A website redirect sends visitors from the URL they typed to a different web page. Website admins usually create URL redirects to maintain user experience when fixing broken links, moving to a new domain, or migrating from HTTP to HTTPS. The easiest way to create redirects for websites hosted on a WordPress server is to […]
The post 13 Best WordPress Redirect Plugin Options for SEO + Best Practices to Redirect URLs appeared first on Hostinger Tutorials.
A landing page is important to generate more conversions. However, creating one can be difficult and time-consuming. If you have a WordPress website, a landing page plugin can help simplify the task. WordPress landing page plugins provide a visual editor and pre-designed templates, making the creation process easier. However, choosing one can be difficult due […]
The post 10 Top WordPress Landing Page Plugin Options for Better Conversions in 2023 appeared first on Hostinger Tutorials.
Choosing the right platform to build your website can be daunting, given the many options available. While WordPress and Dreamweaver are two of the most popular platforms due to their extensive customization capabilities, it’s important to note that there are some significant differences between them. Therefore, in this post, we’ll compare WordPress vs Dreamweaver to help you decide which suits your needs better. So, let’s dive in!
While WordPress and Dreamweaver allow you to build responsive and effective websites, they differ significantly in their approach. Therefore, before we can assess which platform would be the best fit for you, let’s delve into each.
WordPress is an easy-to-use content management system (CMS) that empowers you to build and manage a website effortlessly. Over time, it has become one of the most widely used platforms for creating websites, accounting for more than 43% of the internet. Being an open-source and free platform, it provides an incredible amount of themes and plugins, both free and premium, that expand WordPress’ core capabilities.
Whether you’re aiming to create a blog, a learning management system (LMS), a membership site, or an online store, WordPress makes it easy to learn and master. This makes it an excellent choice for both beginners and seasoned developers.
Dreamweaver, part of the Adobe Creative Suite, is used to design, develop, and deploy websites. Users have three interfaces to choose from, including code, split (code and visual), or a visual interface with a drag-and-drop editor. However, coding skills are essential if you want to build a fully responsive website. Like WordPress, Dreamweaver supports using HTML, CSS, javascript, and PHP. Still, it’s up to the user to put all the pieces together.
Using Dreamweaver, developers can create web pages from scratch or choose from premade templates, previewing their designs on various browsers and screen sizes. Although not as popular as WordPress, Dreamweaver still holds about .3% of the market share of all websites on the internet.
Comparing WordPress vs Dreamweaver can be complex as they have different approaches to creating websites. WordPress is user-friendly and ideal for those without web design experience. Furthermore, it offers incredible versatility and can be modified by developers or extended with plugins and themes to create different kinds of websites.
On the other hand, even though Dreamweaver provides a drag-and-drop interface, you still need to code draggable elements to ensure they work. Hiring a full-stack developer is also likely necessary if you’re looking to create more than an informational website. As a result, Dreamweaver is better suited for those with advanced coding knowledge.
When it comes to pricing, WordPress and Dreamweaver are very different. That said, after add-ons, they are pretty even regarding price. Let’s explore what you’ll be getting yourself into should you choose one of these platforms.
Calculating the overall cost of WordPress is tricky. While WordPress itself is free, there are other variables to consider. Before you ever start designing, you’ll need a choose a domain and obtain a hosting plan. While these aren’t huge costs – you can get a domain for less than $20 per year – when you factor in other things like plugins and themes, the cost can quickly add up.
For instance, let’s say you are building an ecommerce website. Once you purchase a domain and settle on a hosting plan, you’ll need good ecommerce plugins, such as WooCommerce. WooCommerce is free, but when you factor in any extras you might need, like a theme, security, SEO, and add-ons for Woo, you’re getting raked over the coals.
When choosing Dreamweaver as your website creation tool, the good news is that there aren’t many costs to worry about – at least if you plan to do the coding yourself. Of course, you’ll need to purchase a domain and web hosting, but you’ll also have to pay for the Dreamweaver software. The cost for Dreamweaver is roughly $22 per month before taxes.
However, if you want to access Adobe’s full suite of creative products, including Dreamweaver, the cost increases to around $55 per month. It makes sense for most people using Dreamweaver to opt for the entire Creative Cloud. This is especially true if you plan to create a more advanced website that requires photo-editing tools and a way to make scalable vector graphics (SVG) or animations.
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| Pricing | ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
WordPress is free, but you’ll need multiple add-ons, such as a domain, theme, plugins, and a theme. |
ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
Dreamweaver isn’t cheap after you pay for a domain, hosting and the software, but is on par with WordPress after add-ons. |
| Get started with WordPress | Get started with Dreamweaver |
When building a website, selecting the right platform is critical, with ease of use being a key factor. While WordPress and Dreamweaver have a learning curve, WordPress distinguishes itself because of how easy it is to get up to speed.
Before WordPress came along, creating a website required extensive coding. But thanks to the folks at Automattic, regular people can now easily create them. With that said, the first time you log in to WordPress, you may need help figuring out where to start. Although there is a learning curve, there are plenty of resources available (like our blog) to provide tips and tricks to help users overcome any obstacles. Once you’re over the initial shock of the number of settings available, it’s easy to figure out what things do and where they are located.
Another thing to consider is what type of site you intend to create. This will influence the types of plugins and themes you choose, which can add to the learning curve. Thankfully, some themes make WordPress easier to work with, regardless of the type of site you plan to build. For example, Divi is an excellent choice for beginners thanks to its no-code Visual Builder. You can design posts and pages on the front end to view design changes in real time. Having a visual representation of your site’s content as you add it makes life much easier.
That said, it’s best to familiarize yourself with the default block editor before learning to work with themes and plugins. Since most WordPress content creation centers around posts and pages, learning how and where to build your content will go a long way when learning WordPress.
When you launch Dreamweaver for the first time, you’re met with an easy-to-follow setup screen. It walks you through display preferences and lets you choose to start with a sample file and watch a tutorial to help you get started. We highly recommend watching the tutorial video. It will help you set up the site manager – where you’ll configure your local hosting environment – and introduce you to the most commonly used tools. That said, that’s about all the help you’re going to get. After that, things are complicated if you are a stranger to coding.
To make things easier on yourself, you can start with one of the sixteen available templates. Keep in mind that these are starter pages, not full-blown websites. You can start with a basic multi-column or grid layout, a handful of responsive pages, build an email, or choose from a few Bootstrap pages. Once you load your chosen template, you must code in images, text, and other elements to complete your page.
Overall, the learning curve for Dreamweaver is steep for beginners. If you have a basic knowledge of CSS, HTML, and Bootstrap, you can easily create a basic site, but it will take time. That said, if you are a coding guru who likes to get down deep into the coding weeds, Dreamweaver isn’t that difficult to master. It depends on your chosen coding language and level of comfort with learning a new platform.
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| Ease of Use | 🥇 Winner
After you get over the initial learning curve, WordPress is one of the easiest tools to create websites with. |
Dreamweaver requires extensive coding knowledge to build a website. |
| Get started with WordPress | Get started with Dreamweaver |
One of the most important considerations when choosing a new web platform is having the ability to make it exactly what you want and need. Both WordPress and Dreamweaver offer unlimited customization options. That said, they provide completely different ways of allowing you to do it.
Despite its origins as a blogging platform, WordPress has evolved into a dynamic content management system that can accommodate any website, thanks to its vast add-ons. Within the WordPress repository, you can find many themes, each offering a unique appearance for your website. These themes can be easily installed via the WordPress dashboard or the theme repository. Moreover, there are numerous premium themes available from third-party vendors, such as Elegant Themes, StudioPress, and ThemeIsle, that you can purchase to enhance the look and functionality of your website.
Additionally, thousands of plugins allow you to customize your site. For example, let’s say you’re looking to build a membership website. Adding a good membership plugin will quickly enable you to gate content, create membership tiers, take payments, and even add a forum for community discussion. There are awesome plugins for literally anything, making customization options with WordPress endless.
There are additional methods that allow you to add interesting bits to your website. For example, widgets can enhance your site’s appearance, as they can be placed in various locations, such as the sidebar, footer, or header. They can also display category archives, social media platforms, recent posts, and more. In addition, even though WordPress is designed to be user-friendly, you can take customization to the next level by adding custom CSS, HTML, and Javascript. Depending on the theme you select, you can create customized templates that will give your site a cohesive appearance throughout all your posts and pages, including those for displaying posts, search pages, archives, and more.
Like WordPress, Dreamweaver has tons of customization options. It starts with the ability to create the perfect workspace. You can choose between light and dark modes, assign custom colors for code previews, and more. As previously mentioned, Dreamweaver offers three different workspace views, including code, split, and live. You can drag and drop pre-coded elements into your pages with the live view. That said, you’ll still need to add CSS, images, and code snippets to make them function correctly.
