Intro Best WordPress Theme Artist Portfolio

Over the past ten years, I’ve used a great deal of different WordPress topics and have been really disappointed. Up until recently, I was using MyThemeShop, that was pretty excellent. But I had to perform a lot of customization to allow it to do and operate the way I wanted it to. A couple weeks ago I decided to provide GeneratePress a try, and let me just say, it is by far the best WordPress theme I’ve discovered in a decade . I was blown away and am moving all of my sites to GeneratePress. I will enter exactly why in my in-depth GeneratePress review below. And if you’re wondering, yes I have attempted Genesis, Astra, OceanWP, Avada, X motif, Divi in addition to several other lightweight and heavier multicolored themes. Best WordPress Theme Artist Portfolio

To Begin, Click here to download GeneratePress.

GeneratePress Review

GeneratePress is a totally free WordPress theme made by Tom Usborne, a developer from Canada. I’ve really seen it for many years from the WordPress repository. Most of you realize that I am pretty picky when it comes to web performance, and so I tend to ignore everything in the repository. Typically because a lot of stuff on there is not that great, or not supported for long. However, in this case, that was a mistake. The theme now has more than half a million downloads, 80,000+ busy matches, with over 500 5-star evaluations. So obviously Tom is doing some thing right here.

I Really installed the free version of the theme and in a matter of 15 minutes purchased the superior version. I could tell right off the bat, the developer was thinking precisely how I was envisioning a theme should get the job done. And I will go into that more below, but let us first look at some of the qualities. I will be covering the superior version of the subject, because it’s worth very penny. In fact, Tom, if you read this and are seeing Scottsdale, Arizona, coffees on me.

Features

Super lightweight and fast. Modular design allowing you to enable/disable items you do not want running. This is one of the greatest reasons I adore GeneratePress.

Responsive, looks fantastic across all devices.

Schema built-in, for greater outcomes in SERPs.

Impressive integration with all the WordPress Customizer. I have not been a fan of the customizer previously, but Tom does it right.

Compatible with all popular plugins, Yoast SEO, WooCommerce, EDD, BuddyPress, bbPress, and WPML. Fantastic browser service back to IE8.

It also works great with all the favorite fast-growing Elementor page builder. If you would like to dive into even more customizations, these really are a terrific combo. I’ve also read that individuals using Beaver Builder have had success.

Translation ready.

Font wonderful built in.

Tons of hooks and filters which make it good for developers.

Great active service from the programmer. On average, 3 updates per month.

The Documentation is also incredible. Besides have good documentation on their website, the subject has existed long enough that what I wholeheartedly during the setup procedure was found within a couple of seconds in their own forum.

Diving Into GeneratePress

Now it is Time to the fun part! I always test a brand new theme right out of the box without any customizations to see how quickly the base is. This tells me a great deal of what I can expect by the time I add everything to it. Running the stock GeneratePress WordPress motif on Kinsta hosting clocked in at a whopping 265 ms loading time. I was very impressed.

One Thing I was worried about with GeneratePress was that the modular design was going to produce a lot of big files, but that isn’t the situation. You may tell that Tom literally worked hard on ensuring that every record packed in GeneratePress is as small as possible. Together with HTTP/2, the number of files is not as important. However, the dimensions is! Take a look at a few of the center GeneratePress files below:

/generatepress/css/unsemantic-grid. min.css 2.9 KB

/generatepress/style. css 7.1 KB

/generatepress/css/mobile. min.css 1.6 KB

/generatepress/js/navigation. min.js 1.1 KB

/generatepress/js/dropdown. min.js 1.5 KB

That is a programmer that cares about functionality! And I’ve Seen the same during each the premium add-ons. They’re as small as possible get them. In reality, Font Awesome is probably the biggest file included. And that is not even his. With Font Awesome 5 coming round the corner, we can anticipate this to secure smaller also.

