11 WordPress Page Builders Compared – Beaver Builder vs Divi vs Elementor vs Thrive Architect
In this video to help you answer the question
what is the best page builder for WordPress
or better yet what is the best page builder
for you hi my name is Adam from WPCrafter.com
were really sits unaccounted to help you get
better results with WordPress faster if you’re
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all the links to everything I talk about will
be linked in the video description below what
an introduction will hate this videos actually
going to be sort of a follow-up to a video
that I made last year it is right here let
me click to it I made a video last year comparing
the various page builders and a lot has changed
in the 10 months since I recorded and uploaded
this video and this is a pretty popular video
over 50,000 people watched this video and
it helped a lot of people make their decision
on what page builder that they wanted to use
it for their situation and it is the perfect
time right now to remake this video because
a lot of things have changed in the last 11
months there’s been several updates to some
of these page builders some new entrance and
there’s a lot of things going on with WordPress
in general so buckle and this is can be a
little longer of a video I’ll try to get through
the information as fast and concisely as possible
now the first thing I want you to know is
why should you even listen to me on this topic
there are a lot of people that write reviews
and typically I mean I record reviews all
the time typically you get the product you
install it and you play around with it for
a half-hour or so and then you come up with
your impressions and write your review I’m
not that guy when it comes to page builders
I use all of these page builders and you kinda
get a different perspective if you’re using
something for 30 minutes or if you been using
something since it came out or for several
years and so with the page builders that I’m
to be talking about in this video I have been
eight actual user of these products are not
someone that played around with it for 10
or 15 minutes and am coming up with all these
impressions I know also where all these page
builders are headed and what to expect in
the next 12 months a lot of times because
I’m communicating with the developers of these
plug-ins so there is a little bit of a additional
reason to watch this video and consume this
information is to help you make the best decision
for you when it comes to choosing a page builder
now in this video I’m going to make a big
deal out of certain things and try to focus
on several things so first of all I think
that it’s much better to have a front and
page builder versus a backend page builder
and so it’s a totally different page in content
creation experience a Bakken page builder
you’re just virtually moving things around
you don’t have any idea what it’s gonna look
like in your in this constant process of updating
viewing refreshing and all of that a front
and page builders kind of like a what you
see is what you get experience in this is
the type of webpage building experience that
I think is an absolute must today there is
no reason that I can think of to use a Bakken
page builder when there are phenomenal front
and page builders available and it such a
huge timesaver next I want to make a big deal
in this video about content login and what
that means is there certain page builders
when you use them you kind of have to use
them for life there really is no way of getting
out of it either when you stop using that
plug-in your content disappears permanently
or it’s gonna be loaded up with shortcodes
rendering all of the content useless anyway
and this is a point of difference from the
video that I made last time where I was cutting
some content login page builders a little
bit of slack but were in 2017 I do not think
that anyone should be using your page builder
where you’re locked into that page builder
for life next I mostly had to be talking about
theme agnostic page builders versus a theme
specific page builders and what that means
is a theme specific page builder means it
it’s pretty much a page builder that will
only work with the one theme and it comes
sold as a bundle versus a theme agnostic page
builder where you can use it with any WordPress
theme and lastly I want to bring up some issues
of backwards compatibility that you should
really be thinking about because if you are
using a page builder that has been around
for say five or six years unfortunately those
stage builders are very restricted in what
they can do because they always have to make
it backwards compatible now there are also
two things I’m not gonna talk about in this
video one of them is going to be the page
load time is speed of these builders and there’s
a big reason why things are so mature these
days with page builders in the code that they
create so it doesn’t really matter if a website
takes a fraction of a second longer to load
because using one page builder versus the
another page builder it’s complete nonsense
I know we talked about a lot of times and
having a fast loading website is good for
SCO when it absolutely is it’s actually better
not as much for SCO as it is for the user
experience which if you give someone a bad
user experience they’ll bounce off your site
and that hurt your SCO big time but if you’re
doing proper things you have a proper host
using proper caching what you’re going to
need both of those anyway and I can have a
problem with speed and if it’s a fraction
of a millisecond longer person from using
one page builder versus another I think it’s
really a pointless argument and the second
thing I’m not in a talk about is the actual
rendered code so you make your page layout
and then you’re looking at it one page builder
might have a few extra lines of code over
another one I think it’s pointless to make
those arguments that this is better because
there’s a couple lines of code I mean some
people literally think Google’s come at your
site and they’re saying all my gosh there’s
five extra lines of code were going to have
to knock them down or there’s a couple extra
lines of code we don’t want to recommend that
site because his other one has a couple lines
at less of code is completely nonsensical
if he asked me and it makes absolutely no
sense so I am not going to bring that up as
well in this video don’t I’m mainly going
to focus on four different page builders but
I want to briefly talk about each of the page
builders and I’m not gonna talk about a whole
lot and I want to say why now these are in
no particular order but let’s just get through
that right now number one I’m looking to talk
about the cornerstone page builder this is
a theme specific page builder that is with
a thing called the X theme the reasons I am
not gonna talk about this page builder is
because it’s tied to that theme and you have
this big content login problem where if you
ever wanted to stop using this page builder
your contents can end up being useless because
going to be wrapped in so many shortcodes
I have use this page builder before I find
it very nonintuitive in this is just my personal
experience but I don’t think anyone should
go with the cornerstone page builder for the
mainly because of the content lock-in issue
and because of that short code issue there
it tends to be a lot of incompatibility with
third-party plug-ins that you may want to
use on your site so that is cornerstone next
one is a fusion page builder and this is pretty
much the same thing as cornerstone it’s a
theme specific page builder it’s completely
back and page builder and there is huge a
login on your content and there’s a significant
compatibility issues with other plug-ins that
you may want to use booking plug-ins event
plug-ins all types of plug-ins there’s gonna
be some compatibility issues so next plug-in
page builder is optimize press this is actually
the problem and optimize press as it stuck
in 2014 the website the same website from
2014 when this came out 2014 it was the bees
knees I mean this was applying and having
it and dare I say it was one of the first
kind of front and page building experiences
but your content is all locked in and it is
a very cumbersome to work with if you use
it I just there’s no reason today to use optimize
press what it did in 2014 was nothing short
of revolutionary were about to hit 2018 it’s
completely outdated it hasn’t really been
updated or changed much in the last three
years and is sadly I mean it was a great great
plug and when it came out but sadly it is
very slow to work with and anxious no reason
to use optimize press these days unfortunately
the next one is oxygen I actually did a full
review on oxygen builder this is actually
new and it’s kind of interesting how it works
it’s a plug-in but it kinda takes over your
entire website and the big negative I see
with it is that you get this content lock-in
so if you ever to stop using oxygen you just
all your content completely disappears and
it’s not really technically at page builder
but you could kind of use it as that you can
use it with page builders I would recommend
just watching the full review video that I
did on oxygen app to see if it’s for you there
are certain people that it’s great for its
little technical to use so that’s up to you
whether you want to use oxygen or not but
if you’re interested in this definitely check
out the full review that I created about it
next let’s see here we have site origin now
site origin is used on a ton of websites it’s
active on over a million websites it is I
a front it’s actually back and page editor
but they tried to add some front and page
editing to it and you do not want to use this
