Content Locker Pro Review: MyThemeShop Has Retired It
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You can no longer buy Content Locker Pro. MyThemeShop has retired it: the shop’s plugin range now runs to Rank Math SEO, WP Shortcode Pro, WP Review Pro, URL Shortener Pro, WP Quiz Pro, WP Notification Bar Pro, WP Subscribe Pro and WP Mega Menu, and Content Locker is not among them. If you want to lock content behind a share or an email address, use OptinMonster instead, where content locking starts on the Plus plan at $19 a month billed annually.
The rest of this page covers what the plugin did, what to do if it is still installed on your site, and whether content locking is a tactic worth keeping at all.
What Content Locker Pro did
It hid part of a post behind an action. Readers saw an intro, a blurred block of text and a box asking them to do one of two things.
The social locker unlocked content once the reader shared or liked the page on a supported network. The sign-in locker unlocked it once they handed over an email address or signed in through a social login provider.
You built a locker in the plugin’s own admin screen, got a shortcode, and wrapped the part of your post you wanted hidden.
Around that core it offered sixteen locker designs, eight for each type, all responsive. There was AJAX unlocking so the content appeared without a page reload, an option to blur rather than hide the locked section, and a timer that could release the content anyway after a set delay so you did not lose readers who refused.
An analytics panel reported conversions per locker, with an optional Google Analytics hook. Captured emails could be pushed to Mailchimp, MailerLite, AWeber, ActiveCampaign and a handful of others, or exported to CSV. A setting added links to your terms and privacy pages on the locker box.
Where it fell down
Two things, and both are worse now than they were.
The social locker depended on network APIs and share buttons that the platforms have since changed or withdrawn, so the unlock actions that once worked no longer all do. The sign-in locker depended on third-party login providers, and those have tightened their app review requirements considerably.
The plugin also handled personal data with a fairly light touch. A privacy policy link on the box is not consent, and it never gave you the records you would need to show consent, honour a withdrawal request or answer a data access request.
If it is still installed
Deactivate it, but read your posts first.
The lockers were placed with shortcodes. If you deactivate the plugin without editing your content, those shortcodes stop being processed and readers will see the raw text of the shortcode sitting in the middle of your article. Search your posts for the locker shortcodes, remove them, and check that the content that used to be hidden now reads properly on its own.
Export any collected email addresses before you remove the plugin, and confirm you have a lawful basis for keeping them before you import them anywhere else.
Should you lock content at all?
Worth pausing on, because the answer has shifted.
Locking behind a social share has largely stopped working as a growth tactic. Shares no longer carry the reach they did, the networks have deprioritised outbound links, and readers have learned to close the box and find the same information elsewhere. You pay for it in bounce rate.
Locking behind an email address still works, but only when what is behind the lock is genuinely worth the exchange. A template, a spreadsheet, a dataset or a checklist converts. The second half of a blog post does not, and hiding it costs you the search traffic that brought the reader in the first place, because a locked section is thin content to a crawler that cannot unlock it.
If you do lock, keep the deal honest. Say what you will send, send it, and make the unlock reversible.
What to use instead
OptinMonster is the closest live equivalent and the one we would pick. Content locking is a built-in feature, so you get the blur-and-unlock behaviour without a retired plugin, plus the targeting rules that Content Locker Pro never had: exit intent, scroll depth, referrer and per-page rules.
Plans run at $7 a month for Basic, $19 for Plus, $29 for Pro and $49 for Growth, all billed annually. Content locking needs Plus or above. There is a fourteen day money-back guarantee. Prices checked September 2026.
Thrive Leads is the alternative if you would rather own the plugin than rent a service. It includes content locking among its lead group types and it keeps everything on your own site. It is only sold inside Thrive Suite, at $299 a year against a $599 list price, or $149 a quarter, with a thirty day refund window. Prices checked September 2026. Our Thrive Leads review goes through it properly.
For a wider comparison, including the free options, see our roundup of social content locker plugins.
The verdict
Content Locker Pro was a tidy, well-designed plugin that solved a problem people cared about in 2019. Sixteen designs, a proper analytics panel and a timed-unlock escape hatch were all thoughtful touches, and it was cheap.
None of that helps you now. It is off sale, its social unlocks depend on APIs that have moved on, and its consent handling would not stand up to scrutiny. If you still have it, export your list and take it out. If you want the feature, OptinMonster gives you a maintained version of it with far better targeting.
Also worth reading: our comparison of WordPress popup plugins, which covers the same conversion job with less friction for the reader.