The premium add-ons Are installation in what I’d call a modular layout. You can activate/deactivate anything you are not using to ensure they don’t load on your site. Since the co-developer of this perfmatters plugin which has a script manager built-in, I felt at home with this. Everything ought to be designed this way.

If You’re interested, I’m using the next add-ons on this site:

Website

Shades

Hooks

Page Header

Spacing

Typography

No Child Theme Needed

One of The best characteristics of GeneratePress is that I no longer have to use a Child theme. This makes my life much easier. No longer editing my functions.php or header.php documents. I will literally upgrade my GeneratePress motif this very minute and not lose a single customization. The hooks add-on definitely can help make it possible. It allows you to add custom code/PHP everywhere throughout your WordPress website. Best WordPress Theme Artist Portfolio

Other Things I Love About GeneratePress

On every Page/post that you have a great deal of options. You can change the sidebar layout and the footer widgets.

You Can easily swap a page between the default option to a full width page, as well as disable components.

The WordPress customizer choices is where GeneratePress really shines! Bear in mind, a lot of these choices are enabled by the premium add-ons. I can’t show you everything, otherwise, we would be here all day. But let me show you few which actually come in handy.

Responsive Columns

Another Plugin I highly recommend grabbing is your free Lightweight Grid Columns. Not to my surprise, this is also created by precisely the same developer as GeneratePress. It enables you a super easy way to incorporate responsive columns into any page or article. Characteristics include:

Desktop grid thickness

Tablet grid width

Mobile grid thickness

Add Customized classes

Add custom inline designs

Equal height columns

This is An example below:

You might want to Also catch his amazing WP Show Posts plugin also. View my featured posts on the sidebar of this site? That’s using the WP Display Posts plugin. I have it set to show posts from a specific”featured” category. You can also have it show last modified/updated posts, recent articles, etc.. I am using the free version and it works terrific.

To Get started, Click here to download GeneratePress.

Sections Add-on

The Segments add-in in the premium version of GeneratePress lets you perform all sorts of things in terms of design. Think of it like a webpage builder with no bloat. GeneratePress is certainly not only for blogs! I am in reality utilizing GeneratePress for our ecommerce site (perfmatters.io) that is operating Easy Digital Downloads. Don’t hesitate to check it out. However, as you can see below, it looks nothing like a blog.

Speed Tests

For all those Of those who are regular readers, you likely did not even notice that I changed the whole motif that forces woorkup.com. It only took me about an hour for GeneratePress to mimic my MyThemeShop motif which I had spent annually customizing. Here is a comparison under.

woorkup.com Old MyThemeShop Theme

My older MyThemeShop motif was pretty fast, but I invested a lot of time scrutinizing it. In reality, I’ve gotten a great deal of emails from you guys asking me to print all my customizations. My advice now is, simply get GeneratePress!

woorkup.com New GeneratePress Theme

With the New GeneratePress motif I was able to attain faster speeds and 600 fewer lines of code! And remember, I don’t have a kid motif. All the customizations were created using the wonderful GP hooks and snippets plugin (both CSS and PHP).

Like the WordPress theme I have running on woorkup? You are in luck. Tom asked if he can make a copy of woorkup for the brand new GeneratePress site library. I’m happy to let you know that you can now put in my woorkup theme on your own GeneratePress website with only a click! It’s known as the Marketer motif. Get started using a great blog layout immediately.

brianjackson.io Old Array Theme’s Theme

Additionally, I Moved within my personal website, brianjackson.io, to GeneratePress. Previously I had been using a theme from Array Themes. It is a fairly basic minimal site, as I don’t use it to get much. As you can see it already loaded pretty quickly.

brianjackson.io New GeneratePress Theme

I was Able to duplicate the whole appearance 100% in GeneratePress in under an hour. And as you can see it loads even faster! Amazing. I was able to eliminate a couple plugins which weren’t needed due to GP.

forgemedia.io Old Array Theme’s Theme

I also Moved over our organization site, forgemedia.io, to GeneratePress. Previously I had been using a motif from Array Themes. It is a fairly basic minimal site, as we just use it to our LLC. Since you can see it already loaded pretty fast. Best WordPress Theme Artist Portfolio

forgemedia.io New GeneratePress Theme

I had been Able to move everything over and get it looking just how I wanted it in under one hour. And as you can see it loads even faster! Amazing. I managed to eliminate a total of four plugins and it dropped my whole page weight 2x!

