Are you curious which page builder is best between Elementor vs Beaver Builder? If your answer is yes, then you have arrived to the correct location.
Two of the most popular page builder plugins for WordPress are called Elementor and Beaver Builder respectively. Both of them are the finest in their respective ways. On the other hand, if you are unfamiliar with WordPress, selecting a plugin might leave you feeling overwhelmed.
As a result, in order to be of assistance, we will now offer you with a comparison of “Elementor vs. Beaver Builder.” In this section, we will examine both of them side by side, contrasting their most important features, user interfaces, prices, as well as their benefits and drawbacks.
Let’s start!
Overview – Elementor vs. Beaver Builder
To begin, let’s have a conversation about what what a WordPress plugin is. Plugins are discrete chunks of code that extend the functionality of a WordPress installation. To put it another way, a plugin is a little application that you can add to your WordPress website in order to improve the capabilities of the platform.
The plugins that are available for WordPress are quite helpful and essential. The heart of WordPress is a straightforward, well-organized, and lightweight software application that was developed for the purpose of posting straightforward material on the internet. But in today’s world, you can use WordPress to construct almost any kind of website, and even use it to manage a robust online retail operation. Plugins make it possible.
Your WordPress website may have almost any feature you can imagine added to it by using plugins. In addition, there are literally hundreds of plugins to choose from. However, not all plugins are created with the same level of quality. There are hundreds of plugins accessible, some of which are not just obsolete but also potentially hazardous.
If you choose the wrong plugin, it could:
Slow down your website
Ineffective plugins might have a detrimental effect on the performance of your website. Because of this, it is detrimental to both the search engine optimization and user experience of your website.
Crash your site or cause an error
Because they operate on top of the core programme, WordPress plugins have the potential to modify the characteristics of the primary website. Installing a plugin with bad coding might result in problems or even cause your website to crash.
Expose your site to security vulnerabilities
Some poor-quality plugins make it easy for hackers to exploit vulnerabilities in websites. Because of plugins of this kind, it is possible for malicious users to get access to your website and make inappropriate use of the data it contains.
Add a malicious code to your site
When you install just about any plugin available, there is a possibility that you may also install dangerous malware on your computer. There are crooks who use sparkly items that operate online. You run the risk of having your data stolen if you use their plugin.
Make your site unresponsive
The layout of your website should be responsive so that it can adjust to many sorts of displays, including those on mobile devices. Your site’s responsiveness may suffer if you are using an old or obsolete plugin.
These damages are plenty enough to explain why you should use only the high-quality good plugins. Plus, there are more points like technical support options. We’ll explain all of them below.
Choosing the Right and Best WordPress Plugins – Things to Consider
1. Make a List of Required Features
Plugins may extend the capabilities of your WordPress website in a variety of ways, both in terms of features and functionality. There are some that are necessary for every website, while others are conditional on the sort of website being referred to.
Almost all websites need at least one of the following essential plugins: a security plugin, an SEO plugin, a backup plugin, a contact form plugin, and a performance optimization plugin. In addition to this, there are specialised plugins that are helpful to specialised plugins.
First things first, you’ll need to choose on a specific focus for your website and compile a list of the plugins it’ll need. If you are going to create a blog, then you will need a certain collection of blog plugins. In a same vein, you need a distinct collection of plugins in order to run an online portfolio, an eCommerce site, or a commercial website.
In a nutshell, the list of necessary plugins varies from one website to the next based on the purpose of the website, the kind of material it hosts, and the sort of economic model it employs. As a result, you should first establish a list of the functions you need and then write down the requirements you have.
After that, you may begin the process of looking for the most effective plugins that provide those features. This will not only point you in the proper way, but it will also prevent you from being sidetracked when you are making your choice of plugins.
2. Search for Plugins by Keywords
When you have a list of the plugin functions that you want, you can begin looking for plugins that offer those characteristics. This search may begin as soon as you have the list. You may get plugins from a wide variety of plugin shops, and these plugins can either be obtained for free or for a fee.
The plugin directory on WordPress.org is, above all other sources, the most reliable location to get free WordPress plugins for your website. They, by alone, provide more than 57,000 free plugins for WordPress.