page builder and all your pretty much it is
very cumbersome you have complete content
lock and if you were to disable it you lose
everything that you created your stuck using
it there’s actually no reason to use it right
now obviously it’s free so I think that’s
why gets a lot of activations but there is
a way better free page builder available for
WordPress right now I don’t really see any
reason to use site origin I think the reason
those numbers are so high is because it’s
been around for a very long time it is very
nonintuitive to work with and you get that
content lock in next we are talking about
hunt visual composer I’m going to get some
visual composer folks for sure now visual
composer you buy uncle Canon it’s been purchased
a ton of times 311,000 times now the reason
people are purchasing it there not purchasing
it because I know I want to use visual composer
the reason for buying this thing is because
they’re buying a theme on Theme Forest that
has this built into it and they get a little
message it says if you want update you got
go over there and buy it and that’s the only
reason it’s been purchased 300,000 times I
have never met one person that was stuck using
visual composer and was actually happy about
it it is a very slowly I mean it is probably
the slowest to use page builder out there
it is very frustrating to work with you get
nickel and dime for everything so you you
think 34 bucks is not a lot of money at but
then when you see there’s over 200 add-ons
for it and every little feature he wants 20
bucks your 30 bucks there it hits just the
worst experience of building a page that I
could imagine it is littered with shortcodes
meaning if you were to deactivate and stop
using this any piece of content you created
is a virtually worthless and because of that
short code issue you’re going to get a lot
of incompatibility with plug-ins that you’re
probably gonna want to use on your site like
an event calendar or something like that booking
there’s tens of thousands of plug-ins on WordPress.org
and you can have some compatibility issues
for sure I have yet to meet or come across
anyone that has said anything great about
using visual composer usually you’re using
it because you’re stuck using it because you
got some theme on Theme Forest which I won’t
even do anymore but you get some theme on
Theme Forest that has this integrated into
it and there is a migration though people
are starting to these theme developers are
starting to allow you to use other page builders
and not just visual composer which I think
is going to be a great thing the next page
builder is theme five yes theme five builder
and I did get a lot of comments about theme
five builder and then actually reach out to
me out recently that to see if I would talk
about theme five builder and I did consider
may be doing more of a review on this because
I hear people asking me but I gotta say five
minutes after confusing this I do not like
it at all him and show you the interface itself
it I want to be mean okay so I’ll just say
I don’t like the interface I’ll leave it at
that you do get that content lock-in and the
interface to be gentle I’ll just say it’s
kind of clumsy let me kind of show you the
interface right here so I have it installed
on the click on the theme five builder in
wait till you see the interfaces that I’m
about to show you you’re gonna see this and
it just it just I mean it’s lousy I mean this
is just I don’t even know where to click I
see a bunch of icons and you know it’s it’s
pretty bad I’m clicking I don’t see anything
happening if I want to add something I click
this plus but I can click on it half the time
because of this overlay and then I can only
see this but it’s being cut off with what’s
below it I mean this is really not anything
I would recommend anyone consider using on
their website I know it’s cheap it’s also
built into a lot of their themes but they’re
trying to kind of pull it out and make it
a little bit more theme agnostic but this
is just something that I mean I don’t know
why anyone would inflict this on their life
using the theme of my builder it’s that I
really don’t like it at all now part of that
personal preference you have to take that
with a grain of salt so if you’re the developer
and you want to attack me I’m the first to
say take it with a grain of salt you check
it out yourself but I think you’re going to
agree that the interface is extremely clunky
and it’s there’s just much better stuff out
there so let me go ahead and get into the
first page builder that I’m in a talk about
I did try to alphabetize these to show that
there is no preference in these four main
page builders in the first one is the B so
I’m talking about it first and that is Beaver
Builder and actually Beaver Builder is the
page builder I’m using on my main site WPCrafter.com
several websites so I’m using a lot of these
page builders this one happens to be using
the Beaver Builder I’ve used Beaver Builder
from day one on that website it doesn’t make
any sense for me to change I will be transparent
with you I was considering changing themes
last year 2016 in the summer but when I caught
word of a new product that they had coming
out called Beaver Themer it was a complete
game changer for me and caused me to stick
around with Beaver Builder here’s the thing
Beaver Builder 2.0 is about to come out I’m
in a show you Beaver Builder 2.0 right now
it’s about to come out maybe six months ago
I released a video where I compared Beaver
Builder to another page builder and I was
pretty harsh on both of them exposing all
of the weaknesses with it and every single
weakness that I pointed out about Beaver Builder
they changed in version 2 would Beaver Builder
it is a pretty much an amazing sight to see
a big game changer though with Beaver Builder
is this thing called Beaver Themer and they
were the first to kinda come up with this
concept essentially if you get Beaver Themer
as well it’s can allow you to use it Beaver
Builder the page builder to create.dynamic
headers on your website footers it’s can allow
you to create templates for blog posts and
that something that I’m totally using on my
website custom post types styling I mean it’s
it’s just amazing what it allows you to do
but it’s a little bit more advanced if you
paired up with Beaver Themer some people are
having a hard time wrapping their mind around
Beaver Themer and everything that it does
for you I like to say it makes yours your
website a smart website because there’s all
these conditional things that you can do with
it let me give you a peek will here let me
just look at the pricing of Beaver Builder
real quick and then give you a peaked Beaver
Builder 2.0 so if you go to pricing right
here Beaver Builder’s only $100 just for the
plug-in if you wanted the theme that they
sell as well it’s 199 so $99 is really inexpensive
and you can use it on unlimited websites it
does get a little pricier if you want the
functionality of Beaver Themer Beaver Themer
is going to come in at 147 there two separate
products and so if you want Beaver Themer
you also have to have Beaver Builder so if
you factor that all in now the cost there
the cost to use both tools is a $246 so that
is the cost of Beaver Builder and a lot of
folks use the Beaver Builder theme there’s
actually multiple themes now that will work
with any page builder I even made a video
on that recently okay here is one of things
I wanted to actually talk about how tired
he clicked on it one of the weaknesses of
Beaver Builder the builder is amazing it’s
rocksolid it is trusted by more agencies I
think than any other page builder it is methodically
developed updated built and maintained and
what that translates to you if you are making
websites with the page builder for customers
nothing is worse than clicking update and
then having your whole site get screwed up
you have an upset client or if it’s even your
website now you’re embarrassed and you gotta
spend all of this time to figure out what
the heck went wrong and it’s just not worth
it sometimes this is not going to be your
experience with Beaver Builder it is so methodically
cared for that bill the updates that they
let me put it this way out of every plug-in
or theme I’ve ever had for WordPress the one
that has given me the least amount of problems
next to zero problems is Beaver Builder and
that is because they are so careful in everything
that they do with it Beaver Builder there
is no content lock and I’m making a big deal
out of content locking you get no content
lock-in with Beaver Builder which means if
you stop using Beaver Builder it retains the
vast majority of your content just the way
that you had now a big negative with Beaver
Builder is that they are more focused on having
the most rocksolid is stable and functional
page builder and what’s lacking is a lot of
the advanced modules and styling that is can
offer you to use on your websites and so what
this does is it opens up a third-party marketplace
for an add-on package so right here is the
very best add-on package for Beaver Builder
it’s called ultimate add-ons for Beaver Builder
it’s a $69 which is very affordable it’s going
to add page templates it’s can add road templates
tons of modules and I’m using this on my website
right now if you click on modules your to
get a list of amazing modules that it brings
to the table and it doesn’t slow down your
website it all and this is the package I’m
using on my WP crafter website to bring so
much to the table they recently added gradients
so you can use ultimate add-ons to create
beautiful gradient backgrounds on your websites
you get all of these page templates that come
with it you can just come here and check out
the site beautiful functional and useful page