For example, when working with Bootstrap files, default components are available to bring your pages to life. You can choose from containers, carousels, card layouts, animated spinners, buttons, and more. Dreamweaver even includes the corresponding code snippets to give you a headstart on your CSS and Javascript. Additionally, there’s a front-end CSS designer that allows you to edit CSS for a particular property, which saves time.
When working in the split view, you can easily click on an element in the front end and edit the CSS property in the associated CSS file. You can also duplicate elements, add text decoration to headlines, link images, and make elements responsive with a click of a tick box. Additional customization options include the ability to install third-party extensions such as image galleries, contact forms with reCaptcha, Google Maps, and more.
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| Customization | ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
WordPress is highly customizable with plugins, themes, and custom code. |
ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
You can customize anything with Dreamweaver if you have excellent coding skills. |
| Get started with WordPress | Get started with Dreamweaver |
Hosting requirements for WordPress vs Dreamweaver are very different. Static websites (Dreamweaver) generally require less hosting than WordPress sites. With that in mind, here are a few options for each to give you an idea of what’s available.
There are a lot of variables when it comes to WordPress hosting. First, what kind of hosting do you want? Secondly, what’s your budget? As a WordPress user, you’ll likely be overwhelmed by all the choices. With that in mind, there are a few that we can highly recommend – SiteGround and Pressable. Both providers offer managed WordPress hosting, several price tiers, excellent features, and are optimized for WordPress.
Hosting a site built with Dreamweaver is less complicated. Unless you build server-side applications such as CGI/Perl, ASP, or PHP, you’ll likely get away with low-end shared hosting. The reason for this is Dreamweaver’s basic functions use HTML, CSS, and Javascript, so they don’t require nearly as much power. With that in mind, there are a few that we can recommend that are geared towards client-side, static websites – A2 Hosting and Green Geeks. Both offer reasonable plans with ample NVMe SSD storage, automatic backups, FTP (a Dreamweaver requirement), free site migration, and a free SSL certificate.
When it’s time to choose between WordPress and Dreamweaver, both have their advantages. That said, the one you choose depends on your specific needs. WordPress is easy to use, has an extensive support system, and offers thousands of themes and plugins to customize your site. On the other hand, Dreamweaver is a powerful web development tool that allows you to create static websites, custom applications, and large complex sites.
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| Pricing | ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
WordPress is free, but you’ll need multiple add-ons, such as a domain, theme, plugins, and a theme. |
ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
Dreamweaver isn’t cheap after you pay for a domain, hosting and the software, but is on par with WordPress after add-ons. |
| Ease of Use | 🥇 Winner
After you get over the initial learning curve, WordPress is one of the easiest tools to create websites with. |
Dreamweaver requires extensive coding knowledge to build a website. |
| Customization | ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
WordPress is highly customizable with plugins, themes, and custom code. |
ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
You can customize anything with Dreamweaver if you have excellent coding skills. |
| Get started with WordPress | Get started with Dreamweaver |
At the end of the day, if you want to create a website quickly and don’t have much coding experience, WordPress is the way to go. However, if you want to develop apps or customized websites based on HTML, PHP, or Bootstrap, Dreamweaver could be a good fit.
The post WordPress vs Dreamweaver (2023) — Which is Better for Your Website? appeared first on Elegant Themes Blog.
WordPress community is always in motion to create a better experience for its content management system users. This month, we’re treated with updates, patches, and feature development for various WordPress plugins.
In addition, sticking with the AI trend, we saw more AI adoption in the WordPress ecosystem. Most notably, Elementor, one of the big players, announced its plans to introduce more AI-powered features into the site builder. But more on that later – let’s look at what April has brought us.
Despite being a relatively quiet month for the WordPress core, there are still some interesting and important updates to talk about. Some experimental features got rolled out in Gutenberg, and Yoast updated its minimum requirements.
April saw the release of Gutenberg versions 15.5 and 15.6, which brought three new interesting experimental features to users. To try them out, you must install and activate the Gutenberg plugin and activate the experiments from the Gutenberg → Experiments panel.
Grid Block
The grid block was introduced in Gutenberg 15.5. Acting as the new container block, the grid layout enables users to arrange content, such as displaying product features, in a way that wasn’t previously possible with the “group, row, and stack†block.
Currently, the grid block has a single setting to change the minimum column width, which will affect the number of columns. This block is also included in the container block transformation option, making it easier to transform the different blocks into each other. This way, if you want to change a stack block to a grid block, you simply click a button and get on with your day.
Details Block
The details block, introduced in Gutenberg 15.6, lets users add a collapsible section to their pages to hide content.
For example, you might want to hide a transcript or product details that may take up too much space if displayed by default. This block also comes in handy when users want to create an accordion menu.
The details block consists of a heading for the details summary and a child block. You can insert any core block you want into this block, including a query loop and an image. This gives great flexibility for adding any content inside the accordion.
Command Center
The last experimental feature we want to highlight is the command center. Also introduced as an experiment in Gutenberg 15.6, this feature acts as a shortcut for users to go to other posts, pages, templates, and template parts.
Users simply have to press Cmd/Ctrl + K in the Site Editor, and the command center pop-up will appear, showing the available items to jump to. Alternatively, use the search bar to find the item you want to pick.
Yoast launched two updates in April – version 20.5 and 20.6. But it’s the first update you should really pay attention to.
Version 20.5 will increase the PHP requirement to a minimum of PHP 7.2.5 or higher. This means that the plugin will no longer be compatible with previously supported versions – PHP 5.6, 7.0, and 7.1.
Update your PHP version to improve the performance of your website. You can do so easily with our hPanel: we have a dedicated PHP management panel that lets you change the PHP version in just a few clicks.
Yoast already posted a notice in November 2022 about increasing the minimum PHP requirement for the plugin. While it was initially planned for March 2023, Yoast finally implemented it in version 20.5, launched in mid-April 2023.
Crafting a website with AI is still a hot topic online, and Elementor just jumped on the bandwagon. They just announced that AI technology is being introduced to their products.
Elementor’s first notable AI tool is the text generator. This tool lets users generate text for headings and content blocks with simple prompts. Thanks to the several handy quick prompts, you can refine the results by making the suggested text shorter or longer, simplifying the language, and fixing grammar issues. There are options to change the tone and translate the text.
The second intriguing feature is code-writing AI. Created to help write CSS and custom HTML code, this tool is useful for anyone who wants to create specific visual customization but doesn’t know how to code.
Currently, Elementor AI is available in the beta version of 3.13, with the final release estimation will be on May 8, 2023.
Although we just got the latest major WordPress release last month, the WordPress team is already working on future updates.
The WordPress 6.2 release squad is working on the 6.2.1 minor updates to fix several bugs. While there is still no schedule for the update, the team is expected to deliver it in May.
Enable the WordPress automatic update feature in hPanel, so you won’t miss any patches to the software.
As for the major update, the proposed plan is to ship WordPress 6.3 around August. The WordPress team is still calling for a release squad. If you’re interested, you can check out the Core Team blog post for more information.
This month, we had a rather unusual security breach: an abandoned plugin was exploited to create a backdoor on compromised websites. Not something you wish to happen to your site, right? We have also rounded up some plugins that launched patches to cover cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities.
A security threat was found related to an abandoned Eval PHP plugin. Considered an abandonware, given the last update was over 10 years ago, the plugin was used to add PHP code to WordPress posts and pages. This created an opportunity for attackers to use it to create a backdoor to sites that had the plugin installed.
The attackers first need to install Eval PHP on compromised websites. Then they could insert the PHP code into posts and pages to create the backdoor.
The vulnerability was identified when an unusual spike of installs happened in the last few months despite the plugin’s dormant activity. This resulted in the WordPress Plugins team removing Eval PHP from the repository to prevent more installation and subsequent security threats.
It is recommended to check your website to ensure Eval PHP is not installed on your site. We recommend also securing your WordPress credentials to prevent compromising your site in the future.
Always use secure credentials to prevent unauthorized access to your WordPress admin. We recommend using hPanel’s malware scanner to find any security threat on your site.
Throughout April, some plugins were affected by cross-site scripting vulnerabilities. We’ve scanned through Patchstack data and listed some notable plugins detected with such vulnerabilities:
WordPress is driven by creative contributors who develop themes, plugins, and other tools to improve the website creation experience. Here are some new additions to the WordPress family that we found interesting and worth mentioning.
One of the captivating new WordPress block themes is Lovebird – a multipurpose block theme with a bold design and a feature-rich premium version. The demo version boasts a clean pink-themed style with a noisy image background, giving off retro vibes.
