WordPress ships with half an approval workflow. A Contributor can only submit a post as Pending review, and an Editor has to publish it. That is it: no custom statuses, no checklist, no comments on the draft, no notification to the reviewer, and nothing at all for the social media shares that go out when the post is published.
This roundup compares the plugins that fill those gaps. Six of them handle the editorial side, the WordPress posts and pages. One of them, our own FS Poster, handles the social side, the posts your team schedules to Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and the rest. Most teams need one from each group. Data comes from WordPress.org and each vendor's own site, checked on 28 October 2026. We did not install the editorial plugins for this comparison; the pros and cons come from their listings, documentation and reviews.
Short version. Use PublishPress Planner for custom statuses and a calendar, add PublishPress Checklists if posts keep going out half-finished, and Oasis Workflow if you need multi-step sign-off with assignments. For the social shares, FS Poster's Content Approval is the only plugin here that gates them.
WordPress approval workflow plugins at a glance
| Plugin | Job | Approval model | Active installs | Paid tier |
|---|---|---|---|---|
PublishPress Planner | Editorial calendar and custom statuses | Statuses, comments, notifications | 6,000+ | Pro plugins from $49/ |
PublishPress Checklists | Pre-publish requirements | Blocks publishing until the checklist passes | 3,000+ | Pro plugins from $49/ |
PublishPress Capabilities | Who can publish | Capabilities per role | 100,000+ | Pro plugins from $49/ |
Oasis Workflow | Multi-step review and sign-off | Visual workflow with assignments | 600+ | Pro $119/ |
Edit Flow | Custom statuses and editorial comments | Statuses, comments, calendar | 4,000+ | Free only |
Jumplinks Flow | Client feedback on drafts | Pending, in review, changes requested, approved | under 10 | Flow Pro, price not published |
FS Poster Content Approval | Approval for social media shares | Submit, approve, request changes, decline | 25,000+ paid customers | Developer and Lifetime plans |
Install counts and ratings are WordPress.org figures on 28 October 2026. The vendors round installs to the nearest tier, so "6,000+" means between 6,000 and 7,000 sites.
How these plugins were chosen
The list started with every WordPress.org plugin tagged for editorial workflow, content approval or publishing workflow, plus the two commercial suites that come up in every WordPress editorial discussion. Plugins that had not been updated in more than two years were dropped, which removed the old Approval Workflow and Pre-Publish Post Checklist plugins. Plugins that approve users rather than content were dropped too. What remained was checked on WordPress.org for installs, rating, last update and tested-up-to version, and on each vendor's site for pricing and the features that sit behind the paid tier. Nothing was installed for this comparison.
1. PublishPress Planner and Statuses: editorial calendar and custom statuses
- Job
- Editorial calendar, board, notifications; custom statuses via the free Statuses plugin
- Free version
- Yes, on WordPress.org
- Paid plan
- Pro plugins from $49/year each, bundle $149/year in year one
- Rating
- 4.9/5 from 178 reviews
- Installs
- 6,000+ active installs, version 4.8.2, updated 2026-10-14
PublishPress Planner is the plugin most WordPress editorial teams end up with, and it is the direct descendant of Edit Flow. It gives you a calendar with every post by date and status, and a board where you drag posts between columns from draft to review to scheduled. Editorial notifications follow rules such as "when a post moves to Pending Review, send to Editors". The custom statuses themselves now live in the free companion plugin PublishPress Statuses. It adds steps such as Editorial review, Fact check and Final approval, and decides which roles may assign each one.
- Content calendar with drag and drop, filters by status, author and category
- Content board that groups posts by status, so a reviewer sees everything waiting for them
- Editorial notifications with rules for when they go out, who gets them and what they say
- Custom statuses from PublishPress Statuses, with per-role assignment and alternate paths such as Needs work or Rejected
- Planner Pro ($49 per year for one site) adds Slack notifications and reminders before and after the publish date
Best for: publishing teams of three or more that need to see where every draft is and who holds it.
Main drawback: statuses are a pipeline, not an approval gate. An Editor can still publish a post that never passed a review status. Pair it with Capabilities or Checklists to enforce the gate.
2. PublishPress Checklists: a pre-publish approval checklist
- Job
- Requirements a post must meet before it can be published
- Free version
- Yes, on WordPress.org
- Paid plan
- Pro plugins from $49/year each, bundle $149/year in year one
- Rating
- 5.0/5 from 24 reviews
- Installs
- 3,000+ active installs, version 2.30.0, updated 2026-10-26
PublishPress Checklists turns the "did you add the alt text?" conversation into a rule. You define requirements per post type: word count range, a featured image, a category, tags, an excerpt, alt text on every image. Each requirement can be recommended or required, and required checks keep incomplete content from going live. One of the checks is an approval: "require approval from a user in a specific role before content is published". That single rule turns the checklist into a real gate, because the Publish button stays disabled until an Editor has signed off.