templates are all included’85 Look at the
pricing real quick and then I want to finally
show you Beaver Builder 2.0 only 69 bucks
if you wanted lifetime licenses 249 I own
the lifetime license that I purchased here
is Beaver Builder 2.0 this is the new interface
now here are some of the things that I didn’t
like about Beaver Builder that they have totally
fixed if you noticed if you familiar Beaver
Builder version 1 and you’re looking now you
notice that you can now dock the settings
panel so there’s this little thing here I
can click on and I can undock it I can have
everything float so if I wanted to make an
adjustment it could just float or I can pin
it to the left or the right side so now I
can pin it on to the right side so whenever
I click on something I can change it right
there and here is the biggest improvement
that I thought well that’s huge for me but
check this out you can also notice when you
when you are using Beaver Builder version
1 and you would click on something you would
get this pop-up and then it would take a second
or two for to actually show you the settings
now with Beaver Builder 2.0 everything is
instantaneous so if I click on this bit of
text will see I click on it and then on the
left it’s immediately there for me to change
and this is pretty huge is a vast improvement
over Beaver Builder version 1 I’m so excited
that they added this instant ability to change
the settings I love this doc setting here
as well and another cool thing that they have
I really like you see how unfortunately because
I have some whites in the template that I’m
using right here and the built Beaver Builder
interfaces kind of white is check this out
if I go to the drop down here I can change
it to dark mode I actually like dark mode
on everything my YouTube’s on dark mode everything’s
on dark moan my phones on Dyke dark mode I
love it and tell you get this dark mode right
here you also get shortcuts now so you can
just enter single keys on the keyboard to
save and preview and all of that and now they
also added a preview for mobile so I can choose
one of these mobile devices or these different
orientations I can go mobile tablet or whatever
and it’s just a pretty amazing everything
that they have added to Beaver Builder 2.0
I will say when they first announced Beaver
Builder 2.0 and they first released the alpha
version of it I was 100% underwhelmed but
they picked up speed in the development they
added this docking so that you can move the
setting panel where you wanted to go and then
what really’s rule it really made me a believer
is when they made it so when you click on
anything you can instantly change it and I
do know that there are lots of additional
things that are coming to Beaver Builder some
things I can talk about some things I can’t
talk about some things I’ll talk about later
in the video when I’m talking about other
page builders that have these various features
but this is pretty huge improvement for Beaver
Builder so Beaver Builder is fantastic it’s
super reliable to really get the most out
of it I really think you have to buy one of
the add-on packages that’s kind of a negative
because it adds a little bit of cost to it
but if you are not interested in Beaver Themer
now you’re just looking at $99 for Beaver
Builder and $69 for ultimate add-ons for Beaver
Builder it’s an amazing combination that’s
gonna get you pretty much everything that
you could want in a web design next let’s
take a look at Divi of course Divi is kind
of one of those I guess a cup 800 pound gorilla
meaning they may are a big chunk of the market
of people that use page builders is a lot
of problems with Divi that I’m in a talk about
right now number one you have content lock-in
and what that means is you can’t stop using
Divi and retain your information there’s no
elegant way there is a way to kind of extract
some of it but it’s not really that elegant
or easy to pull off and here’s the problem
that I see with Divi Divi is one of the original
page builders for WordPress they were out
a very very long time ago there on version
3 or talking years and years and years they
were pretty much the first out of all of these
page builders that I’m talking about and what
happens is if they’re going to release a new
version of Divi they have to make it backwards
compatible with all of the older versions
of Divi so they don’t break people’s websites
this is very good but it’s also horrible because
they’re restricted on what they can do with
Divi so Divi is known for having these shortcodes
and there’s really no way for them to get
away from shortcodes and that is because of
this a backwards compatibility let’s take
a quick look at their pricing I think one
of the main advantages with Davey is there
pricing they do have very aggressive pricing
they recently increase the yearly plan to
$89 per year but they are one of the only
page builders that has a lifetime plan for
249 you get lifetime access to Divi which
makes it very attractive if the main consideration
in choosing a page builder is price I personally
don’t think your main consideration should
be price but I can understand if that is one
of your considerations you can actually go
to Jimmy’s websites and you can demo the user
interface of Divi and here it is I think some
of the things I would say about Debbie is
they do have a very unique interface they
came out with that about a year ago and it
is a very innovative they created a interface
that they say to kind of have the interface
kind of disappear one things nice it has in-line
editing that means when you click on a bit
of text you can start typing right there and
you get this in-line text and experience and
this is something that you don’t currently
get out of Beaver Builder however I do know
that they are going to be adding that after
version 2 of Beaver Builder is released now
Divi is mainly geared towards designers but
the problem that I’ve always had with Divi
is if you go to Divi’s website go ahead and
click on their blog and look at some of their
tutorials or go to their YouTube channel and
look at some of the video tutorials they have
if you want to do really anything kind of
custom or unique to their any site that you’re
making with the DB builder it requires you
add so many different lines of text to the
Divi builder it’s just insane there’s no problem
with adding custom code in the certain spots
but it becomes kinda hard to manage when you’ve
got lots of code and lots of places and then
you have a problem and is this bit of code
conflicting with this bit of code and you
start to have these problems that happen and
you don’t even know how to begin troubleshooting
it is uniting to remember that bit of custom
code that you added a year ago now I will
say that Divi is coming out with some really
innovative features to their builder they
have one that’s really need it’s called selective
sink and I remember when they announced this
in a video a few months back I thought wow
that is a brilliant feature where you can
actually sync up styles so if you Place the
same module in different places on your website
you can have the style changes be synced so
you can change the style in one spot and it
will change on all of the spots is actually
pretty innovative way of doing things and
I also know that a lot of new features have
been hitting Divi and are coming out were
Divi and it’s pretty exciting to see however
for me I think that I would not use the V
on a website if I was building it today because
I’m afraid of all that backwards compatibility
that they’re stuck maintaining and they have
a history of releasing aggressive updates
which is good but then a lot of the sites
end up breaking so if you go to any of the
Facebook groups for Divi right after an update
comes out there’s going to be a lot of people
complaining that it crash their site and this
is probably because they have such a large
user base and there’s so many sites using
Divi but it’s also probably part of that backwards
compatibility problem so in summary I do think
Divi is a great value I think if you see all
the most vocal people supporting Divi they
have always used Divi they been using Divi
since the early days and they’ve had these
lifetime licenses is a lot of great people
in the Divi community one of things I kinda
don’t like about the Divi community is there
is this add-on market that has kind of sprouted
up and it’s very fractured there are some
really good add-ons that people have created
there some really crummy ones as well and
there’s this fractured next to it in my opinion
but I think that something that Divi’s going
to fix later on with opening up its own marketplace
so next let’s move on to Elementor Elementor
has really taken the page building experience
of building the websites of by storm and they’ve
only been out for maybe a year and two months
or so and they just hit a great milestone
of having over 200,000 active websites using
it it took my think about nine months to get
the first hundred thousand it took him four
months to get the second hundred thousand
and I think they’ll probably by the end of
2017 have over 300 websites actively using
Elementor now what’s amazing about Elementor
is it’s completely free they do have a pro
add-on package were to look at both in this
video but the core of Elementor is a free
analyst times when there is a free plug-in
it’s usually just a couple of features so
you can kinda get a feel for how it works
but that’s not how Elementor does things Elementor
gives you a full-featured free version you
can save things you can get free templates
there’s tons of it fully functional it is
amazing how generous they are with the free
version of Elementor and I tend to think that
that’s probably what has attributed to their