The magazine-inspired design makes Lovebird suitable for fashion or online magazine websites. Its bold and catchy style easily captures readers’ attention, and the strong typography selection makes the text pop out for max readability. The theme is also WooCommerce-ready, so starting a fashion store or charging for a magazine subscription is possible from the get-go.
AI technology is here to stay, and the Flusso AI plugin is one of the latest examples of how it can be leveraged for content creation.
Flusso AI brings four AI functionalities to your site:
The plugin uses OpenAI, meaning that you must connect the plugin to your OpenAI account using the secret key.
Curious to see what are the most popular WordPress plugins? Pascal Birchler created a periodic table of 108 WordPress plugins from the official repository with the most active downloads.
The table is interactive, too. Click on any element, and it will expand to show more information about the plugin, what it’s used for, and so on.
Although this periodic table was built to celebrate the 20th anniversary of WordPress, it still provides useful information to users, especially if you’re looking for the most popular and reputable WordPress plugins for your website.
On May 27, 2023, we celebrate a great milestone in WordPress – the software’s 20th anniversary!
It’s rare for a community-supported software to grow and evolve for so long, and it’s surely something WordPress fans are keen to celebrate. Check out the official WordPress 20th Anniversary website for community events near you.
Hostinger will take part too! Stay tuned: we have special content planned for celebrating 20 years of WordPress.
The post This Month in WordPress: April Roundup appeared first on Hostinger Blog.
There have been platforms for building websites, landing pages, and sales funnels for quite some time now. For many, the choices come down to WordPress vs ClickFunnels, two powerful platforms that help people build websites that get more conversions on their digital properties.
WordPress is the most flexible CMS on the market and can be adapted (with themes and plugins) to create sales funnels and landing pages optimized for lead generation. ClickFunnels (and its major update ClickFunnels 2.0) is a popular sales funnel builder that has grown to become an all-in-one platform for building a website. It has built-in tools for funnel marketing that include a funnel builder, LMS (for online courses), eCommerce, affiliate site builder, email marketing, and CRM. This makes it hard to compare with something so modular as WordPress.
In this post, we’ll review how ClickFunnels and WordPress compare in price, usability, customization, eCommerce, and more, so you can find the right marketing funnel platform for your website.
Pricing is a big deal for websites. WebFX has calculated the average cost for a professionally built small-business website at $2,000 to $9,000 with annual costs of between $400 and $1,200. And it’s easy to justify those figures when you recognize all the mission-critical features baked into a modern website. Ideally, you’d want to minimize the costs associated with a website or funnel builder while retaining the features and general capability. How do these two web platforms stack up on price?
WordPress is open-sourced software, meaning the core technology is free to use. However, there are costs associated with using it. At a minimum, you’ll spend around $20/yr on a domain (Namecheap) and from $5/mo to $75/mo on web hosting (you can get both of these with a trusted provider such as Siteground). Web hosting prices vary depending on the provider and the hosting you choose, such as shared hosting vs VPS hosting or dedicated hosting. These are the ante for working with WordPress (and any website platform, SaaS or self-hosted).
Aside from the costs associated with hosting and domain registration, you can also purchase premium themes and plugins. This is where you can transform a powerful blogging CMS into a full-fledged funnel builder.
With options like WooCommerce + WPFunnels, FunnelKit, or CartFlows, website owners can bring sales funnels, in all their glory, to WordPress. Some even have free options for those just starting in this world. CartFlows, at the time of this writing, cost only $79 per year for their starter plan. Compare that with ClickFunnel’s $147 per month price tag.
Maybe add a premium WordPress theme (Divi has a one-time cost under $300), a contact form plugin like Gravity Forms (for $59 per year, a caching plugin like WPRocket (for $59 per year), and a mix of other free or low-cost plugins. With the domain, hosting, and these example plugins, powering a WordPress sales funnel would cost less than $250 per year with an additional one-time payment of less than $300. All that is the cost of only four months on ClickFunnels’ Basic plan.
ClickFunnels also allows the creation of membership sites, courses, and CRM/Email marketing campaigns. WordPress, of course, can also do those things with the right free/premium tools. See our top recommendations for membership plugins, CRM plugins, and LMS plugins for WordPress sites.
ClickFunnels is a platform that offers three plans for businesses to choose from based on scaling needs.
The Basic plan includes the foundational features of ClickFunnels at $147 per month. It provides one website, 20 funnels, one admin user, one domain, three courses, 1,000 students, and 10,000 contacts. Users get unlimited workflows, pages, products, email sequences, and basic analytics.
The Pro plan includes everything in the Basic plan but with higher usage limits and additional features. For $197 per month, users get one website, 100 funnels, five admin users, and usage on three domains. The plan also includes 15 courses, 10,000 students, and 25,000 contacts. Additional features in the Pro plan are the ability to create an affiliate program, API access, ShareFunnels, Liquid Theme Editor, and CF1 Maintenance Mode Plan.
Lastly, the Funnel Hacker plan includes everything in the Pro plan but with even higher limits and advanced features. For $297 per month, users get three websites, unlimited funnels, 15 admin users, usage across nine domains, and advanced analytics. The plan also includes 200 courses, 20,000 students, and 200,000 contacts.
It’s important to note that while ClickFunnels does have a monthly cost, it is an all-in-one solution for creating sales funnels, which can save you money and time compared to creating funnels with multiple tools and platforms. It offers this simplicity and packaging for a higher cost. The Basic plan would cost about $1,524 per year with the annual payment option.
Thankfully, ClickFunnels does offer a free 14-day trial, so you can try it out beforehand.
Ease of use is where things can get interesting. It all depends on your experience with funnel building which is pretty different from creating a typical website. If you’re new to this concept, then it may be difficult either way you go. We’ll explore this in a little more detail below.
WordPress offers excellent ease of use when creating a basic website or blog. The platform’s simple interface allows users to easily create and edit pages, posts, and media without much technical knowledge. However, setting up WordPress is more involved than many beginners expect. Finding the right hosting and domain registrar and installing WordPress, a theme, and plugins require some experience (at least good guidance). But it isn’t that hard.
WordPress’ block editor and core settings are very easy to use, and there are plenty of resources online to get you up to speed. Although building marketing funnels in WordPress involves more integrated tools, you still have more flexibility to build funnels using your favorite drag-and-drop editor or visual page builder. For instance, with Cartflows, you can select a page builder like Divi to use for your funnel-building process.
Funnel Builders on WordPress do present more of a learning curve (especially for those that aren’t tech-savvy). This is the same as if you started with ClickFunnels. You’d have to learn how the program works—and for WordPress, we recommend trying either WPFunnels, FunnelKit, or CartFlows. Building eCommerce-powered sales funnels for products or courses is more challenging than creating a business website. You should expect that building a funnel will be a little more complicated (in WordPress or a dedicated sales funnel builder).
ClickFunnels has an intuitive drag-and-drop interface, making it easy to use for beginners. The platform offers a range of templates and prebuilt funnels, which can be customized to fit your specific needs. ClickFunnels also provides a visual editor that allows you to design and edit your funnels in real-time without any coding required.
ClickFunnels also has all the tools you’ll likely need built-in. This includes eCommerce capability, funnel builders, and email marketing. This is nice compared to WordPress since you don’t have to figure out individual plugins that can do these tasks and then double-check that they all work seamlessly together. On the other hand, this also means that you are 100% bought into the ClickFunnel ecosystem—if they miss one or two features, you’re stuck with that.
Customization is a big part of many website-building platforms. It’s hard to know what your website will need in a couple of years, but you need to trust that your website technology will grow with you. Both WordPress and ClickFunnels offer a range of customization options, but as we’ll see, they look very different.
WordPress is a highly customizable platform with endless possibilities for design and functionality. Unlike website builder platforms like ClickFunnels, WordPress offers a vast array of tools, resources, and people to help you create the website you want. With its theme repository containing thousands of free themes, as well as premium themes and page builders (including Divi), you have almost limitless options for design customization and extendibility.
In addition to themes, WordPress has over 50,000 free plugins available for use. These plugins can add a wide range of functionality to your site, including forms, social media integration, eCommerce features, email marketing, and much more. You can also use free and premium plugins to create custom functionality unique to your site.
Moreover, those with coding skills can take customization to the next level by extending and modifying existing themes with simple CSS tweaks or more advanced PHP coding. With WordPress, you can make your website your own and stand out from the crowd.
ClickFunnels has limited customization options. It does come with prebuilt funnels and templates for creating things easily, but you are limited to what the Clickfunnels team has developed themselves. Impressively, the tools it has built span funnel building, CRM, and eCommerce. So, it isn’t like they don’t have any tools—you are just restricted to what they’ve built.