I can’t express my Excitement about locating GeneratePress and I’m moving over all my websites to it (which includes several EDD e-commerce websites ). After I’ve got my 9 websites all running in GP with no child themes, my life will be a breeze! The programmer has restored my faith in multi-purpose themes, which when done the correct way, can actually perform quicker.

And The best news isI finally have a billion more choices to pick from than I did earlier.

What GeneratePress Is Great For…

GeneratePress Is the ideal option for performance-focused users that want to have the ability to customize and control exactly how their site looks.

You Can make GeneratePress perform pretty much anything. And since GeneratePress has a focus on performance, the website that you build will have a fantastic base to make it load quickly.

Because Of that, those who assemble WordPress sites for a living love GeneratePress. They’ll typically pair it with a WordPress page builder and use it for literally any kind of site.

However GeneratePress Might Not Be A Good Combination If…

…you Need something that will instantly appear perfect from the box.

For Example, if you realize you wish to create a fashion blog, you may be happier picking out a niche theme that’s developed exclusively for fashion bloggers.

While GeneratePress has gotten a great deal easier to use, thanks to its pre-built Website Library, GeneratePress still seems very barebones if you first install it.

So To create GeneratePress look how you want it to, you will almost certainly will need to go in and personalize things. And while the substantial advantage of GeneratePress is how customizable it is, many users, especially casual users, don’t like having to make those changes themselves.

GeneratePress Features Which Make It Unique

Here Are some of the particular features that explain why GeneratePress is so popular.

Plenty Of Customization Options From The Real-Time WordPress Customizer

Past Performance, another place where GeneratePress does nicely is its customization choices.

GeneratePress Uses the WordPress Customizer for customization, and this is convenient as you will have the ability to see all the changes that you create in real time.

The Free version of GeneratePress gives you decent possibilities, but should you own GeneratePress Premium, you’ll be able to customize nearly all about your website.

For Example, if you go into the Design area, you may configure detailed settings to yourown:

Header — you can move your header around and change its own styling
Navigation — GeneratePress gives you two different navigation options, including sticky menus
Sidebar layout — you can use a Couple of sidebars
Blog post layout — such as featured image size, metadata, etc..
Footer layout — like the number of widgets to include

Similarly, The Typography area lets you control the font to get each and every element on your site, including buttons:

And You also get a detailed region to control the colour of each and every element on your site.

All In all, GeneratePress will provide you much more customization options in the WordPress Customizer than most other themes. This amount of detail may be a little overwhelming if you’re a beginner. But once you realize how the settings come together, you’ll have complete control on how your site looks.

Optimized Performance And Fast Page Load Times

Across All its features, GeneratePress consistently includes a focus on excellent performance and clean code. The entire theme is less than 30 kB, and it will be about as small as you are ever going to find for a WordPress theme. Even most other optimized WordPress topics are still 200+ kB. And a few poorly coded topics can even exceed 1 MB!

GeneratePress Also has no code dependencies, which will help you avoid the render obstructing error that Google Pagespeed Insights often mentions.

Place That together, and you get a superfast-loading motif. How fast? To give you an idea, I ran a little test.

First, I put up an empty site utilizing a haphazard popular WordPress.org motif (Envo Magazine). After analyzing its performance with Pingdom, it:

Had a performance tier of 77
Loaded in 1.05 moments
Had a page size of 243.9 kB
Had 15 requests

That’s Not bad in any way! But GeneratePress can perform.