massive massive growth it is a very well coded
a plug-in you don’t have any content lock
and if you disable it you still have all your
content there in a WordPress it’s pretty amazing
let’s take a look at their Pro version and
their pricing and then I’m gonna show you
Elementor or do I have it open here know that
the settings on the show you in a moment okay
Elementor Pro actually just came out last
December and essentially it’s an additional
plug and that you add to your website and
it adds procedures to Elementor including
some really amazing additional modules now
let’s get to the pricing and then I want to
show you what you get for it some scrolling
down what I like about Elementor is they it’s
really easy to get started if you really only
need a page builder for one website you can
buy a single site license for $49 and be in
business now they also have a three site license
for 99 and unlimited sites for 199 I have
this unlimited sites package right here it
is fantastic I will see the annual renewal
of Elementor is you get a 50% discount which
is pretty massive as well Beaver Builder you
get a 40% discount and I don’t know if you
get any discount with Divi so what this is
going to mainly do is it’s mainly can add
these Pro widgets is going to give you the
ability to have globally saved items it’s
going to give you CSS editing on a module
by module basis is can give you Pro designed
templates but these additional features a
gives you normally would cost about $40-$50
by themselves on their own in the beauty is
if you are used to using Elementor write your
use to the interface if you went and got to
say a form of plug-in gravity forms as you
say gravity forms and you buy that that’s
40 bucks or so and then you have to learn
its interface and how to do that what’s beautiful
about Elementor is you’re using the same Elementor
interface that you are to get used to anyways
and now you’re able to do more things with
it so it’s can add a sliders can add forms
so you can have a full form builder it’s the
most flexible form builder that I’ve seen
in the sense that you can totally customize
and style how it looks visually I’ve never
seen anything like this no other page builder
has a form builder like Elementor you get
this amazing price table you get account out
the price tables pretty amazing that you get
so many different options you can style it
anyway you want without touching a line of
code you get a countdown timer which is amazing
priceless is perfect if your restaurant or
urinal list prices out that pricelist is amazing
flip box you get a bunch of WooCommerce elements
as well and in this amazing when they just
came out recently called animated headline
that is amazing and you you can do more things
with Elementor tuna kinda gives an idea of
where they’re headed you can create login
forms coming soon pages maintenance mode pages
you can do some pretty amazing things with
Elementor now this is the the pain stuff the
free stuff are amazing they have this shape
tool a they have this hover animations to
everything they have gradients I mean if you
are a designer you will fall in love with
Elementor if you’re not a coder you will fall
in love with Elementor it is the best page
builder for people starting out in you have
a low budget it’s free but then it is great
if you don’t want to touch a line of code
you have a good strong design sense to you
and you know how you wanted to look now there
have been some problems with Elementor but
they recently came out with an update to kind
of fix it they are very aggressive in adding
new features to the plug-in it is astounding
I mean they are moving so fast and they are
really pushing the envelope and what they’re
doing it’s amazing to see but because of that
and because they’ve only been around the year
sometimes when they release an update it can
have some problems with your website and unfortunately
it has happened I think it’s gotten a lot
better in the last two or three months there
now doing more extensive it beta testing and
they recently added a feature to the settings
panel of it so if you log in and click on
tools there is this option right here where
it says a version control so first you can
opt into be a beta tester this way you can
Beta test the plug-in before you unleash it
on your websites but this is really nice right
here you can do a rollback a version rollback
so if you do an update you’re noticing some
problems you can click a button and then it
rolled back easily to the prior version in
your perfectly fine you can submit your bug
report and they will fix it and then you can
go ahead and update I think out of all the
user interfaces for all the page builders
I think my preference is Elementor it has
the best thought out user interface I find
it very easy to use and it’s pretty amazing
what you can do with this free page builder
let me just show you some of the things that
I was talking about here let me go ahead and
I do have the Pro version enabled so you get
these widgets with the free version and here
are the Pro elements right here right here
we have some general elements that are common
the free version as well and then some WordPress
shortcodes you can click on add template right
here and you can see this vast library of
very practical templates that you can use
on your website here’s one went on I this
is exit 1 of the free ones right here let
me go ahead and insert it into the speech
you can see some of the very advanced design
elements so first of all right here this is
the shape tool you see how you’re getting
that shape at the bottom this is the shape
tool it is amazing so I can click right here
to get into the settings of this section and
then right here we have three tabs layout
style advanced most of the things are in a
doer and style, click on here ominous scroll
down and here it’s called shaped divider and
we don’t have a shape divider on the top we
have it on the bottom and it’s the curve so
I can adjust the curve you see how I’m adjusting
it right here I could change it to something
else I wanted waves I can go with waves and
and adjust that down like this there’s so
many design options that you you have your
you notice on each of these columns right
here when I hover over you get this however
affect or just gets lifted off the page you
get these very nice styled covering effects
have to show you this amazing at thing that
they added recently and it is that animated
text where are you animated text it’s right
here animated headlines let’s see if I drag
and drop that let me drop it right here like
that you see how it just did that it just
circled a word while I think it’s pretty amazing
you can have it do this underline right here
and you see just underline the like that you
have full control over the font style and
everything I suppose it would look better
if I would make it white like this so I made
the shape white let me make the headline whites
like that and there you go that’s perfect
and then actually for the shape tool I would
probably want that to be like yellow or something
like that like a highlighter maybe there we
go and we can preview it it’s just amazing
this little things like that I mean I really
think that Elementor is good in so many different
use cases it is by far the very best free
page builder for WordPress if you have a very
low or no budget Elementor is definitely the
page builder that you want to be using it
is amazing what you can do you can build stuff
so fast you can save template you can buy
template you can export templates there so
much that you can do with Elementor I must
say that for all of these page builders in
terms of features I think Elementor is definitely
leading the pack and setting the pace with
everything that they’re doing and everything
that they’re adding in everything that they
were planning I think they’re really shaking
things up and I really believe they’ve only
just got started so a lot of those page builders
I was talking about earlier that I’m saying
the got all this content login problems and
all that prep example site origin content
login it’s a back in page builder well Elementor
is free there’s no reason why you would I
would even use any of those paid once I was
talking about over Elementor sold those page
motors cornerstone site origin visual composer
all those ones I listed theme file those ones
that have [email protected] just totally
squashes all of them it is just that amazing
of a page builder completely free and their
pay version is a very very affordable now
I with Elementor I know I’m only scratching
the surface on explaining it here but I do
have a ton of video content on Elementor and
they have great community behind Elementor
okay the last page will Dharma talk about
cipher link the video is going to be called
the Thrive Architect now there used to be
a plug-in used to be like a week ago called
Thrive Content Builder and now there’s a Thrive
Architect which is version 2 of Thrive Content
Builder I personally think it was very smart
of them to change the name now there were
some problems with Thrive Content Builder
that I talked about in last year’s video number
one it would work with any theme but it wouldn’t
be fully functional with every WordPress theme
now Thrive Architect can truly stand on its
own in any WordPress theme also last year
I was saying how in Thrive Content Builder
was looking pretty dated it’d come out in
2014 but they were actually working hard on
the building Thrive Architect when I made
that video last year and what they did which
I think was very good as they made it fully
backwards compatible everyone that using Thrive
Content Builder can upgrade and most of their
stuff will work there are some upgrade issues
