rule for all visitors
- Setup wizard for configuring the optimal site compliance features
- Customizable cookie consent banner
- Automatic cookie descriptions
4. GDPR Cookie Compliance
GDPR Cookie Compliance is also a popular free WordPress cookie plugin. Apart from GDPR, it also supports LGPD, PIPEDA, CCPA, and other regulations. It enables you to install and set it up in mere seconds. You can give your users complete control over their cookies, including letting them revoke consent.
GDPR Cookie Compliance is flexible, so you can decide the scripts to load when the user consents or by default. This WordPress cookie plugin is fully customizable so that you can upload your own fonts, colors, and logos. It lets you change all the text it comes with. It also lets you choose the position of the consent banner with options at the top and bottom of the page.
The accept, reject, close, and settings buttons are fully customizable. The consent expiration settings are quite extensive. GDPR Cookie Compliance has a link to the privacy page. It has 2 unique layouts to work with. With it, you get a beautiful and intuitive user interface. It boasts the sleekest animations to enhance the user experience even further.
Key Features of GDPR Cookie Compliance
- Consent expiration setting
- Permission for users to revoke and consent
- Customizable style and text of the consent banner
- User-friendly cookie consent notice
- Top or bottom banner position
Premium Features
- Export and import settings
- Cookie wall or Fullscreen layout
- Renew consent
- Accept on scroll/hide timer
- WordPress multisite features
- Geo-location
- iFrame blocker
- Cookie declaration
- Premium shortcodes
- Language-specific scripts
- Local data storage
5. Termly
Termly is a SaaS-based cookie consent service that’s easy to integrate with your site. It is just as easy to install, and you can set it up in seconds. It has a unique consent banner with custom features from colors and text to theme and font. With Termly, you will have automatic cookie scans to keep you updated.
Unlike other plugins in the catalog, it allows other banner positions apart from the bottom and bottom bar. You also get a corner tooltip and full-screen modal. For EU users, you will have regional banner display options to work with. Automatic cookie configurations will be based on the cookie database of Termly.
Like CookieYes, Termly lets you customize your cookie policy. Cookie categories and descriptions on Termly are automatically generated. You can customize the cookie policy too. You can choose to have a scroll or click to consent for your visitors.
Termly has automatic blocking of scripts along with other tracking mechanisms. It also supports auto-updates to the consent banner and cookie policy too. You will enjoy access to the additional disclaimer, policy, and terms and conditions generators. The superb plugin supports banner translations of different languages. They include German, English, Italian, Spanish, and French.
Key Features of Termly
- Consent logs for audit compliance
- Generation of disclaimers, privacy policies, and other vital pages
- Fully automated SaaS solution
- Automatic blocking of 3rd party scripts and tracking techniques pending consent
- Only showcase cookie banner consent in regions where it’s required
- Automatic cookie scans
- Fully customizable cookie consent banner
6. Real Cookie Banner
Real Cookie Banner is a near-perfect cookie banner and consent management system for your site’s compliance. To get informed consent, you can use the plugin to store all legal and technical information about cookies and services. You have over 120 content blocker templates and over 150 service templates to work with to provide all necessary information securely and quickly.
Real Cookie Banner has a content blocker feature to prevent themes, plugins, and co. from loading scripts, content, and styles before obtaining consent. You get to customize the design of your banner extensively with Real Cookie Banner. More than 20 design templates and over 200 customization options, so you’ll customize it to suit your needs. You can work with different effects, colors, and effects.
You can set up your cookie banner safely and quickly. The configuration settings of Real Cookie Banner guide you closely to ensure that you do all the right things. The plugin tells you all about the legal basis of the features and the legal repercussions of changing the settings.
Since Real Cookie Banner documents consent, you have proof of visitor consent, which you may need to prove. The best cookie consent plugin WordPress provides is Native to the CMS. It is fully installed in your WordPress version as a native plugin so that all consent records are available on your server. Nothing will be downloaded from your visitor’s browser to prevent legal consequences.
Top Real Cookie Banner Features
- Guided configuration
- Checklist for a legally compliant setup
- Automatic website scans
- 120+ content blocker template and 150+ service templates
- Legal links
- Individual groups for services
- Automatic acquisition of new consents
- Acceptance of all cookies for bots
- Individual groups for services
- Cookies and processing of personal data
7. Cookiebot
Cookiebot is one of the best consent plugins WordPress offers to control cookies and trackers automatically. It offers a customizable consent banner that helps with consent and the option to choose and ignore cookie categories. Cookiebot’s cookie policy and declarations will be generated and updated automatically. They will always have categorization and purpose descriptions of your cookies.
The Cookiebot cookie declaration has a Do Not Sell My Personal Information link so that users can refuse to have their data sold to 3rd parties. The plugin offers monthly scans of your website. They find all 1st and 3rd party cookies and similar tracking on your website. Cookiebot also detects their duration, provenance, and the location to which their data is sent.
Cookiebot blocks cookies automatically. It holds back all cookies and tracking so that none will be active until the appropriate consent is obtained. It enables compliance with the ePrivacy Directive and GDPR. Cookiebot provides an easy way for users to change or rescind consent. Unlike Termly, this plugin supports many languages, 45.
With Cookiebot’s cloud-based environment, you can secure the storage of user consent. You can download the consent and use them as proof if the need arises. Your pages won’t have to reload when users give consent for your site to execute the cookie-setting scripts.
Top Feature Highlights of Cookiebot
- The highly customizable notification cookie banner
- Support for 45 languages, many more than Termly
- Monthly scans of website cookies
- A Do Not Sell My Personal Information link on the cookie declaration
- Automatic generation and update of Cookie policy and cookie declaration
Conclusion
Choosing the best cookie plugin requires figuring out your needs and your budget. As we mentioned earlier, free plugins are available, and the best are in here.
The free plugins enable you to display a cookie consent banner. They give you a full-fledged consent management platform so you can list all cookies. You can also let users control cookie permissions and keep clear consent logs. If this is what you’re looking for, this list is all you need.
If you want a complex consent management platform, you can go with Cookie Notice, CookieYes, Termly, or Complianz. Just figure out what you want and choose one plugin that offers it. All the best as you enhance your site’s user experience and protect your users’ privacy.
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