Welcome to my full review on Elementor and Elementor Pro for 2019! My goal online is to help you find the perfect tools for your next project, and Elementor is a web design behemoth that absolutely cannot be missed.
In this tutorial we are going to go through all the best (and worst) features of Elementor, compare it to the stiff competition in the page builder space, and help you decide if this is the right page builder for you.
Ready to roll? Let's go!
More...
What is Elementor?
Elementor is a WordPress Page Builder plugin. That means its entire job is to help you design beautiful pages with as little coding as possible.
It does this through an intuitive drag and drop interface where you can see exactly how your content will look for the visitor... while you are building it!?
Page builders like Elementor have allowed non-coders to become incredibly successful web designers, and choosing a page builder for your website is a huge decision (because you'll use it just about every day!).
What is Elementor Pro?
Elementor has both a free version and a paid pro version.
This makes it perfect for beginners to dip their toes in the waters before committing to making the small investment to go pro.
While the free version will allow you to build nice looking landing pages by itself, the true power of Elementor is reserved for its pro version.
At the time of this writing, the pro version is $49 per year for a single site, up to $199 per year for unlimited sites (Discounts also apply, read on!).
Elementor Free vs Pro Features
Elementor is an extremely full-featured page builder, so you may wonder if it is even necessary to upgrade to the pro version.
Below is a feature-by-feature comparison of the Free vs the Pro versions of Elementor. I'll go through some of the notable differences between each version below.
Click to see feature by feature comparison of Free vs Paid Elementor
Wow... that's a serious list... I hope you didn't get lost on the way down here!
Here are some of the must-have features of the Pro version that I think justify the upgrade fee:
The features above are really a must-have if you want to have full design freedom and increased functionality in your websites. We will cover these features more throughout this post.
Elementor Page Builder Widgets
Elementor includes dozens of widgets to help you efficiently build your pages:
Even the free version of Elementor gives you plenty of power
And the Pro version adds even more interesting and useful widgets like the Pricing Table and Blog post list widgets:
Elementor Pro gives you some extremely powerful (and fun) widgets to play with
Every widget can be easily dragged onto the canvas and edited on the front end.
They will all have their own unique style properties that you can adjust from the left hand toolbar:
Every widget has 3 types of settings to adjust:
Content Settings: This is the actual words / images / major aspects of the widget itself.
Style Settings: Set and adjust your typography, color settings, alignment, and other aspects of your widget's style.
Advanced: Don't be afraid! The Advanced section isn't too scary - but you get to adjust your margin / padding settings here, as well as a control more fine tuned controls like mobile responsiveness and custom CSS.
Elementor Pop Ups
Pop ups are often thought of as annoying distractions to a website, but successful digital marketers know that pop ups are one of the most effective list-building tools we have in our arsenal.
Until Elementor released their pop up feature, I would have said that Thrive Leads was the reigning champion of lead generation.
Elementor's Pop up feature has added full design customization to all parts of your marketing opportunities - social sharing / email capture / call to action buttons...
They can all be added in seamlessly with pinpoint accuracy with the Pop ups extension.
Elementor Pop Ups vs Thrive Leads
Because these two tools are in direct competition (Thrive Themes and Elementor), I decided to do a complete comparison of their lead generation tools to help you make a better decision:
As you can see, both tools are extremely capable, and deciding between the two of them will be a bit of personal preference (although I will definitely give my recommendations below... oooh the suspense!)
Elementor Theme Builder
Have you ever had theme envy? You know that feeling when you come across an incredibly beautiful blog and you just don't know how to make your site look the same way?
Well, Elementor takes that feeling away once and for all with their Theme Builder feature.
With Elementor Pro, you unlock the ability to fully customize your website's look and feel without touching a line of code!
What's the difference between a Theme and Page again?
The quick way to understand Page builder vs Theme Builder
Most of the page builders on the market only focus on the actual content of the blog post or page that you are building.
Theme Builders like Elementor allow you to bring the same level of customization to every aspect of your website, including:
The theme builder is one of the most impressive features of Elementor Pro.
It starts to make you wonder when "themes" will become completely irrelevant in the world of WordPress...
Theme Building is the future
Most page builders (Divi, Thrive Architect, Brizy) are all working on their Theme building functionality, but Elementor has a huge head start on them. They've done a great job implementing. It is smooth and logical. Kudos!
Elementor Integrations
Integrations should be a big consideration for anyone considering a new page builder. In this section of the review I want to talk briefly about Elementor's openness to 3rd party plugins, as well as their built in integrations with Email providers.
3rd Party Development for Elementor
Elementor is extremely open to outside development efforts to add additional functionality to their tool.
A quick search for Elementor in the WordPress repository shows 475 plugin results for "Elementor":
Elementor is a very open platform for development. A blessing and a curse...