These plugins, which were developed by web developers from all over the globe, are available to you totally free of charge. Because they are put through a stringent review procedure before being included to the directory, you can be sure that the quality of these plugins meets at least a bare minimum requirement. The plugin review team over at WordPress.org is the group that is in charge of this task.
To locate free plugins, go to the plugins page on WordPress.org and begin your search by typing a term into the search box located on that page. For instance, you may do a search by entering “SEO” into the search box and clicking “Search.”
Once the available SEO plugins have been shown, you will be able to evaluate each one according to its capabilities, user ratings, the author’s standing, and other factors, and then choose the finest WordPress plugins from among them.
If the free plugin repository does not have what you are looking for, you may try searching the premium plugin repository instead. CodeCanyon, which is a plugin marketplace and is managed by Envato, is by far the most popular and biggest paid plugin shop. You may begin your search by going to the page dedicated to the WordPress category on CodeCanyon.
There, you will discover more than 7,500 premium plugins for WordPress created by developers from all around the world. Checking through the many aspects that will be covered in the next section will allow you to choose a plugin that is a good fit for your requirements.
Additionally, there are a great number of additional websites that serve as third-party providers of WordPress plugins and that provide a variety of plugins. You may get high-quality plugins from retailers like as WPEverest.com, Yoast.com, and many more.
3. Consider Your Budget – Free or Paid Plugin to Use
In the previous section’s second point, we discussed both free and commercial plugins, as well as where users may get them. But at this point, you may be wondering whether you should use the free or paid plugin (also known as premium). Let’s talk about this right now.
You are aware that there are thousands of plugins for WordPress, both free and commercial, that are accessible. If you search for a certain functionality, you will discover several plugins, both free and paid, that support that feature. Now, this raises the issue, which is better: the free version or the premium version?
When you realise that free plugins offer virtually the same functionality as those supplied by commercial plugins, the uncertainty becomes even more difficult to deal with. Therefore, it is a legitimate issue to ask: why spend money on a premium plugin if your requirements may be satisfied by using a free plugin instead?
If it turns out that your requirements can be met by using free plugins, then there is no need to second-guess your decision to do so. However, if there is anything more that you are seeking for, you should check at paid plugins.
Premium plugins will often charge you a fee in exchange for more sophisticated choices and superior support. In point of fact, many of the free plugins also offer premium plans, which allow access to extra features as well as specialised customer service.
Aside from that, paid plugins often come with additional features that are more developed and tuned. Because companies are in the business of making money, they are always implementing new upgrades to correct their deficiencies. If you want a plugin that is of a higher quality and cleaner, a premium plugin is a fantastic option to consider.
However, you should not rush into purchasing one before doing some study beforehand. When a premium plugin is not required, spending money to buy one is a waste of money. As a result, before deciding whether to use free or paid WordPress plugins for your website, it is in your best interest to do an extensive amount of research.
4. Check Out the Most Popular Plugins
The plugins that are most liked, utilised, sold the most copies, and have the highest ratings are the ones that are considered to be the most popular. The best plugins are often the ones that have been tried, tested, and are still widely used. Therefore, you should consider giving them a shot.
The official WordPress plugin repository has a category called “Popular,” in which the most downloaded plugins are displayed in a row for users to peruse. These are the plugins that have received the highest ratings, had the most downloads, and the most active instals.
You may check to see if the plugins you’re searching for are listed farther down on this page by scrolling down. If there is a specific plugin on this page that catches your eye, you may click on it to get further information about it, such as user reviews, support options, and so on. In the following stages, we will describe how to verify each of these items.
In a similar vein, the plugin marketplace on CodeCanyon provides many entry points for discovering popular plugins. It has individual category sites for the best-selling books of the week, the best-selling books of all time, the newest bestsellers, the most popular books, etc.
You will be able to swiftly discover which plugins other users like using thanks to this feature. In addition to that, you have the option to test out the best-selling items on your website.
5. Read User Reviews and See Ratings
The reviews and ratings left by real customers are the most reliable sources for information on the quality of a certain product. Users are encouraged to write about their genuine experiences with the product, whether those experiences were positive or negative. Therefore, the most effective method for locating the greatest plugins is to read evaluations written by previous users.
