Say you’re planning to bake a pizza. What will the base, sauce, cheese, and toppings be? Thin or thick crust? Marinara or pesto sauce? Mozzarella, cheddar or Parmesan cheese? Pepperoni, mushrooms, anchovies? And let’s not even talk about pineapple here!
There are so many variations to choose from. If only there was a way to mix and match them to get exactly what you want. Oh, wait…there are several food chains who’ve exploited this very need.
If you’re planning to customize your WordPress website, using a page builder is similar to customizing a pizza. You choose the elements you want in your page, add content, set their alignment, background, colors, fonts, etc. And voila! Your page is ready to be published, for the entire world to savor.
What is a WordPress Page Builder?
In WordPress, a page builder is essentially a plugin that lets you design your site’s pages and posts without any coding involved. It’s a given nowadays for most page builders to come with drag-and-drop functionality. Thus, you can create detailed web page layouts pretty fast, like building a complex structure out of legos.
Why Use a Page Builder for WordPress?
There are many advantages of using a page builder. Here are the 4 primary ones:
No Coding Knowledge Required
Many website owners find it difficult to make even minor changes to their website’s page layouts or styles. You may know exactly what you want to change, but may not know how. With a page builder, you don’t need to learn HTML, CSS, JavaScript, or PHP to make these changes.
This enables you to achieve high-end web pages without any coding involved. What would’ve taken days or weeks earlier, including hiring a professional web developer, can now be done by yourself in a matter of hours, if not minutes.
Feature-Rich
Another amazing advantage of page builders is that they come loaded with tons of on-page widgets and features: Sliders, image carousels, galleries, content grids, social sharing buttons, pricing tables, charts, CTA buttons, forms, animations, etc.
Want the same functionalities without using a page builder? You’d have to install quite a few dedicated plugins, premium or otherwise. First, you’d need to research to find the right plugins. Then, you’d have to learn how to use them. And after that, you’ll have to make sure that they’re all up-to-date and work perfectly with one another and all the other plugins you’ve installed.
Imagine doing that with half a dozen plugins, or even more. A page builder eliminates that hassle and helps you keep it simple.
Pre-Built, Attractive Templates
Most page builders come with beautifully crafted templates for standard website pages such as Home, About, Services, Products, Contact, etc. These templates are a great way to kickstart your designing process.
Some page builders also allow you to mix and match sections from multiple templates, thereby giving you virtually unlimited page design options to choose from.
Easy Customizations
Page builders are fast and intuitive. With user-friendly features such as drag-and-drop support and a live preview mode, you can add modules to your pages easily, and then rearrange and resize them quickly as you like. You can also change their styles such as background, font, color, padding, margin, and border effortlessly.
Any changes you make will be reflected immediately in the live preview section, helping you fine-tune your site.
With so many page builders for WordPress out there, we decided to compare the top ones and list them all, so that you can decide which will be the right fit for you.
Let’s begin!
The Top 13 WordPress Page Builders
- Beaver Builder
- Elementor
- Divi
- Visual Composer Website Builder
- WPBakery Page Builder
- Oxygen
- SiteOrigin Page Builder
- Themify Builder
- Themeum WP Page Builder
- Thrive Architect
- GeneratePress Premium
- MotoPress Content Editor
- Brizy
Beaver Builder
Beaver Builder markets itself as “a complete design system.” It’s a flexible drag-and-drop page builder that works on the front-end of your WordPress website, so you can see the changes live as you’re making them. You can also click on individual elements to edit their properties.
If you’re new to page builders, Beaver Builder also includes an intuitive onboarding tour that will explain all its features one by one, helping you get familiarized with its user-friendly interface.
There are modules for adding almost any element you may want on a page, including content sliders, maps, testimonials, galleries, slideshows, accordions, pricing tables, etc.
And if you want to get a headstart with your designing process, it also includes more than 50 finely-crafted templates for landing and content pages. They’re all mobile-friendly, responsive layouts. You can even save your custom templates for use in other sections of your website, or on a different website altogether (all WordPress developers say yay!).
Beaver Builder plugin works great with almost every WordPress theme and Gutenberg. And if you want to uninstall it for any reason, it doesn’t leave behind a mess. If you’re a WordPress developer or an agency, you’ll appreciate how Beaver Builder can help you build some flexibility into your workflow.
Take Beaver Builder for a spin here and see for yourself whether it’s the right fit for you. There’s also a lite version of the plugin available for free on WordPress.org repo (with limited features though).