ClickFunnel’s integrations allow for greater customization and flexibility with frequently used tools. For instance, it has integrations with popular SMS and email marketing services and a few payment processors. But since it is a closed ecosystem, integrations are sparse. When comparing the 3rd party integration potential of ClickFunnels vs WordPress, you quickly notice that there are far fewer options with ClickFunnels.
When it comes to publishing tools, WordPress is the de facto platform for publishing and blogging. It offers a wide range of features and customization options that cater to bloggers and content creators.
The WordPress CMS features an editor that you can use for creating and publishing content. The editor is intuitive and user-friendly, with various formatting options and the ability to add images, videos, and other media. Additionally, WordPress allows you to schedule posts in advance, which is helpful for bloggers and businesses that want to maintain a regular publishing schedule.
WordPress also integrates with third-party tools, such as Google Analytics, SEO plugins, and social media sharing plugins. These tools allow you to analyze your website’s performance, improve your search engine optimization, and increase your social media presence.
WordPress’s Block Editor is an advanced system for creating and displaying content. It goes well beyond a typical WYSIWYG editing environment. Blocks of all sorts can be used to create rich content that thrills visitors.
ClickFunnels primarily focuses on building sales funnels, offering limited publishing tools compared to WordPress. In ClickFunnels 2.0, a new Blog feature lets users create and publish blogs. It provides a simple editing interface that looks like a modern-looking 2015 WordPress editing interface with limited WYSIWYG editing.
WordPress and ClickFunnels both provide features and tools for website security. However, they do differ in how they approach security and how much control you have over these features.
WordPress is a self-hosted platform, meaning you are responsible for ensuring the security of your website. While WordPress is a secure platform, its customizable nature makes it vulnerable to attacks. If one plugin or theme is vulnerable, it can open up your whole site to nefarious actors.
However, numerous security plugins available for WordPress can enhance its security. These plugins offer features such as malware scanning, firewalls, and login protection. WordPress regularly updates and patches to address known vulnerabilities and secure the platform. And the best plugins are routinely updated to ensure patches come out quickly before being exploited.
However, it’s important to note that ensuring the security of a self-hosted WordPress website requires more work and attention compared to using a SaaS platform like ClickFunnels. You are responsible for setting up and maintaining security measures, such as SSL certificates and backup plugins.
ClickFunnels is a SaaS platform, which means that the platform’s team handles the security of your website. It offers a range of security features, including SSL encryption and two-factor authentication. These features help to ensure that your website and data are secure.
A SaaS platform like ClickFunnels can offer peace of mind regarding website security, as you don’t have to worry about setting up and maintaining security measures. However, it’s important to note that SaaS platforms can still be vulnerable to attacks, and choosing a reputable and reliable platform that prioritizes security is essential.
Regarding eCommerce, both WordPress and ClickFunnels offer their features and considerations.
With its integration with various eCommerce plugins like WooCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads, WordPress has become a robust platform for creating online stores. Building an online store and adding products to it using WooCommerce is hassle-free. Once you install the plugin, new menu items are added to your WP admin dashboard. You can create and categorize products, just like you would create a new Post or Page. WooCommerce supports multiple payment gateways by default, including EFT, PayPal, and Stripe.
One of the benefits of using WordPress and WooCommerce is the flexibility it offers. You have full control over the design and functionality of pages used in the buying process (shopping cart, checkout, etc.).You can customize your online store with thousands of plugins and themes to meet your specific needs and preferences. For example, Divi has powerful eCommerce Modules that make building a custom online store possible.
ClickFunnels comes with eCommerce functionality, making it possible for you to set up and manage an online store without leaving the platform. However, customization options are limited compared to WordPress. While you can add products and collect orders, you can’t create a completely customized eCommerce experience.
One of the benefits of using ClickFunnels for eCommerce is the convenience it offers. The platform is designed to optimize your online store for conversions. ClickFunnels takes care of eCommerce setup and maintenance, allowing you to focus on managing your online store within the platform.
These plugins provide users with comprehensive funnel-building capabilities that are specifically designed for WordPress websites. If you already use WordPress for your website and want to keep everything within the platform, WPFunnels and FunnelKit are good options for your funnel-building needs.
We recommend that you try WordPress if you need extreme customization or want better pricing than using ClickFunnels. Setting up WordPress for building sales funnels might be more work than with ClickFunnels, but that work can be considered true sweat equity that saves you from ClickFunnels’ high price tag. This is especially ideal for those starting who probably aren’t fully monetized. Why pay extra when you are still building your business? That said, it wouldn’t hurt to take advantage of ClickFunnel’s free trial to see if it is a better fit.
Let’s look at a quick comparison of the platforms and where each excels.
| Feature | WordPress | Clickfunnels |
|---|---|---|
| Ease of Use | Relatively easy to use, but has a steep learning curve, especially with all the customization options | 🥇Winner Intuitive drag-and-drop interface, easy to use connect tools |
| Customizability | 🥇Winner Highly customizable, with thousands of plugins and themes for just about any need |
Less customizable, with limited design options |
| eCommerce Support | 🥇Winner Fully integrates with WooCommerce, and other eCommerce tools |
Built-in eCommerce functionality that’s limited to what ClickFunnels provides |
| SEO Friendliness | 🥇Winner Extremely SEO-friendly, with numerous plugins available for optimization (many are free) |
Offers basic SEO tools, but not as comprehensive as WordPress |
| Pricing | 🥇Winner Open-source and free to use, but requires hosting, domain, and sometimes premium solutions |
Subscription-based with various pricing tiers and features, but overall priced high since you are paying for multiple tools |
| Integration | 🥇Winner Most 3rd party tools that you’d want to use have a WP plugin or connect with hundreds of other plugins with integrations |
Offers integrations with some tools, but not as extensive as WordPress |
| Get Started with WordPress | Choose ClickFunnels |
Are you thinking about using WordPress? If so, we know it can be challenging to know where to start. Here is a quick guide to help you create the ultimate WordPress toolkit:
What’s your experience with WordPress or ClickFunnels been like? Obviously, both are great platforms, but how have they worked for you?
Featured image from WordPress.org and ClickFunnels
The post WordPress vs ClickFunnels: An In-Depth Analysis (2023) appeared first on Elegant Themes Blog.
As a website owner, keeping your site secure is a top priority. One of the best ways to protect your website is by using robots.txt. This simple tool is often overlooked, but it can make a big difference in keeping your site safe. In this article, we’ll explore how robots.txt can be your new best friend in website protection.
Robots.txt is a file that tells search engine crawlers which pages or sections of your website to crawl and index. By using this file, you can prevent search engines from accessing sensitive areas of your site that should not be publicly visible. This includes pages with private information or admin pages that could be targeted by hackers.
In addition to limiting access, robots.txt can also help improve your site’s performance. By blocking search engines from crawling unnecessary pages and directories, you can reduce the load on your server and improve page load times. This can lead to a better user experience and better search engine rankings.
Hackers are always looking for vulnerabilities to exploit on websites. One common tactic is to search for pages or directories that are not intended for public access. By using robots.txt, you can make it more difficult for hackers to find these areas of your site. This can help reduce the risk of a successful cyber attack.
It’s important to note that robots.txt is not foolproof. Hackers can still find hidden pages or directories by using other tools or techniques. However, by using robots.txt, you can make it more difficult for them to do so. This is just one more layer of protection that can help keep your website safe.
In conclusion, robots.txt is a simple yet powerful tool for website protection. By using this file, you can limit access to sensitive areas of your site and reduce the risk of a successful cyber attack. It’s a small step that can make a big difference in keeping your website safe and secure. So if you haven’t already, take some time to set up robots.txt on your site and enjoy the peace of mind that comes with knowing your website is well-protected!
PHP.ini is an important file that determines the behavior of PHP on your server. It is essential for configuring PHP settings such as upload limits, memory limits, and error reporting. Finding and editing your PHP.ini file can be a daunting task, especially for beginners. However, with this easy guide, you will be able to locate and edit your PHP.ini file in no time.
The first step to editing your PHP.ini file is to locate it. The PHP.ini file is usually located in the root folder of your PHP installation. However, the location may vary depending on your operating system and web server. To find your PHP.ini file, you can follow these steps:
1. Create a new PHP file called phpinfo.php in your web directory.
2. Add the following code to the phpinfo.php file:
<?php
phpinfo();
?>3. Save and upload the file to your server.
4. Open the file in your web browser by navigating to http://yourdomain.com/phpinfo.php.
5. Look for the line that says “Loaded Configuration File”. This will show you the location of your PHP.ini file.
Once you have located your PHP.ini file, you can start making changes to it. Here are some common changes you may want to make:
memory_limit setting in your PHP.ini file. For example, to increase the limit to 256MB, you can set memory_limit = 256M.display_errors setting to Off. For example, display_errors = Off.upload_max_filesize and post_max_size settings. For example, to increase the limit to 50MB, you can set upload_max_filesize = 50M and post_max_size = 50M.After making changes to your PHP.ini file, make sure to save the file and restart your web server for the changes to take effect.