that people are experiencing right now some
of the strengths of Thrive Architect is it
is very much geared towards marketers which
is a great thing but don’t let that limit
you because you can build full-featured websites
using Thrive Architect but there’s little
things that it has to it that if you’re a
marketer or someone that has an online business
that you might want to consider using this
it has a full suite of landing page templates
some of them are dated but now that Thrive
Architect out I’m sure there to be having
some very very nice and new ones coming out
but they have elements that you can use that
have a marketing purpose in case someone actually
show you some of those in a moment I show
you Thrive Architect this page of course was
built with Thrive Architect these are some
of the templates that you’re getting with
Thrive Architect it has in online editing
that’s one of the big cells points that they’re
actually making on the Thrive Architect page
however all the page builders are working
on that lets us scroll down to the pricing
of Thrive Architect and then I’ll show you
some of the pros and cons of it where are
you pricing they have really really good pricing
because the business model of Thrive Architect
or the Thrive Content Builder’s a little different
they will sell you the plug-in and you get
lifetime updates you get one your support
Odyssey they can sell your plug in and say
were going to support it to support you and
provide you with personalized support for
the life that you use it so you purchase at
a single site license for $67 and at the end
of 12 months if you continue wanting support
it’s a very nominal fee but you will never
be locked out of actually getting updates
and that’s one of things I’ve always liked
about Thrive that they do things that way
another compelling thing about Thrive Architect
is a Thrive Architect is one plug-in and into
and an entire suite of plug-ins so Thrive
makes Thrive Leads they might thrive on ultimatum
they make Thrive quiz builder and I know I’m
probably missing a couple there’s couple themes
that they have their their remaking as well
but you get this entire suite of plug-ins
that communicate to each other so here’s the
best example of that I have an Apple watch
I have an iPhone I have a Mac computer I have
an Apple TV I have an iPad man I have way
too much Apple stuff but the point is it all
perfectly integrates together I can control
one thing with the other thing all of these
devices perfectly communicate one with one
another and that’s one of the advantages of
sticking with one family of products so thrive
is really a family of products Thrive Leads
perfectly communicates with Thrive ultimatum
which perfectly communicates with Thrive Architect
and you get this synergy that you can only
get from Thrive all of the other builders
I talked about their fantastic but there just
builders were with Thrive there’s an entire
suite of products that will perfectly work
together it’s pretty amazing when you think
about it let me actually scroll to the bottom
here is are some important information so
they put this what’s coming next Thrive Architect
just came out there to be adding additional
modules there going to be adding something
that I think could be pretty important to
a lot of people there can add 8B split testing
for landing pages now they have mastered the
art of split testing big time with Thrive
because they already have the split testing
in some of their other products so they’re
just bringing that into Thrive Architect I
think it’s going to be pretty huge and I think
it’s going to give some of the software as
a service type of platforms a serious run
for their money because really the only selling
important point for one of those software
as a service things like lead pages and some
the other landing page companies really is
the a B split testing that’s the only advantage
they have these days over other ways of WordPress
related ways of having landing pages but when
they add this a B split testing I think they’ve
got some stuff to worry about for sure so
anyways this is Thrive Architect let’s go
ahead and take a look I have it right here
and I wanted to actually start showing you
the back end here is some of the strengths
of it they have deep API connections with
just about every email marketing platform
or any kind of platform you want to integrate
with limits if it actually shows you a list
when I click on manage connections let’s see
let me click on add a new connection okay
so here’s a list of email marketing services
that it fully integrates with webinar platforms
right here there some other things right here
and also social media you don’t get these
types of integrations with the other builders
at all unfortunately another unique thing
with Thrive Architect is it add something
called a Thrive light boxes and essentially
a light box is a pop up so you don’t need
to have a separate pop up a plug and if you
want accident and pop-ups of some clicks on
a button there’s a pop up at time to pop up
get that all authority built into Thrive Architect
it’s a very compelling thing that they have
added so here is the Thrive Architect interface
like I said it works with any theme now there
has been some criticism on Thrive Architect
that it too closely resembles another page
builder Elementor I don’t necessarily agree
with that because Thrive Architect when it
was Thrive Content Builder had a very similar
interface to begin with yeah there are some
overlap in some similarities but there really
are with all page builders so I personally
don’t buy into that one of the things I really
like about Thrive Architect watching them
to show you some of the elements you get with
that you get this the typical ones that you
would expect right buttons headings images
paragraphs and all that one nice thing is
let me just veer off course here if you scroll
down and you see this long list of elements
there’s a little pin off to the side when
you click on it you can actually pin your
most commonly used elements right there to
the top because I don’t use the whole list
of them I might only use like five or six
all the time you can just pin them to the
top which I think is actually brilliant right
I don’t I don’t know why other other builders
haven’t thought of that I think it’s a pretty
pretty impressive there’s another thing that
is really really cool about Thrive Architect
so when I drag and drop an element in like
this you get this important this breadcrumb
feature so actually it’s not showing well
right here let me start with a about a set
of columns so me drag this column element
here I’ll choose this and then let me click
here and drag and drop this there and now
let me click on the text you get this thing
of breadcrumbs this breadcrumb trail at the
top and what this is is is that showing you
where you are or what settings you’re in and
it makes it super easy to backtrack a little
bit so it knows I’m in the text paragraph
text but if I just want to edit something
in the particular column like maybe the background:
color I can just click there on the breadcrumb
and now I’m I’m changing the style of the
individual column but hey what if I wanted
to go back one more and edit the style of
all of the columns I can go and click here
on the breadcrumb and I can do that when I
first saw that they did this in the beta a
few weeks ago I was pretty impressed because
it’s little things like this that I think
are very innovative another little thing that
I really like about Thrive Architect if you
click on anything so you got this in length
text editor I think it’s great but it’s really
coming to all of the different page builders
soon it’s gonna come shortly but when you
scroll down you have all of their setting
panels right here there is a responsive option
right here and you can choose to make this
visible only on the desktop or only on a tablet
or only on a mobile that’s fine every other
page builder has us but what I like about
it is safe I only wanted this to be on the
mobile device and I toggle it you knows what
happened I don’t see it anymore I really like
that because there’s times where I have to
duplicate a section and make one that’s perfect
for mobile that I want for mobile and one
that I want for the desktop but I’m stuck
looking at both when I’m on the desktop not
sleep I want to see it even though it’s hidden
I can click on the checkbox and see it but
I just really like the simple things about
that where it will actually hide it if I only
wanted on a mobile device and I do have to
say I think as far as mobile editing goes
Thrive Architect has the best mobile editing
experience in my opinion as far as changing
the different attributes to make it look better
on a mobile device I think it’s a time really
between Elementor and between Thrive Architect
there are some things that I also don’t like
about Thrive Architect I don’t like the interface
here for adding a gradient so here’s a background
style so if I clicked on the columns and then
I will scroll down the background style here’s
what I would do to make a gradient I just
feel like it’s such a horse change from the
interface I like how Elementor does that better
were just slides the panel down but this is
kind of like a pop up in the settings column
here I don’t really like that much like it
that much but it is easy to go herein to change
the gradient so if I wanted to go with the
gradient I can easily choose out these colors
and make something really beautiful like that
and you saw how easy that was to do so then
you have to always remember to click on apply
actually don’t like that either so there are
some things that I don’t like about Thrive
Architect that are really kind of minor things