Pricing: Starts at $99/year (Unlimited Sites) / Lite Version is Free
Check out the WPMU DEV members-only discount!
Elementor
Elementor is another front-end focused page builder plugin for WordPress. It prides itself on its fast live design and inline editing capabilities. And deliver it does, which probably accounts for its 3 million+ active installations!
With Elementor, you make changes to the page and instantly see exactly what it looks like. It makes the whole process of designing and editing web pages a seamless experience. Elementor also works perfectly fine with or without Gutenberg.
While the free version of Elementor plugin includes over 100 designer-made templates and just 30 basic widgets, the Pro version takes it to a whole new level with 300+ pre-built templates and 50+ advanced widgets.
Elementor Pro also tacks on a theme builder, a popup builder, a visual form builder with popular marketing integrations, WooCommerce builder with 15+ shop widgets, dynamic content & custom fields capabilities, and motion effects.
It’s certainly one of the most ambitious page builders for WordPress out there.
Since Elementor is released under Open Source and GPL, other developers are free to create their own extensions for it. Check out these amazing add-ons for Elementor on WordPress.org repo.
Elementor Pro (and Beaver Builder too) pairs well with free themes such as Hello Elementor, Astra, OceanWP and GeneratePress.
Pricing: Starts at $49/year (1 Site) / Free (Only 30 Basic Widgets)
Check out the WPMU DEV members-only discount!
Divi
Divi labels itself as “the ultimate WordPress theme and visual page builder.” Its visual page builder has a pretty slick, easy-to-use interface and comes loaded with tons of features out of the box.
While the Divi Builder plugin works best with the Divi All-in-One theme, you can also pair it up any theme of your liking. It works just fine. And just like Beaver Builder and Elementor, Divi Builder employs a front-end, drag-and-drop WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) editor.
It comes with 40+ website elements and 800+ pre-made designs, including 100+ full-website packs. Furthermore, Elegant Themes adds brand new layouts to Divi Builder almost every week. All these features come together to help you create amazing designs with surprising ease.
When it comes to pricing, Divi has the sweetest deal of all the premium page builder options out there. Not only does it come with a great theme and the standalone page builder plugin, it also includes all the other products by Elegant Themes.
Try the Divi Builder Demo and see it in action for yourself.
Pricing: Starts at $89/year (Unlimited Sites), $249 for lifetime access
Visual Composer Website Builder
Visual Composer Website Builder is a drag-and-drop solution to create websites you’ve always wanted. Just like the options mentioned above, it sports a live front-end editor, which allows you to make changes to your website instantly and see how it looks before hitting the publish button.
It comes with 200+ premium templates and content elements, enabling you to design spectacular landing pages or page sections in minutes. To give you an idea of its extensive customization options, just its button element comes in 30 unique styles.
While Visual Composer sports a clean and minimalistic interface, its actual user experience leaves much to be desired. It does need some getting used to, but once you’ve figured it out, it’s a breeze from there on.
Unlike with other page builder plugins listed above, it also lets you edit the header, footer, sidebar, and other theme features. This is why it’s called a website builder, rather than a page builder.
Visual Composer Website Builder is made by the same team behind WPBakery Page Builder plugin, which confusingly enough was named Visual Composer before. They had to rebrand their old product to avoid trademark restrictions set by Envato marketplace. In case you were confused about this, now you know!
Pricing: Starts at $59/year (1 Site), $349/year (Unlimited Sites)
WPBakery Page Builder
WPBakery is both a front-end and back-end page builder plugin for WordPress. Its front-end user interface is quite similar to that of Visual Composer Website Builder, which isn’t surprising as it’s made by the same team.
Some users prefer its old-school back-end editor to the new front-end ones. You can also move back and forth between the two editing interfaces as needed.
It includes 50+ premium content elements, 100+ pre-built layouts, 200+ 3rd party add-ons, 40+ grid design templates, and much more. And it works with any theme, making it a comprehensive page builder solution.
However, you should note that WPBakery is a shortcode-based plugin, which means that all your customizations through it are tied to clunky shortcodes. It can slow down your website considerably if not used smartly.
WPBakery originally started its journey on Enavato’s marketplace CodeCanyon, where it’s still available. It’s also the most sold WordPress plugin on there. If you’ve ever bought a premium theme from ThemeForest, chances are high that it came preloaded with WPBakery Page Builder plugin.
Pricing: Starts at $45 (1 Site)
Oxygen
Oxygen is the new kid on the block of WordPress website builders. It’s designed from the ground up to be a full site builder, as opposed to being just a page builder. Oxygen’s templating engine lets you design every part of your WordPress site – headers, footers, pages, any post type, and any taxonomy.