Finding and editing your PHP.ini file doesn’t have to be a daunting task. By following these simple steps, you can locate and make changes to your PHP.ini file in no time. Remember to always make a backup of your PHP.ini file before making any changes and test your website thoroughly to ensure that everything is working as expected.
Happy editing!
Believe it or not, directories are still found on the web. People look for products and services daily on popular directory sites like Yelp, Yellow Pages, and even Google My Business. Building your own directory website is an excellent way to drive traffic to your website and establish brand awareness. In this post, we’ll review the best directory WordPress themes to help you get the directory website you’ve always wanted without all the effort.
While everyone’s needs are different, there are some basics that your directory theme should cover. Firstly, it needs to be searchable. There is no use in having a directory without some form of search feature or plugin. Secondly, your theme should allow you to organize your listings into categories. This will help people navigate your site better. You should be able to edit your site with your branding and colors. That’s a third feature to look out for, customization. Lastly, SEO and extendability should also be considered in your quest for the best WordPress directory theme for your project.
In our list, we’ve compared some of the best themes for building your own directory website. Look through our list and see if any of these products satisfy your project needs.
GeoDirectory is one of the best directory plugins for WordPress. The plugin also has dedicated GeoDirectory Themes that allow you to get a powerful directory site up and running with ease. While there is a free version of the plugin and some themes, you’ll get the full experience with the paid version. Firstly, you can access the paid Custom Post Types addon if you want to manage multiple listing types. With this addon, each listing type gets its own set of custom fields, layouts, and more. The Pricing Manager add-on makes it simple to monetize your directory. Give free trials, send payment reminders, and collect funds with over 30 payment processors.
Some GeoDirectory Themes are based on the Genesis framework (by StudioPress) to help those already familiar with the framework get a directory site underway. Furthermore, users of our very own Divi will be thrilled to know that Geo Directory integrates well with our theme and our powerful Theme Builder. This further expands the plugin’s features by giving you a powerful tool to create your custom online directory entirely.
While the Geo Directory plugin and theme are free, you can amp up the power of your directory theme with the paid add-ons that GeoDirectory has available. The add-ons that GeoDirectory provides make it one of the best WordPress directory themes for users with grand plans for their websites. Extend the core theme by adding extras like a dedicated pricing manager, BuddyPress integration, and event management, to name a few.
Learn how to create a directory in WordPress with GeoDirectory.
GeoDirectory is the ecosystem to plug into for an all-around good theme and plugin combo. With a powerful plugin at its foundation and a range of themes to make customization a breeze, the GeoDirectory family is a great starting point for building a directory on WordPress.
Pricing: Free core plugin and themes available. Paid add-ons and themes start at $19—memberships with all themes and add-ons for $199.
Directory Theme by PremiumPress is a theme that helps you build a site like Yelp or Yellow Pages on WordPress. It is a feature-rich theme that works effortlessly with Elementor. This means you have the power of its theme builder and modules to build a stellar directory site. Directory Theme lets you create categories to organize your listings. You can also add custom fields to each category, making it possible to have unique fields and content types per category.
Directory Theme is integrated with Google Maps, allowing users to share their location on their listings. This also allows for its powerful geolocation settings so that searchers can find listings via zip code and the distance from their current location. Users can create listings with YouTube videos, image galleries, music, and many more content types.
Directory Theme impressively handles monetization with flair. You can sell memberships to certain countries. You have customization options for invoices. The theme also integrates with over 30 payment processors, ensuring you can get paid. Handle shipping, store credit, payouts, and more.
Directory Theme is the best WordPress directory theme for owners who want to build a sleek, clean directory that doesn’t sacrifice functionality. Also, builders who want the most flexibility in making money with their directory will benefit from using this theme.
Pricing: Paid plans start at $198 per year
Listable is a WordPress directory theme for those who want to build a beautiful directory. The theme gives you an expansive range of customization options that will have you designing an attractive directory in minutes, with not a single line of code required! Apart from its design options, Listable has a vast range of features. For starters, its search and filtering system allows users to search by tag, category, region, or any other field that they choose.
Secondly, you can use its easy drag-and-drop builder to create custom single-listing page templates. You can do this easily if you want a different layout for different listings in various categories. You can also have a beautiful blog on your site and static pages like a contact page, shop page, and much more.
Listable’s style manager makes creating tailor-made color stories for your site painless. With color adjustment tools like color diversity, shuffle, and more, designing and changing the colors across your site is a breeze. Backgrounds, buttons, titles, and icons can all be instantly changed with a simple click of a button. No code or extra effort to make sitewide edits is necessary. Plus, the simple dark mode toggle adds a nice touch!
For the most aesthetically pleasing directory, use Listable. Its modern design options make it one of the best-looking directory themes on our list. Additionally, you can easily customize the design of your site with its color swatches, making it uncomplicated to build a beautiful directory.
Pricing:Â Paid plans start at $85 per year
Listee is an uncomplicated directory theme that works well with the block editor and Elementor. Given that it is a simple theme, it has the standard functionality expected from a directory theme. For example, Listee uses Ajax to power its search and filtering system. You can search by keywords, location, or categories within your directory.
As Listee is compatible with both Elementor and the block editor, it comes with several blocks and custom modules that you can use to build custom layouts for the various pages of your directory. Listee is also translation ready and works with WPML, Polylang, and Weglot for translations. Finally, you can use the WordPress Customizer to edit page template layouts, colors, fonts, and more for your new directory.
Listee has a simple frontend interface allowing users to submit listings without logging into the WordPress backend. The form will enable you to create your account and submit your listing simultaneously. The user backend interface also lets you see when a post has been approved. You can also edit your listing or delete it from the site quickly.
Use Listee if you want to build a directory but don’t want it to be a complex process. The theme does not have as many eye-catching features as others on our list, but to build a stable site, this would be the best directory WordPress theme next project.
Pricing:Â Paid plans start at $49 per year
ExpertHive is a unique directory WordPress theme by HivePress geared toward service providers. If you want to build a service marketplace, the ExpertHive theme is for you. Powered by HivePress, experts on your site can create a profile, list their services and communicate with potential leads through the in-built messaging system.
ExpertHive allows you to set custom criteria for each profile or listing type. Because of its deep integration with WooCommerce, payments are a breeze. The ExpertHive expert dashboard allows site users and experts to manage their listings accurately, track orders, and more. And seeing as ExpertHive is powered by HivePress, you can continue to extend your marketplace with its library of add-ons that connect well with each other.
A unique feature of the ExpertHive directory theme is its bidding system. In addition to people being able to reach out to expert listings, site users can create services and receive offers from site experts. Like an auction or marketplace like Upwork, experts can bid on projects, users can accept offers, and a new order is created, which can be paid before work begins.
ExpertHive is the best WordPress directory theme for those building an expert marketplace. If creating a site like Fiverr or Upwork is your goal, use ExpertPress to get your project off the ground.
Pricing:Â $89 per year
Classipress is a directory theme that covers all your bases for creating a WordPress website for listing classified ads. It has advanced search features making it easy for your site users to find what they’re looking for. It has various widgets, like its latest ads listing grid, for you to show the most recent listings on your site. Furthermore, Classipress also allows you to create a featured listings section for premium ad spots, which you can charge a premium for and create revenue for your directory.
Your customers can manage their listings from a dashboard where they can update their profiles and view their invoices. As an admin, you can also see which listings are performing the best on your site without relying on external analytics plugins like the popular MonsterInsights plugin. All in all, the Classipress directory theme gets you a directory website on WordPress with little hassle.
A cool feature of the Classipress theme is its homepage map. The map shows live listings from the site that can be clicked through. Showcase local listings to your site users as they search through your website. Additionally, you could also promote this as a package feature to listings owners.
Those who want to get a classified listing website up and running quickly will like the ease of use that ClassiPress employs. Easily make your directory website with little fuss but lots of features and functionality.
Pricing:Â Paid plans start at $69 per year
ListingPro is an impressive directory theme for those who want to build the ultimate directory. The search functionality of this theme is head and shoulders above the rest. It provides autosuggestions, can auto-locate via IP or location, and you can determine whether the search match is broad or precise.
ListingPro takes filtering seriously. Users can filter listings by myriad options, including opening hours, distance, custom amenities, etc. Thirdly, this is one of the best WordPress directory themes for those wanting genuinely custom listings. The native drag-and-drop form builder gives you a library of fields that you can use to build forms for your users and admins to submit and manage their listings.