Reading other people’s opinions on the plugins available at WordPress.org is really simple. On every page where a plugin may be downloaded, there is a tab labelled “Reviews.” Simply clicking on it will take you to a page that displays individual user ratings together with an overall rating based on the aggregate of those ratings. For instance, the evaluation of the Elementor plugin may be seen at the following link.
You can learn about the benefits and drawbacks of the plugins if you read these articles. You may get an estimate of the number of people who liked the plugin and the number of people who did not like it based on the ratings.
In a similar fashion, the tab labelled “Reviews” may also be seen on the website for plugins sold on CodeCanyon. When you click on the tab, you will be able to read the most recent reviews of the plugin, as well as the total number of reviews and an average rating for each review.
Take, for instance, the review page of the Slider Revolution plugin, which may be seen in the picture below. It has received an average rating of 5 stars out of a possible 5, based on 10,031 customer reviews. The three most recent reviews seem to be fascinating as well.
Before you install a plugin on your website, you should always verify its quality by reading reviews and comments left by other users.
6. Choose Plugins Regularly Updated
It is essential for a plugin to maintain consistent updates in order to remain compatible with the most recent releases of WordPress. In addition to this, it is essential to resolve any problems that previous users may have reported. Therefore, consistent upgrades translate to increased dependability as well as improved overall security of the plugins.
You may quickly determine when a free plugin at WordPress.org was last updated, which version of WordPress it uses, which version it was tested up to, and which version of PHP it uses—all of this information is shown in a one place for your convenience. You may see them under the ‘Details’ tab that is included on the download page for each plugin.
For instance, the following screenshot demonstrates how to see the update information for the Yoast SEO plugin.
In a similar fashion, you may get information on plugin updates and compatibility on other plugin marketplaces as well. These particulars are encapsulated inside a box that is located on the right sidebar of the CodeCanyon website. You can find out when the plugin was last updated, which other plugins it is compatible with, the version of the WordPress software it supports, and a lot more information by going to that location.
For instance, the following is how the update information for the Essential Grid plugin looked.
You could find these data in other places, in the event that you desire to purchase plugins from other plugin marketplaces or the websites of plugin developers. Make sure that you thoroughly check over the website and locate these facts.
7. Customer Support and Documentation
One very vital aspect that you must never overlook checking is the customer support available. It involves determining the level of assistance provided by plugin developers in times of need. No matter how knowledgeable you are, you can get stuck when using the plugin and want assistance at some time. Therefore, ensure that you examine it.
It is a well-known fact that premium plugins, in compared to their free counterparts, often provide more comprehensive support options. The price you pay gets you not only the plugin itself but also prompt and devoted assistance. This is what makes investing money in premium plugins worthwhile.
You may obtain assistance through the plugin’s support forum page on WordPress.org if you download a free plugin from WordPress.org. This page is located on WordPress.org. There is a help page for every plugin, where users may post questions and the plugin writers can answer to those questions.
You may access the support forum by going to the download page for the plugin and selecting the “Support” option from the drop-down menu.
In addition to being located in the right sidebar below the ratings, the link to the assistance forum may also be found there.
This is how the help forum page appears when it first loads.
You are able to see the queries that were posed by prior users, in addition to the dates on which they submitted them and an indication of whether or not the problems have been resolved. When you click on the individual questions, you will also get the authors of the plugins’ responses. Plugins that can react quickly are desirable.
A tab labelled “Support” may also be found on the individual plugin pages sold on CodeCanyon.
If you choose to click on it, you will be sent to the help page of a particular plugin author’s website. You are able to ask for assistance from that location. Additionally, they may sometimes reroute you to their documentation website.
Checking out the documentation is yet another essential thing to do. The term “documentation” refers to a series of “tutorials” that outline the process of using the plugin in sequential order. In addition to that, they provide answers to questions that are asked regularly. On the website of the particular plugin, you may find the documentation.
This kind of support option is often offered by vendors of both free and commercial plugins. Additionally, there are occasions when the documentation and assistance are arranged on the same page. For instance, this link will take you to the help and reference page for the Slider Revolution plugin.
In conclusion, before you install the plugin on your website, you should thoroughly review the documentation that they provide.