With Oxygen, you’re essentially building a custom WordPress theme from scratch (though the team behind it doesn’t like to call it as such). But instead of hand-coding it, you’re using an intuitive, live visual editor to do it. This makes the process much simpler and quicker.
The elements in Oxygen are “more flexible, more customizable, and more powerful.” In a way, it lets you do more, but with less! It sounds counter-intuitive, but that’s how I can describe Oxygen in a nutshell.
The Oxygen design library includes premade design layouts for almost everything you can imagine. You can import complete websites from it with just a single click. Not happy with the existing designs? You can mix and match sections from any website template to create beautiful pages with a uniform style.
The end result is an optimized WordPress website with minimal bloat, thus making it load faster.
With that being said, Oxygen is meant for advanced, professional website designers. You need to have at least some knowledge of HTML/CSS/JavaScript, and a rudimentary understanding of PHP and WordPress CMS to make the most out of it.
The best part about Oxygen though is its current pricing, which seems almost too good to be true.
Pricing: $99/lifetime for Unlimited Sites (limited-time introductory pricing)
SiteOrigin Page Builder
SiteOrigin Page Builder boasts almost 2.5 million downloads and 1+ million active installs on WordPress.org repo. While its user interface isn’t that easy to use, it’s nonetheless a highly popular page builder plugin. This can be attributed mostly to its price (which is free), while still delivering full-fledged page builder features.
It works with any theme, supports live editing, row and widget styles, and is available in 17 languages. Page Builder uses standard WordPress widgets as its content elements, so combined with its widgets add-on bundle (also free), it should take care of most of your page designing needs.
One cool aspect of this plugin is its History Browser feature, which lets you roll forward and back easily through any changes you make. This gives you the freedom to experiment with your page layouts and designs without worrying about breaking the content.
While I wouldn’t recommend SiteOrigin Page Builder to anyone, especially newbies, it still needs to be acknowledged as it’s used by many out there.
Pricing: Free / Premium Add-ons start from $29/year (1 Site)
Themify Builder
Themify Builder is both a front-end and back-end page builder plugin for WordPress. It’s included with all Themify themes as part of the Themify framework, but the standalone Themify Builder plugin works with all WordPress themes and is available for free.
Its compact back-end interface lets you to drag-and-drop modules around quickly and easily, while the front-end interface allows you to preview your design live (WYSIWYG).
Themify Builder comes with 40+ professional pre-designed layouts for various website types such as blogs, shops, portfolio, services, etc. All of these website templates can be imported with just a single click.
Most of the standard modules are included for free (text, post, gallery, video, widget, menu, slider, button, map, icons, etc.). However, you can extend its capabilities further by purchasing an add-on bundle which includes 25 extra premium modules.
If you’re looking for a free page builder for WordPress with a simple, easy-to-use interface, you should give Themify Builder a try.
Pricing: Core Plugin is Free / $39 for Add-on Bundle
Themeum WP Page Builder
Themeum is known for its high-quality, user-friendly themes, and their WP Page Builder plugin is no different. Its sleek and simple front-end interface is easy to understand, even if you’ve never used any page builders before.
WP Page Builder calls its modules add-ons, and they’re all unique and perform a specific task. As of now, it includes 30+ add-ons, with more slated to be coming soon. All your WordPress widgets can also be used as an add-on. Apart from that, you have plenty of pre-designed blocks and page layouts to choose from to get started.
Its library feature lets you save any part of your page design as its own template, which you can replicate on other pages or websites easily with just a single click. You can also import or export entire page layouts.
The free version of the plugin includes everything you need to get started. The Pro package gets you 15+ premium layout bundles, that also includes 83+ readymade page layouts. And if you ever want to create custom add-ons or add custom blocks and layouts to WP Page Builder, you can do that easily by following their developer guidelines.
Wanna see it in action? Try the live demo of WP Page Builder.
Pricing: Core Plugin is Free / Pro starts at $39/year (1 Site)
Thrive Architect
Thrive Architect is an intuitive drag-and-drop front-end page builder for WordPress. What sets it apart from the rest of the page builders is that it’s focused on building landing pages that convert.
Want to change something on your page? Just click on it and start editing instantly. Wanna move something? Click to select, and then drag and drop where you want it to be.
