Let’s face it – there are HUNDREDS of jQuery sliders available. The only real thing you need to know about a plugin are a few basic aspects: how easy is it to implement, what transitions are available, is it compatible with WordPress, and other similar very simple questions. If you go looking for plugins without some criteria in mind, you could spend almost an entire morning searching for the exact plugin you need.

So instead of creating a massive list of tons of different sliders, I decided to focus on a few that cover the broad range of features. My goal was to prevent you from filtering through a ginormous list, wasting valuable time that you need to reserve for more important tasks. Without further ado, check out these top-rated, FREE jQuery plugins based on your slider needs.

Coin Slider

Here’s a jQuery slider that’s actually compatible with EI6! Lots of features make it a great slider, and you can fully skin it using CSS. Images are linkable and all transitions can be customized.

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Supersize

This plugin offers the ability to go full-screen, which is ideal if you’re a designer/photographer and want to show off your images for brochure printing projects or photographs. It’s free and available for WordPress.

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Nivo

This includes a WordPress plugin, support, and tons of transition effects. It’s free but also has paid developer support for your more complex commercial projects.

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Presentation Cycle

If you need more than just images, Presentation Cycle gives you a simple way to add content to each slide. The plugin also has a unique animated progress bar that shows when the next image will appear, but can be clicked to progress at the user’s own pace.

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AnythingSlider

This is a robust, full-featured slider with just about every imagineable feature. You can add videos, use multiple sliders on a single page, and much, much more. Like any fully-featured plugin, there’s a learning curve to get it up and running. If you need feature-rich content within each slide, this is your plugin.

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Easy Slider

Where AnythingSlider is complex, this Easy Slider plugin is the opposite – it’s very simple and easy to implement. It’s lightweight and a WordPress plugin is available.

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Galleria

Here’s a nice jQuery plugin that gives you the perfect marriage of simplicity with loads of features. Using a theme concept, you can easily implement this slider or dive in and customize to your heart’s content. One of the unique features is that it has a thumbnail preview option. Lots of premium content is available for upgrading and support, but the basic theme is free.

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Thumbnails Navigation Gallery

While not technically a slider, this plugin still functions as a slider by allowing visitors to view a rotating line of thumbnail images. This is wonderful for photographers or designers who have graphic heavy content to display. Implementation is a bit involved, but you can build an entire site around this feature-rich plugin.

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Sideways

This is a full-featured gallery plugin that is easy to get started with, but lets you grow into more features if you need them. It creates a spectacular effect with a thumbnail gallery on the left and the featured image on the right. Once you click a thumbnail, you’re taken to a full-screen view where you can continue sliding through images or go back to the thumbnail view.

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Dragdealer

Dragdealer is far more than an image slider, but you can use it to implement a slider and then use the other built-in features for other elements. The framework allows for users to drag or click various elements and produce an effect. For example, you can drag a bar (mobile touch compatible) to zoom into text or an image. Definitely worth checking out if you need a robust plugin.

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Did I miss any of your favorite plugins? Have you used any of the plugins above?

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jQuery Slider Shock

jQuery SliderShock is the most complete jQuery and WordPress slider ever. Some of its features: 31+ effects, 31+ skins, external data sources (Instagram, Flickr, Youtube, RSS, and more), responsive or fixed width (mobile and tablet ready), resizable, several slideshows in same page, several thumbs positions, change any design aspect, colors fonts, placements, html captions, and much much more. SliderShock has been launched by the team behind WP Theme Generator.