If you are a blog administrator, then you might be spending more time on the back-end than on the main site. So you will definitely want the back-end interface to have a professional look and also customized to suit your needs. In this post there are 10 WordPress Admin themes and plug-ins that specifically expand the functionality of the WordPress admin dashboard.
All the plugins and themes have been tested on WordPress 3.1 RC4.
Admin Trim Interface
Admin Trim Interface is a plugin that allows you to trim the interface by removing elements that you don’t want. You can remove the header WordPress logo, “Search Engines Blocked” link, “Help” link, WordPress version in the footer and many more elements. All changes made are global and would affect all users.
Download: Admin Trim Interface
Admin Menu Editor
With this plugin, you can customize the Admin menu layout by dragging and dropping the menu in the order you want. It also also you to create new custom menus, and edit existing ones.
Download: Admin Menu Editor
Adminimize
Adminize allows you to visually compress and hide many items in the admin interface. You can hide unnecessary items from the main menu, sub menu and even the dashboard. The plugin also offers various features for tweaking the post edit page, media, links and the plugins panel. The best thing of the plugin is that it does not set a global rule for all users and lets each user customize the interface the way they want.
Download: Adminimize
Admin Management Xtended
Admin Management Xtended adds AJAX-driven icons to the posts/pages management panel. Using the icons you can toggle post/page visibility, toggle comment status open/closed and change publication date without having to open the edit screens or reloading the page.
Download: Admin Management Xtended
WordPress Tweaks
WordPress Tweaks offers various tweaks, including disabling auto-complete for tags, disabling flash uploader, and disabling self-pinging. You can also use it to control various options for SEO, security and the nofollow options.
Download: WordPress Tweaks
Admin Expert Mode
Admin Expert Mode plugin lets you hide the inline documentation and help texts found on the admin pages. You can get an idea of what it does from the above image.
The plugin lets each user have their own settings and it needs to be activated by the user by going to their profile page.
Download: Admin Expert Mode
Pre Publish Reminders
Pre Publish Reminders is a simple plugin that lets you set reminders that needs to be considered before publishing a post. Reminders can be customized by setting any text or background color you want. Each reminder, while displaying, has a checkbox next to it. You can check the box when an item is done.
Download: Pre Publish Reminders
Ozh’ Admin Drop Down Menu
This plugin moves the Admin menu from the left side of the dashboard and displays it as a horizontal drop down menu at the top. The menu supports various color scheme and icons.
Download: Ozh Admin Drop Down Menu
Fluency Admin
Fluency Admin is an awesome WordPress Admin panel theme which provides the user with an entirely different interface. The theme contains different color schemes and also supports keyboard shortcuts allowing you control the dashboard using only a keyboard.
Download: Fluency Admin
Easy Admin Color Schemes
If you don’t want a brand new interface then you can customize the regular WordPress dashboard with different color schemes. Easy Admin Color Schemes provides a simple form, using which you can change the look of the admin interface without even knowing CSS.
The themes that you create can also be exported for use on other installations.
Download: Easy Admin Color Schemes