Fill-O-Bot is a feature of ListingPro that allows your users to pull their Google My Business details to their listing. The Search by Google feature will match their Google listing fields with the signup form. This will provide a better user experience for posters, saving time and energy when creating their profile on your directory.
To be a powerful, feature-rich, modern directory, choose to use ListingPro. It takes customizations seriously when it comes to the crucial features of a directory: monetization, search, filtering, and user interaction.
Pricing:Â Paid plans start at $138 per year
Listify provides a directory theme that is deeply integrated with Elementor. If you’re a fan of this page builder, you’ll like building your directory with Listify. Listify provides you with various ways to monetize your website’s features. The theme makes it easy to earn ad revenue from PPC with dedicated ad spaces across the site. You can also charge for access to the site, access to view listings, or access to features like appointment booking and reservations, amongst other monetization features.
Users of your site can bookmark their favorite listings and contact listings owners. Listing owners can then reply and manage these messages in their private inboxes. Users can also leave reviews, search your site by region and labels (set by you), and use social login to create their account easily on your site.
One of the unique features that you can offer users of your directory is the Appointify addon. Now, listing owners can set and book appointments through your website. They can rapidly create appointments, save events to their calendars, and preview upcoming meetings through a tooltip. Furthermore, all this can then be added to their Google Calendar!
If you have plans to scale your website, Listify is the best directory WordPress theme for you. With its diverse collection of free add-ons, growing and adding features to your directory doesn’t need to be expensive. With Listify, you don’t need to worry about plugins potentially breaking your site. You can rely on their library of addons you can pull from as your directory expands.
Pricing: Paid plans start at $138 per year
| Plugin | Price | Free Option | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🥇 | Geo Directory Themes | $199/year | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| 🥈 | Directory Theme | $198/year | ⌠| Visit |
| 🥉 | Listable | $85/year | ⌠| Visit |
| 4 | Listee | $49/year | ⌠| Visit |
| 5 | ExpertHive | $89/year | ⌠| Visit |
| 6 | Classipress | $69/year | ⌠| Visit |
| 7 | ListingPro | $198/year | ⌠| Visit |
| 8 | Listify | $138/year | ⌠| Visit |
In conclusion, we know that there is a WordPress directory theme out there for you. Geo Directory Themes are the best choice for the one who wants to have the most control over their site. A large feature set supports it and sits at the top of our list. PremiumPress’ Directory Theme comes in second. With its library of 100+ design blocks, you can build your custom directory website with this theme.
Lastly, Listable’s editing options set it in our top three. Your branding will shine through with this directory theme, from filters to colorization, color palettes, and its dark mode. Ultimately, the best WordPress directory theme is the one you choose to use and make your own. Which one will you choose for your next directory website? Was there a theme that you think we missed? Share it below in the comments section!
The post 8 Best Directory WordPress Themes in 2023 appeared first on Elegant Themes Blog.
WordPress and Bootstrap are two popular methods of building websites. Although they share some similarities, such as responsive design and the ability to create visually stunning web pages, and are both free, they differ in approach. Bootstrap relies on only three programming languages: HTML, CSS, and javascript. In contrast, WordPress uses PHP, integrates CSS, HTML, and javascript, and requires a MySQL database. Deciding between the two for your web development needs depends on your goals and technical expertise. This post will compare WordPress vs Bootstrap to help you decide which platform suits your needs best.
Although WordPress and Bootstrap are used to create responsive websites, each platform is tailored to a different audience.
WordPress and Bootstrap are meant for different types of users when building websites. If you know HTML, CSS, and Javascript well, Bootstrap lets you create a website from scratch by writing code for every part of it. However, since Bootstrap relies heavily on coding, it’s not the easiest choice for people who don’t have experience in this area. But Bootstrap can still be a good option if you’re willing to learn. That said, there are ways to use Bootstrap in WordPress, should you decide to go that route.
On the other hand, WordPress is more user-friendly, which makes it an excellent choice for people who aren’t technically savvy. WordPress websites use themes that can be quickly installed, styled, and filled with content. Moreover, most themes either come with or allow page builder plugins to drag content blocks, images, and other design elements into a post or page. However, WordPress users will find that even though it’s not absolutely necessary, it’s good to know at least some basic CSS and some HTML codes in case they need to make changes that their chosen theme doesn’t support natively.
Overall, WordPress is a more suitable platform for beginners. At the same time, Bootstrap is better suited for web developers with coding knowledge who prefer to build websites from the ground up.
Regarding pricing, it’s worth noting that both the core Bootstrap and WordPress platforms are free and open-source, making them accessible even for those with tight budgets. However, it’s important to remember that there are still associated costs if you want to expand the functionality of either platform.
As a multi-purpose platform, WordPress is hard to beat. You can create any site with it, make it look any way you like, and even easily create an online store. That said, the costs associated with WordPress can quickly add up. You’ll need a domain, hosting, a theme, plugins, and other things like email accounts, should your hosting provider not offer them. The costs of using WordPress can vary depending on the hosting type, theme, and plugins you choose.
Hosting options include shared, managed, dedicated, cloud, or VPS, with monthly prices ranging from a few to hundreds of dollars. For themes, you can choose from thousands of free options on the WordPress theme repository or invest in a premium one. Depending on your chosen theme, you can expect to pay anywhere from $40 to several hundred dollars annually for premium themes.
Additionally, plugins are essential for expanding your website’s functionality, but they can also be costly depending on your needs. For example, suppose you’re building a membership website. In that case, you may need a membership plugin like MemberPress, which costs around $180 annually. If you’re creating an ecommerce site, you can use WooCommerce. Still, extensions can potentially cost thousands of dollars when it’s all said and done.
One of the best features of Bootstrap is that it’s completely free, but as with anything free, there is a cost. In this case, the price is your time. As previously mentioned, Bootstrap uses HTML, CSS, and javascript. It utilizes a 12-column grid system designed to be responsive, making it an excellent platform for creating mobile-first websites. However, to build a beautiful, mobile-friendly website with Bootstrap, you must build it from scratch. No drag-and-drop builders, plugins, or themes will do the work for you. You will only spend a little as long as you’re okay with spending countless hours in the depths of inline CSS.
The only costs you will incur with Bootstrap are hosting and a domain. Fortunately, Bootstrap doesn’t require much to host, so you can generally get away with cheaper shared options like Bluehost, HostGator, or Hostinger. For domains, you can expect to pay less than $20 a year through top domain registrars.
|
 |
|
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | While it is technically free, you’ll eventually need to pay for hosting, a theme, and plugins. Your costs depend on how much you’re willing to spend. | 🥇 Winner
Costs associated with Bootstrap are far less, with hosting and a domain being the only necessities. |
| Get started with WordPress | Get started with Bootstrap |
Depending on your coding expertise and familiarity with a content management system (CMS) and its unique features, WordPress and Bootstrap can be challenging to learn. To help you choose the best platform for your needs, let’s explore which one is more user-friendly.
Anyone who knows WordPress is aware that getting used to things takes a little time. Initially, the dashboard can be overwhelming, mainly when using multiple plugins. That said, since it is so widely used, there are plenty of places to learn WordPress. One of the best features of WordPress is the fact that you don’t need to know how to code. WordPress uses the Gutenberg editor out of the box, which is based on blocks and functions similarly to old word processors, allowing users to start typing right away. However, the block editor expands on this by adding over 40 blocks to build pages and posts.
You can also create templates with the editor, which allows you to build custom page designs for archives, 404, search results, and more.
While the learning curve for Bootstrap is steeper compared to WordPress, it’s manageable. As mentioned earlier, you need to develop a basic understanding of coding to add content like posts and pages. However, even without prior experience with Bootstrap, we grasped it quickly, thanks to our knowledge of CSS and HTML. After reviewing the documentation and coding examples on Bootstrap’s website, we built a functional one-page website in just an hour or so.
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|---|---|---|
| Ease of Use | 🥇 Winner
Creating posts and pages with the Gutenberg editor is a breeze. However, deciphering the dashboard takes some getting used to. |
Working with Bootstrap requires coding knowledge, so it may take a while for beginners to get up to speed. |
| Get started with WordPress | Get started with Bootstrap |
Both platforms let users fully customize their websites, giving them complete control over design and functionality. This high level of customization is a significant reason for their popularity. However, there are notable differences between the two that may impact your choice.
WordPress is one of the most highly customizable content management systems available. With unlimited themes and plugins, and the ability to add custom code, custom fields, additional post types, and any number of widgets, you can create the perfect website for your needs.
WordPress offers thousands of free themes in the theme repository, along with countless premium options from professional developers like Elegant Themes, aThemes, and StudioPress. Most themes offer customization using the live WordPress customizer or proprietary theme options pages, allowing users to adjust colors, fonts, site width, and more. Some themes, such as Divi, have a Theme Builder that enables users to create custom templates for a fully customized look.