8. Check the Reputation of Plugin Author
Before purchasing a WordPress plugin, it is essential to think about the developer’s track record and popularity. You may have faith in the plugins that come from reputable firms since a solid brand reputation is earned through hard effort.
In general, you should have the ability to anticipate that well-known and established companies would give regular updates, rapidly address any problems or deficiencies, add new features in response to user ideas, and provide helpful assistance.
Visit the company’s main website and read some customer testimonials for the most straightforward method of determining the reputation of the business. You also have the option of looking up the company’s profile on review websites such as Trustpilot.
For instance, MemberPress is a well-known plugin for WordPress that might be helpful for constructing membership websites. The company’s presence on Trustpilot may be seen here.
In addition, you may look at the plugin provider’s previous work on plugin shops such as WordPress.org or CodeCanyon.com. For instance, “sevenspark” is a plugin creator on CodeCanyon who is responsible for the creation of the widely used menu plugin UberMenu. On the homepage page for the plugin, you will see author information similar to the ones below.
Envato Market has a badge called “Power Elite Author” that it gives to plugin developers who have made more than one million dollars off of their products via the marketplace. Additionally, it demonstrates how popular the brand is.
You might also do a search on the company’s testimonials using a search engine such as Google to locate them online.
9. Avoid Bad Plugins
In spite of all of these advice, there is still a possibility of selecting unreliable plugins. In addition, we have previously gone over how damaging it can be to your website to use poor quality plugins. Therefore, you simply cannot allow any of these problems to exist on your website. Therefore, you want to use extreme caution while selecting your plugins.
Here are some simple strategies to stay away from questionable plugins:
- Choose the plugins that get regular updates at all times.
- Check out the ratings and comments left by users.
- Check the amount of people who are using the plugins, as you may put more faith in a plugin that is used by numerous people.
- Before installing plugins on your production website, you should always test them on a staging server or on localhost first.
If you keep these things in mind, we have no doubt that you will locate the most useful and appropriate plugins for your website.
Best “Must-Have” Plugins for Every WordPress Site
Having completed the procedures necessary to choose the best WordPress plugins, let’s move on to a more in-depth examination of some of the very finest WordPress plugins that are required. As was just said, there are a few plugins that are helpful to each and every site. They are used mostly for the sake of enhancing the site’s speed, security, and other functions.
We have compiled this short list in order to assist you in locating the vital and excellent plugins in a timely manner. Let’s explore.
WordPress Backup Plugin
As soon as you launch your website, you need to initiate the installation of a backup plugin. This is due to the fact that it will keep all of your site data in a safe area and provide you the ability to rapidly restore your website in the event that you delete it by mistake. UpdraftPlus and VaultPress are two backup options that are both free to use (paid).
WordPress Security Plugin
It is essential to have a WordPress security plugin installed, since this will prevent hackers from gaining access to your website. A reliable security plugin will have a variety of capabilities, such as a site scan, a firewall, quick alerts, and so on. You may use Wordfence or Sucuri if you are concerned about security. Both of these are examples of freemium models, meaning that there is a free version as well as a paid one.
WordPress Performance Plugin
You may make your website operate more quickly with the assistance of a performance plugin, which also enhances the user experience and search engine optimization. It will handle things such as caching pages, minifying files, and compressing pictures for you automatically. You may use either WP Super Cache (which is free) or WP Rocket to optimise your site’s performance (paid).
WordPress SEO Plugin
If you have a solid SEO plugin, it may help you improve your content so that it ranks higher on the pages of search results. Gaining higher search results will result in a significant increase in the amount of customers visiting your website. We advise using the Yoast SEO plugin for search engine optimization (SEO). There is a free version as well as a paid premium version accessible.
WordPress Form Plugin
A website must always have a contact form in order to maintain user interaction. In addition, you could need registration forms, feedback forms, and so forth. Therefore, you need a plugin that acts as a form builder. You have the option of using WPForms (freemium) or Gravity Forms for your WordPress forms (paid).
Conclusion
We really hope that this post was helpful to you in gaining a better understanding of how to choose the most appropriate WordPress plugins for your website.
To begin your search for a plugin, it is recommended that you first make a list of the needed features. And after that, you may search for the finest plugin available for each functionality that you need.
