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Nightingale Companion

by NHS Leadership Academy Digital Team · WordPress.org page · Website

v1.3.8 Tested up to WP 6.9.7 PHP 8.2+

Nightingale Companion has 300+ active installs on WordPress.org and 8,684 downloads all time. We have tracked it since September 4, 2026; download trends appear after 30 days of data. The last update was on May 11, 2026, tested up to WordPress 6.9.7.

Nightingale Companion at a glance

Active installs
300+
Total downloads
8,684
Downloads, last 30 days
–
available after 30 days of tracking
30-day growth
–
tracking since September 4, 2026

Is Nightingale Companion well maintained?

Support threads resolved
No open threads
nothing waiting on the WordPress.org forum
WordPress compatibility
Behind
tested up to WordPress 6.9.7, not yet with the current 7.1

Features

The feature list from the plugin's own readme on WordPress.org, trimmed to the essentials.

  • Disable Emojis – this disables the default emoji packages that ship with WordPress, which load on every single page of your site and impact performance and…
  • LoadCSS – Removed as caused a number of conflicts with some WP plugins
  • InstantPage – Removed as causing multiple issues on the sites. pages preloading when a user hovers their mouse over links. This does not, in fact increase load…
  • DeferJS – Removed as caused a number of conflicts with some WP plugins
  • Set Browser Cache – Removed as caused a number of conflicts with some WP plugins. (Recommend using CloudFlare or similar for better results)
  • Cleanup WordPress meta tags – removes lots of WP native tags included in the header region
  • Use Excerpts as Meta Description – WordPress automatically takes the first 55 words of a post or page to create an excerpt (or you can manually add your own…
  • Modified the login page to use the theme design and layout
  • Adds the emergency alert header to the theme customiser

Details

A plugin to enhance performance on sites running the Nightingale theme

The full description, screenshots and every review live on the WordPress.org page.

Tags

  • nhs
  • nightingale
  • theme

More from NHS Leadership Academy Digital Team

Version
1.3.8
Last updated
May 11, 2026
First published
Jun 22, 2020
Requires WordPress
6.4
Tested up to
6.9.7
Requires PHP
8.2
Pricing
Free on WordPress.org

Nightingale Companion FAQ

What does Nightingale Companion do?

According to its WordPress.org readme, Nightingale Companion offers Disable Emojis – this disables the default emoji packages that ship with WordPress, which load on every single page of your site and impact performance and, LoadCSS – Removed as caused a number of conflicts with some WP plugins, InstantPage – Removed as causing multiple issues on the sites. pages preloading when a user hovers their mouse over links. This does not, in fact increase load, DeferJS – Removed as caused a number of conflicts with some WP plugins and Set Browser Cache – Removed as caused a number of conflicts with some WP plugins. (Recommend using CloudFlare or similar for better results).

How many active installs does Nightingale Companion have?

WordPress.org reports 300+ active installs for Nightingale Companion as of September 7, 2026.

Is Nightingale Companion still maintained?

Yes. The last release was on May 11, 2026 and it is tested up to WordPress 6.9.7.

Is Nightingale Companion free?

Nightingale Companion is free to install from WordPress.org. Many plugins also sell a paid version or add-ons.