- Requirements per post type, each one set to required, recommended or ignored
- Checks for word count, images, alt text, categories, tags, excerpt, links and more
- An "approved by a user in this role" check that makes editorial review an explicit step
- Checklist panel in the editor that updates as the author writes
- Checklists Pro ($49 per year for one site) adds more checks, such as image and WooCommerce product requirements
Best for: teams whose posts come back from review for the same small reasons every time, and anyone who wants the cheapest real approval gate on WordPress.
Main drawback: it checks the post, not the judgement. A post can pass every rule and still need a human read of the facts, and there is no comment thread on the post for that conversation.
3. PublishPress Capabilities: control who can publish
- Job
- Edit what each role may do, including publish
- Free version
- Yes, on WordPress.org
- Paid plan
- Pro plugins from $49/year each, bundle $149/year in year one
- Rating
- 4.7/5 from 143 reviews
- Installs
- 100,000+ active installs, version 2.53.0, updated 2026-10-14
PublishPress Capabilities is the role editor, and it is the quiet half of every WordPress approval setup. Approval only works if the people who write cannot publish. Capabilities lets you take publish_posts away from a role, give it to another, and do the same per post type. It also handles the admin menu and editor features each role sees. With 100,000 installs it is by far the most used plugin on this list, because many sites need it for reasons that have nothing to do with editorial workflow.
- Edit every capability per role, with backups and a restore
- Per post type publishing rights, so Authors can publish news but not product pages
- Hide admin menus, editor blocks and metaboxes per role
- Capabilities Pro starts at $69 per year for one site
Best for: any site that wants a real gate: authors submit, only editors publish.
Main drawback: it enforces who, not what. There is no review screen, no comments and no history of who approved a post.
4. Oasis Workflow: multi-step review with assignments
- Job
- Design a review process with steps, assignees and sign-off
- Free version
- Yes, on WordPress.org
- Paid plan
- Pro $119/year for two sites
- Rating
- 4.8/5 from 51 reviews
- Installs
- 600+ active installs, version 6.5.5, updated 2026-09-23
Oasis Workflow is the one plugin here built around approval itself rather than around statuses. You draw the workflow in a drag and drop designer from three task types, Assignment, Review and Publish, with the roles or people attached to each step. It scales from a one-step process to a multi-step, multi-user one. When an author submits, the post lands in the reviewer's task inbox. The reviewer signs off to the next step or fails it back with a comment, and every action goes into a process history you can download for an audit. Due dates and email reminders keep the queue moving. The free Lite version already includes the designer, the inbox, notifications, history, multisite support and unlimited workflows.
- Visual workflow designer with assignment, review and publish steps, shipped with single-level and multi-level review templates
- Task inbox for each user, with claim and reassign
- Role-based routing, custom statuses on the success or failure path, due dates with email reminders
- Process history with review comments and sign-off timestamps, downloadable for audits
- Pro ($119 per year for two sites) adds auto-submit to the workflow and revisions of already published content; comments, checklist and teams are separate add-ons
Best for: teams with a formal process, such as legal or compliance review, where "who approved this and when" must be answerable.
Main drawback: it is heavier to set up than a status plugin, the install base is small, and contextual comments and checklists cost extra as add-ons.
5. Edit Flow: the free original, lightly maintained
- Job
- Custom statuses, editorial comments, calendar
- Free version
- Yes, free only
- Paid plan
- None
- Rating
- 4.2/5 from 50 reviews
- Installs
- 4,000+ active installs, version 0.11.1, updated 2026-08-18
Edit Flow came out of WordPress.com VIP and is the plugin PublishPress Planner was forked from. It still does the core job well: custom statuses, editorial comments with email notifications, a calendar, story budgets and user groups. It is free with no upsell. The catch is pace. Releases are infrequent, the version number is still below 1.0 after many years, and the rating has drifted down as block editor support lagged.
- Custom statuses, editorial metadata fields and editorial comments
- Calendar and story budget views
- User groups for notifications
- No paid tier at all
Best for: small teams that want statuses and comments for free and do not need support.
Main drawback: slow maintenance. Check the changelog date before you build a workflow on it.
6. Jumplinks Flow: client feedback on drafts
- Job
- Review statuses and client feedback on WordPress drafts
- Free version
- Yes, on WordPress.org
- Paid plan
- Flow Pro, price not published
- Rating
- no reviews yet
- Installs
- under 10 active installs, version 2.7.1, updated 2026-10-28
Jumplinks Flow is the newcomer, and it is built for the agency case. You assign a reviewer to a page or post, either a WordPress user or just the client's email address. The client gets a private magic link to the rendered page, with no account or login, pins comments to the exact text or image, and approves or requests changes. With Mandatory review on, WordPress will not publish until a reviewer clicks Approve, and the review records who did. The free version allows one reviewer per post. Flow Pro removes that limit and adds a minimum number of approvals, Slack notifications, webhooks and an activity log; its price is not published. The install count has not reached the first tier yet and there are no reviews, so trial it on a staging site first.
