WP Astra Theme - Create Beautiful and Lightning-fast WordPress Theme (Review 2021)
Are you looking for the perfect theme to decorate your WordPress site?
There are many theme providers that have beautiful pre-made website themes. However, not all of them are fully customizable.
Astra is the fastest, flexible and free WordPress theme that is intuitive and offers customizable themes for you. In this post, we will review WP Astra Themes including its features and theme examples.
Getting Started
If you are looking for the fastest, lightweight, and highly customizable WordPress theme then Astra Theme is the best choice for you. It is the most popular theme for WordPress that works well with all page builders. In this article, we will review everything about WP Astra Theme:
- What is WP Astra Theme
- What Does WP Astra Theme Offer?
- How Does WP Astra Theme Work>
- What Are The Features of WP Astra Theme
- What Page Builders Work with WP Astra Theme
- Why Should I Use WP Astra Theme?
- Is WP Astra Theme Free?
- How Is WP Astra Theme Pricing?
- How to Use WP Astra Theme?
- Pros
- Cons
- What Are the Alternatives to WP Astra Theme?
- Conclusion
What Is Astra Theme?
Astra is a WordPress theme suitable for blogs, personal portfolios, business websites, and WooCommerce storefronts. Not only providing you with beautiful themes, but it is also very lightweight (less than 50KB on frontend) and highly customizable. Built with SEO in mind, Astra comes with Schema.org code integrated and is Native AMP ready so search engines will love your site.
The team behind Astra is Brainstorm Force who is a WordPress development company that has been active since 2009. No need to be said that they are an expert in online business. Astra itself has been trusted by more than 1.6 M+ websites, including Google, Liquid Web, NASA, Stanford University, and many more. If you want your themes to be beautiful and lightning-fast without difficulty to customize, Astra is the answer!
Astra offers special features and beautiful templates that come for both free and premium. It is WooCommerce ready, fully customizable, responsive, RTL & translation ready, extendible with premium addons, and runs smoothly. Besides that, Astra works perfectly with all page builders like Elementor, Beaver Builder, Visual Composer, SiteOrigin, Divi, Gutenberg, etc.
What Does Astra Theme Offer?
- Great themes for both beginners and professionals
- Highly customizable WordPress themes
- Lightning-fast theme
- Building themed websites easily in a few clicks
- Beautiful website themes without sacrificing speed
- Themes that are fully compatible with the most popular page builders
How Does Astra Theme Work?
Creating a beautifully and pleasantly looking website is very easy using Astra Theme. It was designed so beginners could create websites easily as they can directly edit the theme layout without coding knowledge.
The first step to using Astra Theme is to download the Astra plugin in WordPress. You’ll find the “Astra Options” page under the WordPress appearance menu. Inside the page is the WordPress theme customizer that contains all customization options. With this, you can preview any changes you make in real-time. You can also switch the preview mode from desktop to tablet or mobile.
If you want to import a design into your website, you need to download the Astra Starter Sites plugin which is basically a collection of pre-made themes by Astra for your website. You can use this to design a theme instantly that has been optimized for the page builder that you currently use. After choosing your favorite page builders (Elementor, Beaver Builder, Brizy, Gutenberg), it will show the available themes. Select the theme you desired and install it. Currently, there were 35 free designs and 35 premium designs provided in the Astra Started Sites.
Read also: Astra vs OceanWP – Which One Is the Best WordPress Theme For You in 2021?
What Are the Features of Astra Theme?
Astra has many features for theme customization. It covers the performance, designs, site layout, typography, colors & background, blog layouts, full control, WooCommerce, integrations options.
Speed Performance Features
Astra uses Vanilla JavaScript that prevents render blocking jQuery. Also, it also uses optimized code for WordPress and self-hosted Google Fonts. As the result, Astra becomes the most lightweight theme that loads in less than 0.5 seconds.
Powerful Design Options
Themes by Astra are highly customizable. You can customize the layout of the website containers, transparent header, header & footer options, dedicated sidebar, and WooCommerce-ready features. For the Pro, there are additional features such as sticky headers, mobile headers, page headers, colors & typography, and mega menu.
Various Site Layout Options
For the container area, including content and sidebar, there are 4 choices offered by Astra: boxed, content boxed, and full width (contained/ stretched). If you opt for the Pro version, you will get more layout options: boxed, padded, full width, fluid layout. Moreover, you can manage the margin and paddings using the Spacing Control Addon.
Responsive and Customizable Typography
By default, Astra provides you with 700+ Google fonts and even allows you to import fonts using the free custom font plugins. You can customize the fonts’ sizes for different devices, set them in PX or EM, and transform them for your heading tags. In addition to that, there is an option to manage the paragraph margin, including spacing between paragraphs and around them.