I think the biggest thing I don’t like about
Thrive Architect is that and I’m sure they’ll
add this you can save modules and reuse them
but you can’t have one be a global module
so I made a section and states like a call
to action and there’s a button and I want
that on every single page of my website they
can’t all be linked so I can make a change
in one of mom and it would change in all of
them I don’t like that however I do think
that they will add that feature here in the
future also I do think that Thrive Architect
could use some new modules but I think they
spent so much effort and energy wrapping up
and getting Thrive Architect ready that they
haven’t yet had a chance to focus on adding
new modules let me show you some of those
some marketing related modules that I wanted
to show you okay here’s a simple one a button
okay so a button is a button but one of things
I really like about the button is right here
you can have a secondary line of text and
this would essentially be text to reinforce
why someone should click on the button in
the first place don’t get this with the other
builders I don’t know why it’s a simple marketing
thing if you want any kind of a cell speech
you see it’s very common to have a button
with two lines of text I love it I don’t understand
why other builders don’t added it’s probably
because they don’t have this marketing focus
with them so that is a real simple thing I
know okay so when I scroll down I really like
this content reveal so essentially you can
have content revealed on a timer so say you
have a 10 minute video and you want some content
to reveal right at eight minutes you can do
that with this content reveal I really like
the countdown timer will really the Evergreen
countdown timer you can actually also get
this for Beaver Builder if you have ultimate
add-ons for Beaver Builder but a an Evergreen
countdown timer they are fantastic so that
means when someone comes to your page it will
start counting down on them but then if someone
comes later at a later time that’s when their
counter restart its evergreen is that this
global countdown timer a lot of people like
this credit card module so essentially what
this does is it will show credit card icon
so this is really good if you have a sales
page or something like that or actually maybe
I should have just gone ahead and put that
underneath the button there so I would probably
need to center this right here under layout
and position I would go like that and center
it you do have really neat spacing controls
now that I have them up right here so I can
drag this and change my padding or change
my margin like this and you can even go a
little negative on the margin like that to
get it exactly where you want you didn’t have
those options before one of the other modules
that Thrive Architect has that others don’t
that I think is pretty huge and very very
useful and if I scroll down it’s right here
I really like this it is a table module right
here so you can create tables that you are
so you can pick how many rows and how many
columns you do that and then I can just start
clicking into them and adding the information
that I want to so I could just click on manage
cells and now I can start clicking on on the
various cells and adding information actually
doesn’t seem to be working right for me it’s
probably because it is one of their newer
modules I don’t actually have this working
right how embarrassing but that is okay this
is actually very useful if you are creating
a blog post and using Thrive Architect on
a blog post and you want this extensive information
that you would find in a table or self I would
actually consider using Thrive Architect for
blog post I know tons and tons of people use
the Thrive Content Builder on blog posts and
I’m sure Thrive Architect might end up being
the very best page builder if you’re writing
blog posts because there’s a lot of blog post
friendly type of stuff like this that are
actually really really good okay so let me
try to summarize all of this stuff I know
I gave you lot information but I wanted to
help give you the information so you can make
the best decision for you so number one if
you are someone that has a very low budget
I would consider Elementor the free version
and the paid version if you just had one website
and also consider Thrive Architect because
you only have to buy once and you get lifetime
updates you can also consider Divi although
if you’ve noticed some kind of shying away
from Divi because of the content lock-in issues
and the updates that break website issues
but you can’t get away from the fact that
for 250 bucks you can get a lifetime license
and that’s pretty good because you’re not
having to pay each year to renew it so that’s
if you have a low budget number two if you
are someone just making the one website I
recommend Elementor the free version of Elementor
and the paid version because you could buy
the the one site license for $49 or use Thrive
Architect because with Thrive Architect you
don’t have to renew it the next year those
are to be great options for you if you are
a web developer and you want to create more
complex projects hands down you’re going to
have to go with Beaver Builder and Beaver
Themer and epiphenomenal community of advanced
web developers I mean you can also use it
for normal websites as well in fact I would
probably say Beaver Builder is the best tool
if you are making websites for someone else
because you get unbelievable reliability when
updates are pushed out and that’s can essentially
gonna make it easy for you to manage multiple
clients if you’re not having to come in there
and fix anything on each update but if you
want that advance functionality pairing Beaver
Builder with Beaver Themer is amazing what
you can do it is amazing what you can do and
there is nothing that even comes close to
it at this point I have a full tutorial series
on Beaver Themer and you can watch that and
see you can do some really amazing stuff without
touching a line of code that you could not
do before Beaver Themer was available and
you also get that added bonus of the the Beaver
Builder product you can use in unlimited websites
and get support for unlimited website so you
really can’t beat the value there if you’re
a web developer web design agency and you
don’t want to have to bring unnecessary heartache
of websites having issues on you you’re gonna
want Beaver Builder in there some amazing
things that you can do with Beaver Builder
that I didn’t talk about where you can restrict
the access that your clients have to edit
certain things so say you come out with this
beautiful layout you give it axis your client
and they screw it all up while with Beaver
Builder there are ways to restrict what they
can and cannot do she can make it so all they
can do is change the text that’s perfect is
then they can change the font they can change
the background they can’t rearrange anything
and that’s good to make a life a lot easier
for you and it’s can allow you to provide
more foolproof solutions for your customers
next if you are a marketer I think you really
want to give Thrive Architect a serious look
because of these marketing centric features
that they have you can create sales funnels.
Pretty soon be able to do a B split testing
which is amazing if you’re buying any kind
of pay traffic definitely Thrive Architect
if your marketer you probably also making
lots of blog posts longform content you’re
knocking to be able to make any longform content
right now in Beaver Builder Elementor until
they add in-line editing so if you want to
engaging longform content right now your only
option is a Thrive Architect and I highly
recommend it for that also if you want to
create high converting or landing pages also
give Elementor a look because Elementor is
a very designer friendly which means you can
and have access to the most recent design
trends to make a unique looking landing pages
for yourself or for your clients definitely
give Elementor a look for that if your marketer
as well at the end of the day I think these
are all great page builders and unfortunately
the information changes new features come
out new versions come out I have a link down
below I linked everything of course but I
also have a link down below to page on my
website where I’m keeping you up-to-date on
all of these different changes so when you
go to the site you’ll see all the updates
for each of these four main page builders
or you can just click on the link and go read
more if you wanted to but everything’s gonna
kinda be consolidated right there once again
I have links everything down below what page
builder do you use and want to know why you
choose that page builder let’s try not to
attack the other ones but let’s definitely
share why you think your page builder in the
one you’ve chosen to use is the best page
builder few thanks for making it stick in
and out with me through this very long video
but I think that Ed the page builder you choose
to use is just as important as the web hosting
you choose the use which means it is everything
and I just wanted to give you as much information
as possible to make the best decision possible
for you thank you for watching.
Join The Conversation
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Hi, Adam, thank you a lot for this article, I appreciate your work!
I use Elementor myself, it has a lot of essential blocks for free 🙂
Hi Adam,
I love what you do, I love all your tutorials, and I have a question for you. I’m building a directory website, I purchased listingpro theme, however I read that it’s not well coded and is not as scalable and seo friendly as geodirectory plugin. Should I go with the theme or plugin ? Thank you so much for your help.
