9 Best Side Menu Lite Alternatives in 2026
Updated September 7, 2026 · Ranked by how closely each plugin matches, from WordPress.org data · How this works
Side Menu Lite has 7,000+ active installs on WordPress.org. These 9 plugins share its category or its tags on WordPress.org, are actively maintained, and each has at least 100 active installs. They are ordered by how closely they match, not by our opinion.
The 9 closest alternatives to Side Menu Lite
- 1
Simple Floating Menu
Closest match5.0 (38) 10,000+ active installsSimple Floating Menu adds a floating sticky bar of icon buttons to your site, with tooltips, in the position and shape you choose.
Shares the fixed menu, floating menu tags on WordPress.org. A similar number of installs, last updated 11 days ago.
- 2
4.8 (141) 2,000+ active installsAdd WordPress Dropdown Menu Widget easily! Upgrade your sidebar menus to responsive dropdown widget now!
Shares the nav menu, sidebar menu tags on WordPress.org. About a third of the installs, no update since November 28, 2017.
- 3
WPB Accordion Menu – Collapsible Vertical Sidebar Responsive Mobile Menu – WooCommerce Category Accordion
4.4 (54) 10,000+ active installsWPB Accordion Menu: Responsive accordion, vertical sidebar and mobile menu for WooCommerce categories, navigation menus & Elementor.
Shares the sidebar menu tag on WordPress.org. A similar number of installs, last updated today.
- 4
4.8 (25) 900+ active installsAdd a responsive sliding SideMenu to your WordPress site with the SideMenu block.
Shares the sidebar menu tag on WordPress.org. 900+ installs against 7,000+, last updated 24 days ago.
- 5
5.0 (20) 2,000+ active installsAutomatically all of a nav menu item's descendants as submenu items. Designed for pages but will work with any hierarchical post type or taxonomy …
Shares the nav menu tag on WordPress.org. About a third of the installs, no update since September 6, 2022.
- 6
4.9 (219) 70,000+ active installsHide custom menu items based on user roles.
Shares the nav menu tag on WordPress.org. About 10 times the installs, last updated March 26, 2026.
- 7
4.2 (37) 6,000+ active installsDisplay image as a menu item content.
Shares the nav menu tag on WordPress.org. A similar number of installs, no update since November 28, 2017.
- 8
4.7 (23) 1,000+ active installsAdds search box as a choice of item in navigation menus admin area.
Shares the nav menu tag on WordPress.org. 1,000+ installs against 7,000+, no update since November 28, 2017.
- 9
5.0 (20) 5,000+ active installsAdd navigation menu field type to Advanced Custom Fields
Shares the nav menu tag on WordPress.org. A similar number of installs, no update since June 10, 2025.
Switching from Side Menu Lite: common questions
What is the best alternative to Side Menu Lite?
Simple Floating Menu is the closest match: it shares the same WordPress.org tags and has 10,000+ active installs with a 5.0 out of 5 rating.
Which Side Menu Lite alternative has the most users?
Nav Menu Roles, with 70,000+ active installs reported by WordPress.org.
Which Side Menu Lite alternative is rated highest?
Nav Menu Roles, rated 4.9 out of 5 by 219 reviewers. Only plugins with at least 50 reviews are counted.
Are these Side Menu Lite alternatives free?
Every plugin listed here is free to install from WordPress.org. Where WordPress.org marks a plugin as commercial, the developer also sells a paid version or add-ons, and that is shown on each plugin.
How are alternatives chosen?
Automatically, from WordPress.org data: plugins that share a category top 10 with Side Menu Lite score highest, then plugins that appear in the same WordPress.org rankings, then plugins with the same tags, weighted so rare tags count more than common ones. Plugins by the same author and plugins rated under 4.0 are left out.
How we choose these alternatives
Nothing on this page is picked by hand. Every day we walk the whole WordPress.org directory, then score every plugin against Side Menu Lite on three signals: sharing a category top 10 counts most, then appearing in the same WordPress.org rankings, then carrying the same tags, with rare tags counting for more than common ones like "wordpress". Plugins by the same author are excluded, so an author's own add-ons cannot fill the list, and so is anything rated below 4.0 or with fewer than 100 active installs. The ten highest scores are what you see, in that order. Full methodology.
The bottom line
Simple Floating Menu is the closest match to Side Menu Lite by the data we track, and Nav Menu Roles has the widest reach with 70,000+ active installs. WPB Accordion Menu shipped the most recent release, on September 6, 2026. The list is rebuilt every day from WordPress.org, so a plugin that stops being maintained drops out on its own.
Weekly · free
What moved this week
One email a week, built from the same daily snapshots these rankings come from: the plugins that climbed, what launched, and one ranking worth a look.