Akismet vs HappyForms
Compare WordPress plugins and tools side by side. Pick products with “Compare” in the software directory.
| Feature | Akismet v5.7.2 · checked 23 Oct 2026 Free + paid · ★ 4.7/5 Visit Details | HappyForms v1.26.17 · checked 23 Oct 2026 Free + paid · ★ 4.4/5 Visit Details |
|---|---|---|
| At a glance | ||
| Active installs | 5M+ | 20,000+ |
| Last updated | August 18, 2026 | October 5, 2026 |
| Editions | Akismet Anti-spam: Spam Protection · Akismet paid plan ($) | Happyforms · Happyforms paid upgrade ($) |
| Pros | Checks comments and contact form submissions against a shared spam database; Works with Contact Form 7 and Gravity Forms; Stats through a dashboard widget and REST endpoints | Free contact and custom form builder with admin-stored submissions; Built-in honeypot spam protection with no external service; No third-party API calls from the free code |
| Cons | Needs an Akismet API key from akismet.com; Commercial sites must buy a paid plan; Submitted content is sent to Akismet for checking | Payments, multi-step and file upload fields need the paid upgrade; Conditional logic is not in the free code; Limited to what the free field set provides |
| Mentioned in our posts | 2 | 1 |
| Features (Form plugins checklist) | ||
| Conditional logic | — | No |
| Multi-step forms | — | Paid |
| Payments | — | Paid |
| File upload | — | Paid |
| Entries in admin | — | Yes |
| Spam protection | — | Yes |
| Free version | — | Yes |
| More features | ||
| Other features | Checks comments before they are saved, Spam checks for Gravity Forms and Contact Form 7 submissions, Scheduled deletion of old spam and orphaned comment meta, Block statistics dashboard widget, REST endpoints for key, settings and stats, Webhook endpoint for Akismet account updates, Stats ability for the WordPress Abilities API | Customizer-based form builder with parts, Email notifications on submit, XML export of forms, Limit choices per option, Gutenberg block and widget, Paid field teasers (date, phone, rating, signature) ($) |
| Integrations | ||
| Plugins | Contact Form 7, Gravity Forms, Jetpack | — |
| Other | Akismet | — |
| Requires WordPress | 5.8 | 5.0 |
| Requires PHP | 7.2 | 7.0 |
| Tested up to | 7.1 | 7.1.2 |
| Phones home | No | No |
| External services | rest.akismet.com | — |
| Blocks | — | 1 |