Yea my preference is the MyListing Theme. See if you can get a refund.
Very Informative! Thanks for sharing this Adam. Cheers!
“11 Best WordPress Page Builders Compared…”
I must be mathematically challenged. I see 5, Adam, there are 5.
The content is in the video where the 11 are compared. But many of those 11 are outdated.
Adam, after days of research, this was ‘hands down’ the most clear, balanced and valuable source of advice that cut through all the one-sided reviews from others. Thank you SO much! I have decided the best product for my needs is Elementor Pro. I am very grateful for your expertise.
Adam, after days of research, this was ‘hands down’ the most clear, balanced and valuable source of advice that cut through all the one-sided reviews from others. Thank you SO much! I have decided the best product for my needs is Elementor Pro. I am very grateful for you expertise.
Hi Adam,
Thanks for all your interesting blogposts and videos. I have build my first website with the Avada theme. It is a portfolio website to show my articles and mages. It took so much work as I continuously struggled with the limitations of the theme. In the end, I also had to built every page from scratch as the templates they offer proved useless for my design.
Now I want to rebuild the website, because I am still not happy with some design parts. I was thinking of:
1. Pairing Hello Elementor with Elementor pro
2. Pairing Generate Press with Elementor pro
3. Sticking to Avada – with Elementor pro – it has already been installed and that was also difficult, so I am already scared of having to switch to a new theme.
However, Hello Elementor seems to be the theme that is the most fastest to load. But I wonder what brings a theme as Hello Elementor to the table, and what brings Generate Press to the table? Are these themes still bringing in features that Elementor pro is lacking? Like many more lettertypes?
It seems that Elementor pro has so many features, that you don’t need a theme. Is the only reason you need a theme because WordPress demands that?
I would appreciate your feedback at this, since it is difficult to find information about it.
Many thanks,
Tessa
Many people just use Elementor Pro with their Hello Theme, but really is not a good combo today unless you are a developer. Soon Elementor Pro will have global styling and that will make it more practical for everyone else.
Hi Adam,
I am trying to build a website like Quartz digital magazine https://qz.com/ . Can I use Elementor pro for this.
Regards,
John
Yes you can, it would take some design work, but you can.
Hi Adam i wanna know which best page builder to create logistic website like this https ://www. cevalogistics .com/your-industry
with pop up page on each service. they build it with drupal i think.
so when you click its not open in new page but just pop up like that. thank you for your great wordpress course in youtube!! i really appreciated
There isn’t really anything special there. You can do that with any page builder or no page builder at all. Those are not popups, they are separate pages.
Why do you use an alt-right dog whistle in your opening paragraph?
Just read the comments here.
This is one of the most valuable 59 min videos I have watched recently and clearly comes from someone who knows his stuff. Thanks.
Thank you Scott. I do these every year with updated information. I’ll have a new one in 2 months.
Have you tried Offsprout? They’re new, but they check all of the boxes:
– inline editing
– full site editing with their Theme
– archive and 404 page creation
– no shortcodes
You said that there’s nothing that comes close to what Beaver Builder and Beaver Themer can do, but it seems like Offsprout can do pretty much the same things, plus has some other features like the Site Grower than none of the others have.
The only drawback is that it’s pretty expensive ($600 for the bundle) so it’s probably not going to be something that beginners can afford.
I’m curious if you’ve tried it?
I haven’t tried it, but I think at some point they may have reached out to me. My prediction is that it’s not going to go anywhere. I just don’t see the selling point of using a less powerful, less mature page builder, less integrations that is 3X the cost. So without them having a truly awesome marketing plan, it’s a very tough sell.
I’d like to see a top list of the best GPL licensed builders that aren’t free but paid. No matter how powerful, fast or intuitive a particular plugin is, if it isn’t GPL then it’s not an option to me. I want to support plugin vendors that do things the WordPress way rather than those thinking they know better. Obviously, the GPL works as there plenty of successful commercial examples. That’s just how things are done in the WP space.
Elementor PRO though while an excellent option hasn’t embraced the spirit of the GPL and by extension the WP community itself. With terms like theirs, why would you choose it? You probably wouldn’t unless you’re aware. Many will assume just because the free version is GPL that the PRO version is too. While that’s common, it’s not the case here. People don’t read terms and that’s on them.
Have you read these – https://elementor.com/terms/ – Scroll down to the section “3. Licenses”
These are Facebook level bad or worse IMO. However if after reading and comprehending them, you’re still ok with that compared to how their GPL competitors license their paid versions then that’s certainly your choice. While I think it’s a bad long term choice but in short term there’s probably minimal harm in choosing to be shackled voluntarily like this.
Elementor is 100% GPL. The addon they offer, Elementor Pro, which adds additional modules and some extra features, is not GPL. Anyone is free to fork Elementor or create add-ons for it. I have read what you are referencing and its hardly comparable to Facebook, that’s quite an extreme take on it. It is there to prevent all the GPL clubs from distributing it.
I totally understand why they choose this, if you are a company, with investors, if you go with a GPL license you have no intellectual property. Anyone can copy everything you have paid to develop. I see no problem with all that they have given with Elementor.
Also from this list, Thrive Architect is not GPL.
I stopped reading after the first line. Can you tell me what you mean by “move over pippin”.
That is a term of endearment.
That’s how I understood it.
Bro, I am new to building websites. I am learning by experimenting on my own websites I recently created. I also want to design websites for my Fiverr clients (I will post the gig within 10 days). So can you please recommend me the theme & page builder which is also cheap & easy to use. Remember I have to deliver it to my clients so quality is at my top priority. It can be any time of website like a woocommerce website or Matt be a landing page or may be a blog so please suggest that is usable for all purposes. Please only suggest single page builder & theme because I am totally confused till now & want your help.
Lalit from India
Bro, I am new to building websites. I am learning by experimenting on my own websites I recently created. I also want to design websites for my Fiverr clients (I will post the gig within 10 days). So can you please recommend me the theme & page builder which is also cheap & easy to use. Remember I have to deliver it to my clients so quality is at my top priority. Please only suggest single page builder & theme because I am totally confused till now & want your help.
Lalit from India
Hi Adam, Can you please check out on Themify Builder , they released a new version and it seems amazing with it’s parallax feature and the ultra theme.
Read the commenter here ( people hate it ) https://www.wpcrafter.com/review/themify-builder/
Thank you for the advice!–our website guy gave us options of only themes that use Visual Composer, but I find it so difficult to use whenever I want to update something. When I tried deactivating VC on our current theme Royal 8Theme in favor of Elementor, it caused a whole host of problems. I am hoping to convince him to let us switch over to another theme where we don’t have to use VC.
Yea I really feel for people that are stuck with Visual Composer. I like to say that no one chooses to use VC, they are stuck with it. Hopefully your web developer will make different choices on what to use in the future.
Hi Adam, great info. I also think that a lot of people would prefer a more all-in-one solution like from Themify. I think their themes include their Themify Builder, which gets pretty good reviews. One of the main problems with Elementor is it requires a separate theme. While you personally may not consider that much of an issue or hassle, it does add yet another WordPress vendor and app to have to research, become proficient in, maintain, and also pay for if you opt for the pro version.
Elementor is this way by design. They aim to eliminate the need for a theme and have EVERYTHING done in Elementor. This will be more and more evident early next year.