Next, I activated GeneratePress on the same test website without altering anything else. Here’s how GeneratePress failed:

Had a performance tier of 87, 10 points better
Loaded in 666 ms, ~37% quicker
Had a page size of 26.8 kB, ~90% smaller
Had 9 asks, ~40% less

If You do the exact same test with other topics, you’ll continue to see that GeneratePress is among the fastest-loading WordPress topics in existence. Best WordPress Theme Artist Portfolio

Other Useful Premium Extensions, Plus Much Modular Approach

Past Giving you more style controls in the WordPress Customizer, GeneratePress Premium comes with a lot of other useful features such as:

Elements — a exceptional feature which lets you create custom hooks, page headers, or design templates.
Page Header — lets you create a unique page header on a per-page basis.
Sections — that is kind of like lightweight page construction. It permits you to create different”sections” on a webpage, each with their own design and column settings.

To Stay lightweight, GeneratePress also provides you a modular port where you can select and choose exactly which characteristics you want to activate.

That Way, you do not have to slow your site down for a feature which you’re never going to use.

Pre-Made Starter Sites Make It Easier To Design Your Site

In The last, you had to construct GeneratePress websites from a blank canvas no matter what, which made the theme difficult for casual users to install.

Earlier In 2018, however, the programmer added a new Website Library attribute for GeneratePress Premium users which lets you easily import any one of those 25+ pre-built demo sites.

You Can import them directly from the WordPress dashboard.

Yes this Website still uses GeneratePress! All I did was click a few buttons to import a presentation site.

Page-Level Settings Provide You Comprehensive Control Over Each Bit Of Content

With Most themes, each page and post will use the same settings for the most part. You might have some custom formats or templates — however you do not have very much control past that.

GeneratePress Changes that by providing you a new Design meta name box for each and every page and post:

You Can utilize this meta box to:

Change how many sidebars your site uses, or the sidebar orientation (such as altering the sidebar from right to left)
Choose the number of footer widgets to utilize
Disable certain elements, such as your header, navigation menu, post featured picture, article title, or footer
Create a special”container” for your page builder

Where These controls are the most useful is if you are using a WordPress site builder.

By Disabling certain components, you’re in a position to create the proper baseline for your own page builder layout, which makes it effortless to create custom content as needed. Best WordPress Theme Artist Portfolio

GeneratePress Pricing: Affordable And Works On Unlimited Sites

The Heart GeneratePress theme is available for free at WordPress.org.

Nevertheless, If you are serious about utilizing GeneratePress, I feel you need to purchase the GeneratePress Premium plugin, as that is what produces the theme so elastic. The free version does not give you nearly as many settings from the WordPress Customizer. And you will also miss out on the premade Site Library.

GeneratePress Premium can be still fairly affordable. It costs only $39.95, and that gives you use on unlimited websites . You will also get a 40% discount if you want to renew to continue receiving support and upgrades after the first year (you can, obviously, continue using GeneratePress after the initial year without renewing — you won’t receive any more upgrades ).

When You consider the typical premium WordPress theme will often cost around $60, GeneratePress provides a great value.

Wrap-up

As I said, I don’t believe GeneratePress is for everybody.

If You desire a niche-specific motif, you can probably save time by purchasing a theme that fits your requirements for your niche out of day one.

However, If you are willing to spend some time altering settings, GeneratePress’ mode controls give you the flexibility to turn it into any type of WordPress website. Or, you may even have the ability to locate a starter site that fulfills your needs to save a little time.

Additionally, It’s one of the fastest-loading WordPress topics that you will locate. Therefore, if you’re looking for the best performance possible, utilizing GeneratePress as your WordPress site’s base is a great decision.

If You blend it with fast-loading hosting, so you shouldn’t have any difficulty making your website load in under one second. Best WordPress Theme Artist Portfolio