WordPress plugins offer users a range of features to enhance their website’s functionality, such as SEO improvement, LMS integration, custom forms, security optimization, and more. Additionally, excellent plugins are available for almost anything you can imagine, making it one of WordPress’s best features.
Custom post types, widgets, and custom code are other tools to make your website unique. Plugins such as Toolset allow you to create specialized websites like real estate, membership, business, or directory sites using custom post types. WordPress widgets let you add elements to your website, such as recent posts, search bars, categories, tags, and social media platforms, which you can place in the header, footer, or sidebar. You can add custom CSS or HTML to customize design elements further or insert snippets for third-party integrations, such as Google Analytics or Pinterest tags.
Bootstrap is highly customizable, with every aspect being hand-coded, including reusable components, JavaScript code snippets, and CSS styles. This allows developers to modify Bootstrap’s framework and create a website that suits their needs without being limited by templates or themes. With a wide range of components to choose from, including headers, hero sections, modals, buttons, menus, and more, you can add elements to your site that can be easily adjusted with CSS to fit your website’s specific style.
For those who require a more structured approach, Bootstrap offers more than 80 themes that can be used as a starting point. While they aren’t free, they are reasonably priced compared to some WordPress themes. They offer a solid foundation for developers to build on, with pre-designed styles and components that can be customized easily.
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|
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|---|---|---|
| Customization | ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
WordPress offers tons of customization options by way of plugins, themes, custom post types, widgets, and custom CSS and HTML, giving you ample ways to make your website unique. |
ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
Although Bootstrap doesn’t offer many themes, you can create your own with plenty of snippets and custom components at your disposal. |
| Get started with WordPress | Get started with Bootstrap |
Both WordPress and Bootstrap require hosting to display a website. That said, each has a different set of requirements.
WordPress runs on PHP, so it needs a stable version installed on the server. In addition, WordPress requires a MySQL or MariaDB database to store all of your site’s content, including posts, pages, comments, and images. It also helps to use a web host optimized for WordPress, where the server is set up with specific parameters to make it fast, stable, and secure.
There are so many options for WordPress hosting that we’ve written plenty of posts about it. With several different types, including managed hosting, dedicated hosting, cloud hosting, and others, it’s essential to familiarize yourself with the different types before deciding.
On the other hand, Bootstrap is a more straightforward option that utilizes Syntactically Awesome Style Sheets (Sass), a preprocessor scripting language that generates CSS stylesheets. This enables Bootstrap to provide a modular and customizable architecture. As a result, hosting requirements for Bootstrap are less stringent, and you can often use a budget-friendly hosting provider, depending on the size of your website. However, it’s worth noting that better options are available that optimize their web servers to run Bootstrap websites more efficiently.
One of the better options is A2 Hosting, which offers several plans for Bootstrap ranging from $12-$25 per month. They offer turbo hosting, which is built using LiteSpeed servers. Additional features include a free SSL, one-click Bootstrap installs through Softaculous, and several server location options.
Both WordPress and Bootstrap have a learning curve and offer plenty of customization options.
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|---|---|---|
| Pricing | While it is technically free, you’ll eventually need to pay for hosting, a theme, and plugins. Your costs depend on how much you’re willing to spend. | 🥇Winner
Costs associated with Bootstrap are far less, with hosting and a domain being the only necessities. |
| Ease of Use | 🥇 Winner
Creating posts and pages with the Gutenberg editor is a breeze. However, deciphering the dashboard takes some getting used to. |
Working with Bootstrap requires coding knowledge, so it may take a while for beginners to get up to speed. |
| Customization | ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
WordPress offers tons of customization options by way of plugins, themes, custom post types, widgets, and custom CSS and HTML, giving you ample ways to make your website unique. |
ðŸ³ï¸ Draw
Although Bootstrap doesn’t offer many themes, you can create your own with plenty of snippets and custom components at your disposal. |
| Get started with WordPress | Get started with Bootstrap |
However, the choice between the two ultimately comes down to what you want to achieve with your website. WordPress is the better option if you’re looking to create a blog or an e-commerce website. On the other hand, if you’re interested in building a custom website and enjoy coding, Bootstrap may be more appropriate. Regardless of your choice, WordPress and Bootstrap are excellent options for creating a unique website.
The post WordPress vs Bootstrap (2023) — What You Need To Know appeared first on Elegant Themes Blog.
Choosing a suitable WordPress theme for your online business can be daunting, especially since many themes are available. Therefore, finding the perfect one that aligns with your business goals is crucial. This post will provide a comprehensive guide to the ten best ecommerce WordPress themes perfect for any online business, making your choice easier. Let’s get started.
Ecommerce WordPress themes allow you to display and sell your products on your WordPress website. They are usually integrated with WooCommerce and feature enhancements, such as shop and product layouts, shopping carts, checkout pages, and product filtering and sorting options. Basically, ecommerce WordPress themes provide site owners with an easy way to do business online.
When creating our list of the best ecommerce WordPress themes, we considered several factors. Our top priority was to find themes designed explicitly for WooCommerce since it is the most widely used ecommerce platform for WordPress. Additionally, we evaluated each theme’s features, customization options, and the number of starter websites. Now, without further delay, let’s dive into our top picks.
Our next entry for the best ecommerce WordPress themes is Divi. It provides the most customizable experience compared to other WordPress themes, thanks to its front-end, no-code Visual Builder. With over 200 design elements, you can design every aspect of your site while viewing your design changes in real time.
Divi integrates seamlessly with WooCommerce, offering over 20 Woo-specific modules to help you create product layouts, shop pages and more using the Theme Builder. With the Theme Builder, you can create custom layouts to showcase products, design headers, footers, search results pages, and more, giving you complete design control over your ecommerce website.
Divi is packed with over 2300 professionally designed layouts to help your ecommerce website stand out. Each layout pack comes standard with a shop page layout, so there are nearly endless possibilities to feature your products. Plus, you’ll have access to the Divi Marketplace, where you can purchase extensions, child themes, and layouts specifically designed with Divi and WooCommerce in mind. For instance, there’s the WooCommerce Layouts for Divi bundle that includes 55 product, 30 shop, and 15 cart pages, so you can create the ecommerce Divi website of your dreams.
Additionally, Divi offers bulk-editing modules, keyboard shortcuts, and copy-and-paste styles, which can significantly improve your workflow when building out those product pages and templates.
Divi is best for:
Divi’s ease of use, design flexibility, and customization options make it an excellent ecommerce WordPress theme for beginners and developers looking to create a professional and visually appealing online store quickly.
| Divi | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $89/year |
| Websites | Unlimited |
| Free Layouts | 2300+ |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get Divi | |
Our next ecommerce WordPress theme is Astra, which provides seamless integration with WooCommerce, front-end editing with Elementor, Spectra, and other page builders, and dedicated WooCommerce modules to build the perfect online shop.
With Astra and Elementor, you can create custom page templates for every aspect of your site. Whether headers, footers, single posts, product archives, or anything in between, Elementor’s drag-and-drop theme builder makes it easy to tailor your site to your unique style and branding. Astra is one of the fastest WordPress themes around, weighing in at under 50kb on the front end. A lightweight theme means quicker page loading times, which can seriously boost your site in search engine optimization (SEO).
Astra is best for:
Try Astra if you’re looking for a fast, lightweight theme that integrates well with Elementor and WooCommerce. With over 40 design modules, 40+ starter templates for ecommerce, and endless customization options, Astra is one of the best ecommerce WordPress themes available.
| Astra | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $59/year |
| Websites | 1 |
| Free Layouts | 240+ |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get Astra | |
Our next ecommerce WordPress theme is OceanWP. With seamless integration with Elementor and Gutenberg, this theme offers endless customization options to make your online store your own. With over 220 premade demos, you’re sure to find a layout that perfectly suits your needs. And with the Ocean Extra plugin, you can easily install demos with just one click, control page settings at the page level, create custom templates, and more.
While the free version of OceanWP is packed with features, the pro version takes things to the next level. With instant access to Freepik and Flaticon, A/B testing capabilities, over 220 premade demo websites, and 22 extensions, you can create the ultimate ecommerce site. For example, the Ocean eComm Treasure Box extension lets you make every aspect of your ecommerce site from start to checkout, including custom shop, single product, cart, checkout, and thank you pages. You can even incorporate a buy now button or a WooCommerce popup to highlight sales or specific products.
OceanWP is best for:
OceanWP is an excellent choice for a flexible and feature-rich ecommerce WordPress theme. Its vast demos and customization options suit small and large online stores. At the same time, its integration with popular page builders like Elementor and Gutenberg means you don’t need to be a coding expert to create a professional-looking website.
| OceanWP | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $54/year |
| Websites | 3 |
| Free Layouts | 210+ |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get OceanWP | |
Up next on our list of best ecommerce WordPress themes is Neve by ThemeIsle. Neve uses a mobile-first design, is compatible with all major page builder plugins, and integrates seamlessly with the Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) plugin to provide a fast, highly-customizable website for your online store.