- Reviewer per post: a WordPress user or an email invite with a magic link, no account needed
- Comments pinned to the exact text or image on the rendered page
- Optional or mandatory review per content type, a Review column in the post list and a dedicated Reviewer role
- Pro adds unlimited reviewers, a minimum number of approvals with each vote tracked, Slack notifications and webhooks
- Updated on 28 October 2026 and tested with the current WordPress release
Best for: an agency that wants client sign-off on WordPress pages without giving the client a login.
Main drawback: no track record yet. Fewer than ten sites run it, nobody has reviewed it, and the Pro price is not public.
Content Flow Manager (free, fewer than ten installs, last updated February 2026) covers a similar single-level flow: pending review, approve or reject with a note, an approval history log and cron reminders. It has no reviews yet either.
7. FS Poster Content Approval: approval for the social shares
- Job
- Review social posts before they go to Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and 23 more networks
- Free version
- No, 14-day money-back guarantee
- Paid plan
- Included in the Developer ($229/year) and Lifetime plans
- Rating
- 4.91/5 from 656 reviews on CodeCanyon
- Installs
- 25,000+ paid customers, 120,000+ installs
Every plugin above stops at the Publish button. The social shares that go out when a post is published, or that your team writes directly for social, have no gate at all. FS Poster is our plugin, so read this entry knowing that. Since version 8.2 its Content Approval adds the missing gate on the social side, inside the same WordPress admin.
- In Settings > Approvals you pick the roles whose social posts need a check, for example Editor and Author
- Those users see Submit for review instead of Share now when they write a post in the composer or calendar
- The approver opens the post, sees the content, channels and planned time, and approves, requests changes or declines it
- Comments and an activity timeline stay with the post; posts in review, changes requested and declined are colour-coded in the calendar
- Workflow notifications tell approvers and authors what happened, in the app or on Telegram
Approvals cover posts written in the FS Poster composer and calendar. WordPress posts that auto-share on publish, and planner reshares, go out as before, because the WordPress post itself already passed whatever editorial gate the plugins above provide. The documentation has the setup, and our social media approval process guide covers the workflow design.
Best for: teams and agencies that already publish to social from WordPress and want the review step for social posts in the same place.
Main drawback: it is a social media plugin, not an editorial one. It does not change how WordPress posts and pages are reviewed, so it pairs with PublishPress or Oasis rather than replacing them.
How to combine them: two gates, one site
The cleanest setup most teams land on uses two plugins, one per gate.
- Gate 1, the WordPress post. PublishPress Capabilities takes publishing rights away from Authors and Contributors. Planner adds the statuses and the calendar. Checklists blocks the half-finished drafts. The Editor publishes.
- Gate 2, the social shares. FS Poster auto-shares the published post to the connected networks, and Content Approval holds every social post the team writes by hand until an approver signs it off.
- Formal sign-off. If a lawyer or a client must approve the post text itself, replace Planner with Oasis Workflow, which records who approved what and when.
For the auto-sharing half of that setup, our comparison of WordPress social media auto-posting plugins covers the options. If the team writes social posts in a SaaS scheduler instead, our roundup of the best social media approval tools compares the approval workflows of 14 of them.
What WordPress does on its own: Pending review
WordPress core already has a tiny approval step, and it is worth knowing before you add a plugin. A Contributor cannot publish. When they finish a draft, the button reads Submit for Review, and the post gets the status Pending. Editors and Administrators see it in the post list under Pending, open it, and publish it or send it back by saving it as a draft.
That is enough for a blog with one editor and a few guest writers. It breaks down when you need more than one review step, a reason for a rejection that stays with the post, a checklist, a deadline or a notification. Every plugin above exists to add one or more of those.
Frequently asked questions
Does WordPress have a built-in approval workflow?
Only a minimal one. Contributors submit posts as Pending review and an Editor publishes them. There are no custom statuses, comments, checklists or notifications without a plugin.
What is the best free WordPress approval workflow plugin?
PublishPress Planner for statuses and a calendar, PublishPress Capabilities to stop authors publishing, and Oasis Workflow's free version if you need a real review step with assignments. All three are free on WordPress.org.
Can I require approval for social media posts from WordPress?
Yes, with FS Poster's Content Approval. Posts written in its composer or calendar by the roles you choose wait for an approver, on the Developer and Lifetime plans.
PublishPress or Oasis Workflow?
PublishPress when you want a pipeline you can see and move posts along. Oasis Workflow when you need a formal sign-off with assignees, due dates and a history log.
Is Edit Flow still safe to use?
It works and it is free, but releases are infrequent. Check the last update on WordPress.org and test it with your editor setup before you rely on it.
Conclusion
Pick by the gate you are missing. If drafts get published too early, start with Capabilities and Checklists. If nobody can see where a post is, add Planner. If someone has to sign off formally, use Oasis Workflow. And if your social shares leave WordPress without anyone looking at them, FS Poster's Content Approval closes that gap in the same admin your team already uses.
Write once. Post to 26 networks.
- 26 social networks
- Schedule & auto-repost
- Runs inside wp-admin