Fully Customization for Blog Layouts
You can fully customize the theme for your blog posts. It has options for grid layout, list layout, masonry layout, highlight first post, date box, excerpt count, blog structure control, blog content width, post pagination, infinite loading, and related posts.
WooCommerce-ready Features
Astra allows you to build your eCommerce or online shop website. It has various useful features to aid your website. There are options for displaying your products in a grid layout, off-canvas sidebar, infinite scrolling, products quick view, product gallery, dropdown chart, and sales bubble style.
Rich Integrations
Astra has many integrations with other great plugins. In the free version, it integrates with Schema to help search engines find your website and is SEO optimized. The Pro version gives additional integrations with LifterLMS and LearnDash to help you to build engaging online courses and training-based membership websites.
Astra Widgets
You can add widgets by Astra, including Address, Info lists, and Social Icon widgets.
Custom Layout
It covers customization of your website’s header, footer, 404 page, hooks, display conditions, and Gutenberg pages.
Customer Support
You can reach out to Astra’s team 24/7 through emails. To help you understand more how to use Astra theme, there are in-depth articles and video tutorials provided.
What Page Builders Work with Astra Theme?
Astra theme integrates well with all popular WordPress page builders, including:
As for the Astra Starter System, it only requires you to use Elementor, Beaver Builder, Gutenberg, or Brizy. You can import Astra’s pre-made website design using these four-page builders.
Why Should I Use Astra Theme?
Quick Load Speed
Unlike other themes, you can customize everything for your website’s design without affecting your page speed. Astra is a lightweight theme that allows you to have only 0.5 s of load times.
Easy to Use
Designing your website with Astra doesn’t require you to understand coding knowledge. Inside the Astra Theme Customizer, you can click the customization options you need and see the changes in real-time on your page.
Highly Customizable Themes
There are many customization options in Astra. Starting from the header, footer, fonts, margin page, colors, background, widgets, blog layouts, and many more. Basically, you can customize everything.
Pre-made Designs in Astra Starter Sites
You don’t need to create your website theme design from scratch. Astra provides you with beautiful pre-made theme designs in its Astra Starter Sites. There are around 35 free themes and 35 premium themes that you can choose from.
Plugin Integrations
Astra has several integrations with other great plugins. Firstly, it has the WooCommerce default options to give you more control over the look of your shop and product pages. Secondly, you don’t need to concern with SEO as Astra is already SEO-optimized. Lastly, if you work in the e-learning fields, you can take advantage of its integration with LearnDash and LifterLMS plugins.
Great Documentation
To begin with, Astra is already easy to use, however it also has a comprehensive knowledge base that you can read. Many articles have annotated screenshots, and some have video tutorials. This is will help you understand the how-to Astra themes.
Is Astra Theme Free?
Yes, Astra provides free themes for everyone. You will get 35 themes in Astra Starter Sites and many customization options. However, if you want to get more themes and advanced customization, there is a Pro version of WP Astra Theme that you can choose.
How Much Is Astra Theme?
Astra pricing has two types of billing options: Annually and Lifetime. There are 3 premium plans.
Astra Pro
- Annually: $47
- Lifetime: $249
Essential Bundle
- Annually: $169
- Lifetime: $499
Growth Bundle
- Annually: $249
- Lifetime: $699
Find out more about Astra pricing and detailed features here.
How to Use Astra Theme?
Pros
- Easy to use
- Performs well and fast
- Quality starter site templates
- Free core theme + reasonable price for Pro
- Extensive customization options
Cons
- No comment layout and styling options
- Lack options for header layout and styling
- WooCommerce support is lacking compared to other themes
What Are the Alternatives to Astra Theme?
- Enfold by Kriesi
- Divi by elegentthemes
- Flatsome by UX Themes
- OceanWP by Nicholas
- Neve by Themeisle
- Blocksy by creativethemeshq
- GeneratePress by Tom Usborne
- Go by GoDaddy
- Genesis by StudioPress
Read also: Astra vs OceanWP – Which One Is the Best WordPress Theme For You in 2021?
Conclusion
WP Astra Theme is a great WordPress theme provider that works well with all popular page builders. It provides beautiful themes that are fast & lightweight, responsive, SEO-friendly, and mobile-friendly. The themes are highly customizable as you can customize everything on the page, starting from the layout, header, footer, and widgets. There are many useful features provided for you and great for building WooCommerce and online course websites. In addition to that, you can use the pre-made design in Astra Starter Sites to help you design your website faster and easier.
References
- WP Astra Theme Official Website
- WordPress Repository
- Astra WordPress Theme Review – An Ideal Beginner Theme Boasting 70 Designs – Winning WP
- WordPress’ Astra Theme: Our Honest Review – WP Shout
- Astra Theme – Review, Ultimate Guide + 21 Child Themes – Collective Ray
- 6 Best Astra Theme Alternatives That Are Just As Good (2021) – Themeisle
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