Neve is WooCommerce-ready right out of the box, but upgrading to the pro version will give you some cool, enhanced features. With design elements like a quick product view, a floating cart, off-canvas shop filters, and a wishlist, you’ll have everything you need to take your ecommerce store to the next level. Additionally, the pro version offers various checkout page layouts, six WooCommerce starter templates, and unlimited design options through Elementor integration.
Neve is best for:
Those looking for a speedy, lightweight ecommerce WordPress theme will find Neve an excellent choice. With support for AMP, a mobile-first design, and plenty of demo sites to get you started, Neve is suitable for those without design experience.
| Neve | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $199/year |
| Websites | Unlimited |
| Free Layouts | 110+ |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get Neve | |
The next ecommerce WordPress theme on our list is Flatsome. Explicitly designed for WooCommerce, Flatsome has a front-end page builder, several product layouts, built-in variation product galleries, and complete theme customization through the live WordPress customizer screen.
Flatsome boasts several standout features, including its front-end design editor with over 35 customizable design elements, such as sliders, price tables, product categories, banner grids, and more. Additionally, Flatsome offers more than 100 pre-built layouts focused solely on ecommerce that you can import with just one click using the Flatsome Studio. This lets you quickly jump-start your website with a pre-designed layout if you prefer to avoid building layouts from scratch.
Flatsome is best for:
Online store owners who want a flexible and easy-to-use ecommerce WordPress theme with unlimited design options will like Flatsome. With hundreds of premade designs, nearly 40 modules, and built-in ecommerce support, Flatsome is well-suited for just about everyone.
| Flatsome | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $59/six months |
| Websites | 1 |
| Free Layouts | 300+ |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get Flatsome | |
Next on our list of best ecommerce WordPress themes is Shoppe, available through Themify. With a proprietary drag-and-drop builder, Shoppe makes it simple to design custom ecommerce pages, headers, footers, and more. Additionally, it’s easy to change the theme’s layout with just one click using the website skin option. It provides over 60 regular page layouts and 20+ shop page layouts that can be imported with a few clicks.
Shoppe comes with some excellent features for WooCommerce. Your site visitors will love the quick look feature that lets them see product details quickly in a popup without leaving your shop page. You’ll also get an Ajax cart, so shoppers can add items to their cart without refreshing the page. With Shoppe, you can add products to a wishlist, showcase a product gallery slider, enable image zoom, and add product-sharing options. To simplify the browsing experience, Shoppe has a filtering option that lets shoppers sort by price, color, or category.
Shoppe is best for:
If you’re someone who wants a lot of design choices, Themify might be a good option for you. For only $89 per year, you can subscribe to their Master Club and get access to 42 WordPress themes, 11 plugins, and 25 Themify builder add-ons. This is a great choice for anyone who has multiple websites or wants a wide range of options.
| Shoppe | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $89/year |
| Websites | Unlimited |
| Free Layouts | 42+ |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get Shoppe | |
Our next entry – Shoptimizer – emphasizes site speed. With Shoptimizer, the main CSS file is automatically minified, allowing visitors to see your website nearly instantly. Additionally, the theme is designed to increase conversions by allowing for a streamlined ordering experience that removes distractions such as headers, footers, and sidebars, so your customers can concentrate on the task at hand – spending their hard-earned money. Plus, the single product FOMO feature allows you to add an animated stock counter that encourages people to purchase a product quickly – before it’s gone.
Although Shoptimizer doesn’t come with multiple layout options, you can create the ecommerce site of your dreams with the page builder of your choice. With support for Elementor, Visual Composer, Beaver Builder, and more, you’ll have access to a front-end visual building experience that makes designing your site easier. Plus, Shoptimizer comes packed with features to improve sales on your site, including custom product badges, the ability to request a callback, security badges for increased trust, a wishlist feature, and more.
Shoptimizer is best for:
If you’re looking for a speed-optimized ecommerce theme that comes out running right from the gate, then Shoptimizer may be a good fit for you. With many product-enhancing extras like a wishlist, image zoom, and product variant gallery images, your online shop will be up and running in no time.
| Shoptimizer | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $99/year |
| Websites | Unlimited |
| Free Layouts | 30+ |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get Shoptimizer | |
Our next ecommerce WordPress theme is Botiga, one of two theme offerings from aThemes. It’s the most feature-packed free theme on our list. All theme styles are handled through the familiar WordPress customizer, including WooCommerce settings, making it easy for anyone to style. It comes with several product catalog and single product settings, such as image zoom, image gallery layout style, Ajax add to cart button, and draggable product elements, making customizing your online store a breeze.
Botiga has got you covered with plenty of styling options that you’ll benefit from. You can create custom headers and footers with a simple drag-and-drop editor and pick from various layout formats for products, posts, and pages. You can even style WooCommerce icons, and buttons, add a scroll to top button, or enable parallax effects. To simplify things, you can start with one of the eight starter designs, add your products, and launch your online store without fuss.
Botiga is best for:
If you’re a beginner looking to sell a few dozen products, consider Botiga. While you can’t really change the framework, loads of styling options will allow you to make it unique to your brand. Botiga has a minimal style but maximum potential.
| Botiga | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $69/year |
| Websites | 1 |
| Free Layouts | 8 |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get Botiga | |
Our next ecommerce WordPress theme is Storefront, brought to you by the makers of WordPress, Automattic. It’s a free theme built for WooCommerce, allowing you to easily create an online store in minutes. That said, you can add quite a few bells and whistles with the Storefront extensions bundle, including complete store styling through the WordPress customizer.
With the free version of Storefront, you can still control the design aspects of your store, but your options are more limited. You can change site styles, WooCommerce product catalog, pages, and images. Suppose you want to add features such as advanced product filtering or the ability to edit product meta or layouts. In that case, you’ll need to purchase the expansion bundle.
Storefront is best for:
Sure, Storefront is a vanilla ecommerce theme, but if you are a developer, this is music to your ears. One of the best features of Storefront is its simplicity. You can use it as is or dive under the hood and create a custom-coded, lightning-fast ecommerce website that is fully tailored to your business.
| Storefront Extension Bundle | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $69/year |
| Websites | 1 |
| Free Layouts | 3 |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get Storefront | |
Woostify, our final pick for the best eCommerce WordPress themes, is a lightweight, SEO-ready theme designed specifically for WooCommerce. With a live theme customizer, multiple product, cart, and catalog layouts, and a range of layout styles, it offers plenty of flexibility for your eCommerce website. You can edit your pages using the Gutenberg block editor or Elementor, making customization a breeze.
You’ll get basic styling options with the free version of Woostify. You can adjust various site and WooCommerce settings, but most other options require add-ons. However, you can install and use Elementor to edit products and pages or create templates. If you stick with the core Woostify theme, you can purchase a pro license and get 20+ starter website designs and all pro-add-ons. These include a header and footer builder, a callback feature for customer support, a buy now button, and more.
Woostify is best for:
Elementor users who want a fast, lightweight theme for WooCommerce should try Woostify. With a dedicated theme builder, unlimited customization options, and native WooCommerce support, it’s a good option.
| Woostify | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $49/year |
| Websites | 1 |
| Free Layouts | 13 |
| Visual Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Theme Builder | âœ”ï¸ |
| Get Woostify | |
While we’ve given you ten great options for the best ecommerce WordPress theme, we feel there is a clear winner. Overall, Divi is the best option, thanks to it’s dedicated WooCommerce integration, 20+ Woo-specific modules, and countless free shop layouts to help you create the perfect ecommerce store.
| Starting Price | Websites | Free Layouts | Visual Builder | Theme Builder | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🥇 Divi | $89/year | Unlimited | 2300+ | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| 🥈 Astra | $59/year | 1 | 240+ | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| 🥉 OceanWP | $54/year | 3 | 210+ | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| Neve | $199/year | Unlimited | 110+ | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| Flatsome | $59/six months | 1 | 300+ | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| Shoppe | $89/year | Unlimited | 42+ | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| Shoptimizer | $99/year | Unlimited | 30+ | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| Botiga | $69/year | 1 | 8 | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| Storefront | $69/year | 1 | 3 | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
| Woostify | $49/year | 1 | 13 | âœ”ï¸ | âœ”ï¸ | Visit |
Are you looking for more theme reviews? Check out our picks for the best responsive WordPress themes.
The post 10 Best Ecommerce WordPress Themes in 2023 (Compared) appeared first on Elegant Themes Blog.