Since version 5.1 (December 2018) it has been difficult to re-engage Contact Form 7 reCAPTCHA Version 2. The default is to enable Version 3, which to be honest I don’t believe is working correctly yet.
Contact Form 7 Plugin
A long time favourite for its simplicity and feature set. The parent plugin works well and if you don’t need reCAPTCHA it’s great ‘out of box’.
I experimented with Version 3 enabled for two weeks across a variety of WordPress powered sites. Unfortunately the spam rate raised back to high levels. It was time to find a solution. Either convert to something like Ninja Forms or… *drumroll please*…
Contact Form 7 reCAPTCHA Version 2
This plugin brings reCAPTCHA v2 functionality back and re-adds the [recaptcha] tag. If you already have the Version 2 API keys installed and configured it’s easy. All you need do is select the Version 2 option from the installed configuration page via the dropdown.
- Figure 01
In the WordPress management backend select ‘Contact’ > ‘reCaptcha Version’. - Figure 02
On the resulting page select ‘reCaptcha Version 2’ from the dropdown. - Figure 03
You can now go back to the old design and layout of CF7 forms and use the[recaptcha]shortcode again.
Download Contact Form 7 (wordpress.org)
Download Contact Form 7 reCAPTCHA v2 (wordpress.org)
In Conclusion
A very quick and neat solution to a sticky problem. As of writing there have been no issues but I’m still looking into a longer term viable solution. If you have found a better solution (using CF7 & Version 2 of reCAPTCHA) I would love to hear from you.
Further Reading
- Download Contact Form 7 reCAPTCHA v2 (wordpress.org)
- IQ Computing Home (CF7 v2 Dev) (iqcomputing.com)
- Download Contact Form 7 (wordpress.org)
- Takayuki Miyoshi Home (CF7 Dev) (wordpress.com)
- Google reCAPATCHA (google.com)