This is a both a blessing and a curse:
The Blessing. Due to its popularity and widely adopted free version, there is a big incentive for developers to build their own plugins that sit on top of the Elementor platform. So if there is some functionality that you wish Elementor had but just can't find, there's a good chance someone has already built it for you!
The Curse. You need to be cautious when adding a bunch of 3rd party plugins to your website. Each additional plugin creates opportunities for conflicts and website slowdown. This is especially true when Elementor goes through a major update.
Personally when I build websites with Elementor for clients, I limit myself to the official plugins and try to achieve everything I want. If I simply can't, I'll add additional functionality slowly.
Email Marketing Integrations for Elementor
Now that Elementor has their Pop ups feature, they are becoming a full-featured lead generation suite.
So it's important that they integrate with the most common and powerful email marketing platforms out there. Do they?
Elementor doesn't have the most integrations out there (I think Thrive Leads holds that title), but they capture a good majority of the market share.
One special note is that because Elementor integrates with WP Fusion, it allows you to connect with basically any marketing tool on the planet, but it comes with a hefty additional price tag.
It's best to make sure Elementor will work your email provider before you decide to make the plunge. Or switch email providers... just sayin'!
Elementor Templates
I keep telling myself that one day I'll be a professional designer... but that day has not yet arrived!
Elementor helps the design-challenged out by providing tons of useful templates that we can import and adjust to our needs:
You can also save your favorite designs as favorite items for later reuse. A great, simple way to keep your content on brand!
Elementor Pro Tutorial
I recently ran a head-to-head comparison of my personal favorite page builders:
- Elementor
- Gutenberg
- Divi
- Brizy
- Thrive Architect
I wanted to build the same landing page with each builder to understand which would be the right tool for most people. You can check out the entire series here. Be sure to subscribe to the channel while you're there, hint hint nudge nudge...
At the end of the day, Elementor was an incredibly intuitive page builder that rarely gives me a struggle when trying to achieve the look I wanted.
Can't ask for more than that!
Now let's compare Elementor to the competition:
Elementor Pro vs Divi
Bottom Line:
Elementor is a great choice for beginner or advanced marketers to build powerful, design-focused websites for their own sites or for clients.
Bottom Line:
Divi was the first page builder that my wife and I used when building our initial online business so I'll always love it. But other builders have made better progress in critical areas like theme building.
Elementor Pro vs Thrive Architect
Bottom Line:
Elementor is a great choice for beginner or advanced marketers to build powerful, design-focused websites for their own sites or for clients.
Bottom Line:
Thrive Architect is an extremely powerful page builder, but isn't yet a theme builder. If you are more focused on building conversion business than a fully-customized theme, I think Thrive is a great option as well.
Elementor Pro vs Brizy
Bottom Line:
Elementor is a great choice for beginner or advanced marketers to build powerful, design-focused websites for their own sites or for clients.
Bottom Line:
Brizy is an exciting gamble right now. There is fierce competition in the market, but for the price of the unlimited license, it may be the most efficient client building page builder sometime in the future.
Elementor Pro vs Gutenberg
comparison still coming
Does Elementor work with any WordPress theme?
Absolutely Elementor is designed to work with any WordPress theme, but they do recommend and integrate with Astra very nicely. Using the Astra theme (free or paid), you can quickly import entire websites with a few clicks of a button using their Astra sites feature. read more about it in my full Astra review post.
Elementor Pro Pricing
Alright, the time has come to talk brass tax (is that a phrase anymore?)
Here are Elementor Pro's pricing options:
You have 3 options, $49 per year for 1 site, $99 per year for 3 sites, or $199 per year for unlimited sites.
If you build websites for clients, I think the unlimited sites option is an excellent way to go. You will pay for the membership with a single client and some of the time saving tools of Elementor will continue to come in handy.
But if you are just starting out, I think the 1 site for $49 is a very reasonable price.
The Best Bonus Offer For Elementor Pro
I want you to be successful as you get started with Elementor, so if you decide to use my affiliate link below to make your purchase, I'll give you:
The total value of these bonuses is at least $1,291 but if you sign up using the link below you can get access to all if it for free!
How to claim bonuses: Simply click the link below and complete your purchase of a professional Elementor Pro plan.
Once you receive your receipt in your email, forward that email to john (at) unbeatabletech.com and mention that you would like to claim your affiliate bonuses.
I'll get you taken care of within 48 hours!
Conclusion - Should you buy Elementor Pro?
The decision to buy Elementor Pro is largely personal preference. It is undoubtedly one of the most advanced page builders available today, and it will allow you to build anything your mind can think up.
Every page builder has its own focus, so I'd advise you to purchase the top 2 or 3 on your list to truly test them side by side, and feel free to return the one(s) that just don't make the cut!