Thrive Architect comes bundled with 300+ beautifully designed landing page templates that are 100% focused on conversion. And to eliminate the WordPress plugin hellhole, it includes conversion-focused elements such as attractive CTA buttons, dynamic actions and animations, pricing tables, testimonials, lead generation forms, countdown timers, and more.
Plus, all of these features integrate with your favourite marketing tools, so that you can concentrate on growing your business, and not how your website looks and works.
Thrive Architect works with any WordPress theme. If you’re looking to create professional looking sales pages, webinar pages, or opt-in pages, this is the solution you’re looking for.
Pricing: $67 (1 Site), $19/month (25 Sites)
GP Premium by GeneratePress
GeneratePress is one of the most popular and well-reviewed free WordPress themes. It’s built with a focus on speed and user-friendliness. And thanks to its strict adherence to WordPress coding standards, it works well with all major page builders, including Beaver Builder and Elementor.
Now, you might be wondering why a free WordPress theme is included here. Well, that’s because GeneratePress also offers a premium package called, well, GP Premium.
GP Premium builds on GeneratePress theme and adds 14 premium modules, including the Site Library, from which you can import entire demo sites with just a click. Its Sections premium module acts as a tiny page builder, allowing you to build complex web page layouts with a basic back-end interface.
While it’s not the most intuitive page builder solution mentioned here, it still needs a mention due to its performance advantage.
Most page builders add considerable bloat to your site’s frontend, but GP Premium retains its fast and lightweight nature, thereby giving your site a boost in page load speed and performance.
Pricing: $49.95/year (Unlimited Sites)
MotoPress Content Editor
MotoPress Content Editor is a drag-and-drop page builder plugin for WordPress that’ll help you create better websites with any theme. With its front-end editor, you can easily design your site’s posts, pages, or custom post types.
It includes 30+ content modules and various styling options for you to choose from. However, if you want to display videos, Google Maps, pricing tables, or add a simple contact form, you need to purchase those add-ons separately.
Its straightforward page builder interface can help you streamline your website building process, helping you design your pages swiftly. The designs you build with this plugin are optimized for all viewports, meaning they’re all responsive and mobile-friendly layouts.
This plugin also lets you create custom reusable sections, widgets, and pages. Thus, you can transfer your designs to other websites in no time, saving you a lot of hassle.
There’s no shortcode lock-in with MotoPress Content Editor, which means that even if you choose to deactivate the plugin, your content will still be safe.
Try MotoPress Content Editor here and see for yourself whether it’s the right fit for you.
Pricing: Core Plugin is Free / Premium Add-ons Available
Brizy
Brizy is a relatively new entrant to the WordPress page builder plugins scene. Built from scratch and focused on usability, its intuitive and clutter-free interface ensures that you only see what’s needed for the task at hand.
Like Elementor, Brizy is an ambitious venture and has set its goals pretty high. The first thing you’ll notice about Brizy is its modern, minimalistic design.
It works pretty much like any other front-end page builder plugin for WordPress. You set your page layout, and add or remove page elements as needed. But the area where Brizy truly sets itself apart is how you customize on-page elements. This is where it shines.
For example, if you’re using Beaver Builder or Elementor, you’ll be doing it via a sidebar or a popup. But Brizy lets you edit the element properties inline, right where it is, which seems more intuitive and natural.
Another area where Brizy trumps other page builders is its cloud save feature. You don’t have to worry about saving your changes anymore. It’s all taken care of automatically. And if you ever want to roll back any changes, you can do it easily.
Brizy works with all WordPress themes.
Pricing: Starts at $49/year (3 Sites) / Lite Version is Free
Other Notable Mentions
These page builder plugins were shortlisted, but just missed the mark from making the cut. You can check them out if you’re curious.
How to Choose the Best WordPress Page Builder for You?
With all being said and done, you’re still left with picking a WordPress page builder from a pretty big list. To lock down on any one plugin that’s the best fit for you, look out for these five main factors:
- Ease of Use – how intuitive and fast is the builder interface to use?
- Compatibility – is it compatible with your existing setup (theme, plugins, etc.)?
- Flexibility – does it let you create layouts and apply design styles that you want?
- Price – is it within your budget?
- Final Output – does the end result look good, is responsive, and is optimized for performance?
Start with Your Dream Site Today
WordPress has always been a platform that promotes openness and DIY. With a page or website builder, you can start building a powerful website in minutes, without compromising on design, flexibility, or functionality. This saves you a lot of time and money, as you don’t have to hire a professional web developer or designer.
Using the right page builder, you can create websites that can compete with many professionals out there. Get started with building your dream site today!