Thanks, that helps, sort of. I’m not sure what EVERYTHING means if it’s still based on using WordPress. Also, I didn’t get notified of your reply. Is that a bug in your commenting system?
Everything means, what you normally need a theme for. So for example, headers/footers, blog post templates, archive pages, 404 pages.
Hi Adam,
Thanks for just existing! Your videos and website have changed me thinking towards the web design business.
I see you like Elementor ( you made multiple videos about it), but the BB 2.0 isn’t bad at all.
So whats your advise when it comes to long-term commitment? Should I go will BB or elementor. To me, both offer the same features; apart from the inline editing (which I love) that doesn’t exist yet with BB.
Thanks.
I will say that inline editing will come to Beaver Builder in 2018. Dev’s have already started on it. Regarding which to choose, I feel that Elementor has a wider range of modules. You can get some of these modules with Beaver Builder if you purchase one of the addon packages like Ultimate Addons.
Hi Adam,
waht about X theme‘s cornerstone page builder. Yes its a content lock like divi. But it seems to have the maximum elements and also they have exclusive premium plugin extensions.
Whats your take on Cornerstone page builder comparing to Elementor?
They don’t have any elements that are not found in other builders. It’s more expensive because the cost is per website. From a user experience perspective, UX is not the developer’s strong suit.
Regarding the plugins they include, its really bad because you are dependent on them for updates.
Elementor is in a different league then Cornerstone. They are almost not even comparable at all. It like comparing a Linux computer to a Mac.
Hi Adam-Great Video. I am VERY new to website creation. Started out discovering Divi and Genesis Framework, but got very confused, then found your site with the video talking about the 4 top page builders. I want to develop a website, primarily blogging but with eCommerce. I’d like as much flexibility and design control as possible, but easy (newbie friendly) since I am no coder. I’d like a professional looking site that I can a grow with. Also need tutorials-definitely. So, advise? Should I even look at Genesis with a child theme?
Page Builder? Oh, and is there a theme out there that’s great for blogging that stands out. There are SO many! Also, sounds like these page builders are advancing rapidly-should that be taken into consideration? Sorry for the LONG post, but I’d appreciate your advice; hopefully you get what I’m asking and of course, think I’m asking the impossible. 😉 Thank you so much.
Happy to have you here on the site. So I would recommend avoiding Genesis and their entire product line. Reason being that anything you want to change to it will require custom code. They are very resistant to making their theme easy to use, weird. Right now the best theme available is the Astra Theme, and you can read/watch my review on it. There just isn’t anything that comes close to it.
Then pair that with Elementor, the free page builder, and there is no limit to what you can create.
Thank you so much Adam; I so appreciate your candid and quick response. You are a wealth of knowledge and a treasure chest of resources-glad I found your site.
I Was using SiteOrigin, they have limited number of widgets compared to Elementor,
This is the most informative video I have come across. Thank you.
Yea they just are in maintenance mode with SiteOrigin, there is no activity to make it modern. In fact, if you look at their widget plugin, it now supports Elementor. This should be a sign to anyone considering using SiteOrigin.
This is the most informative video I have come across. Thank you. You mentioned early in your video that you would talk about whether these page builders are theme agnostic, but I didn’t see that info later on. Is Elementor theme agnostic? Are there particular themes that it works best with?
I believed for each one I said if it was dependent on a specific theme, but sorry if I left that out. Yes, Elementor is not linked to any theme. Can be used with any theme.
Hi,
What about oxygenapp?
Do you think Oxygenapp + Thrive and no theme would be a good combination?
Vijay
If you see my review on Oxygen App, there are many signs that development has stopped. I wouldn’t recommend anyone use it at this point and if you are in a refund period, that you should request it. As far as a theme, I would recommend Astra. Realistically, at some point next year Thrive will have a new theme with deep integration, but for now, I would suggest Astra.
Hi ADAM
I’m a fresh website designer and I’m planning to work as a freelance.
I found this video is really useful and Contain a lot of comparisons, but why you didn’t talk about [The Ark ], do you have any recommendation about it?
Thanks in Advance
One of the most important things with choosing which tool to use is the long-term viability. The Ark is a small time theme with its own page builder built in. They do have a respectable 5,300 sales, but that is over the course of 10 months. This video is comparing page builders that are active on 300k – 1million websites. Active installs = revenue = long-term viability. Sadly, as soon as The Ark sales start to slow down, they will have no revenue, and it will stop being developed. It’s just how it works. I wouldn’t base my website on a tool that doesn’t have long-term viability.
Thank you very much, you are Analyst Genius, relied on my case which page builder you recommend that it have a lot of functionality, animated widgets and support responsive and parrallx effects and without content lock, that I can Relied upon to present a lot of design options for various customers?
As I said I am a fresh web designer and in the present time I don’t have enough time to learn scripts and coding languages and I plan to use what you will recommend for long time.
waiting for your reply.
I would say Elementor, but it doesn’t have parallax at the moment. There is an add-on package that adds it, but I am sure it will be added in the future.
My workflow for the last few months has been OceanWP w/ Core Extensions, Elementor PRO & Elementor Extras by Namogo (I like that it gives you the ability to make any element ‘sticky’ within it’s parent container’) as well as button groups, image comparisons and a few other things Elementor PRO lacks. I’ve built 40 sites anywhere from 1 page to 65 pages and it really makes life easy. Now I have my own OceanWP child theme w/ all my standard plugins install with one click using TGMPA. Go from a blank slate to a fully loaded development environment in 30 seconds. Excellent videos & content Adam!
Wow, you are killing it there! Yes, that is a great development stack. Never even considered using TGMPA in a child theme like that.
Adam, Levi you people are awesome… I read every line written on this page & i am very grateful to Adam! Also Levi I am going to try that TGMPA for sure. Its awesome.. Currently i have many websites in OceanWP & its the best theme I have ever used.
But i use SiteOrigin. I know they have limited number of widgets compared to Elementor but i have observed many issues while using embedded images in Elementor Editor. Also one VIMP thing is you cant use Elementor in sidebars, which is possible in SO. So it gives you huge power in sidebar also. It has good caching also & you can transfer entire code in page. So even if you un-install the plugin, everything will just work perfect…
Any thoughts about it??
Yes, I am going to make a video on the TGMPA tool because of his comment. Great idea indeed.
You can use Elementor Pro in any widget area. Also, you can use the free one as well, but you need to add a 3rd party plugin to make it work.
Are you familiar with Make Plus by Theme Foundry? Thoughts?
Yes I am, it’s ok, but I would never recommend it to anyone. It’s way overpriced and relies on its own weird back end page builder.
Came across you on Youtube. I have had used WP for 14 years or so but let the site wither and grow old. I jumped on Avada without doing a lot of research. I am a minister in the UK and time is of a premium to spend on my site which I really need to re-do. I saw your comment of Elementor. Would that still hold in your opinion? I also noted you didn’t mention Avada at all. Is there a particular reason for that?
I think I did mention Avada in my video, it was the part in the beginning. Avada is not anything I would ever use. The theme is very bloated and will be very slow for your website visitors. Also, it is a back end page builder, so you don’t really get to see what your are building. Lastly, there is content lock in, so if you ever want to stop using Avada, you can’t.
Tired of seeing the word bloated without any real substance or backup.
On my Avada review page, there is a video where I clearly go through and “backup” the statement.