Astra WordPress Theme Review (2019)

Astra is quite famous because of a couple of its very distinct features in which speed and page builder support is most demanded.

The best part of Astra theme is that you can use it for almost all types of websites like blogs, portfolios, business, or e-commerce. And you don’t have to build a new website from scratch; you can always pick a ready-made site from the Starter sites. Starter sites are premade Free site by Astra WordPress theme developers for multiple types of niches. They are all page builder supported.

“Astra Theme” is the fastest theme of all times. Build with SEO in mind, this theme integrates with page builders successfully.

In this article, we will try to look into ASTRA WordPress Theme. We will discuss the following points in order to learn about Astra:

About Astra WordPress Theme – Background, you may want to know!

Astra Theme
Astra Theme

Brainstorm force is the team behind this fantastic project. Brainstorm force is pretty old in the WordPress industry as they are building high-quality plugins for WordPress from the past 10 years. And after the launch of Astra, they have crossed a revenue of $1 mil this year.

When you think of selecting a theme, the first thing you see is the ratings it got by the users. That gives a good idea about the quality of that theme.

Astra got excellent rankings because of its extraordinary features. 99.9% of the users rated it with five stars, and very very few themes got these ratings.

Astra Installation and Ratings
Astra Installation and Ratings

Pros and Cons for WordPress Astra Theme at a Glance

Astra Theme Pros and Cons
Astra Theme Pros and Cons

In case if you are not here to read the whole article about all the details of Astra theme, then you can take a quick look at the main perks and cons that you will get using Astra WordPress theme.

Well, the pros are pretty significant, but the cons for Astra WordPress theme are not that important as those are not that significant flaws and can be ignored easily.

Why Astra WordPress theme?

Site Speed

There are some solid reasons to install Astra theme for your website. One of the primary claim that the developers of Astra theme make that, with the WordPress custom settings, the site loads in less than 1 second. Because they have developed the theme in such a way that the resources are less than 50 KBs.

You can always HIRE US if you have any issue with the speed of the website and if you want top-notch security for your WordPress website.

Page Builders Support

One of the most demanded WordPress features of all times is page builder endorsed the theme, and Astra WordPress theme is the best page builder supported theme out there. It supports the top page builders like Elementor, Divi Builder, Brizy, and Thrive Architect. We will talk about that in detail later in the article.

Starter Sites

Starter sites are the collection of pre-made free sites for every type of niche. You have to pick the site that you like and only edit it according to your needs using any page builder. We will talk about them in detail later. Keep reading.

Astra WordPress Theme Features in Details

Astra Features
Astra Features

When it comes to selecting a theme for the website, we research the theme and try to compare the features of the themes with other competitors. Here’s a detailed REVIEW of Astra WordPress Theme performance and features.

Performance-Focused:

  • Less than 50 KB: Developers made it possible to keep the resources under 50 Kb so that the site because as light as possible. It increases site performance, server load time, and many other errors.
  • Loading time: They claim that the site load time is less than 1 second if Astra is used with WordPress custom settings with no plugins.
  • No jQuery: Astra theme uses Vanilla JavaScript for better performance. So for optimization of site speed and performance on different devices, the developers eliminated the jQuery.
  • Optimized code: Astra follows the best coding standards (uses default WordPress data) to make sure that every single piece of code is optimized. Thus the clean code makes this theme a unique theme.

Powerful Design Options:

Powerful Design Options
Powerful Design Options

This is also one of the most liked features of Astra WordPress theme, especially the transparent header. Following are the customizations that you can do to your design. Other WordPress themes do not offer most of these customizations.

  • Layouts: Manage the layout of the site; headers, posts, blogs, single pages, etc.
  • Transparent Header: Sets a transparent header background, you can change the shade of the header to make it semi-transparent.
  • Header and Footer Options: The theme comes with several headers and footer options. These are the options you have while customizing the theme.

    Astra Header and Footer Options
    Astra Header and Footer Options
  • Sticky Header: Even when the user scrolls down, the sticky header sticks on the top of the page to allow the user to access the menu quickly.
  • Page Headers: Set custom page headers to show them up on the posts of your website and specific pages.
  • Mobile Headers: You can customize header breakpoints, menu styles, colors, set a different logo, etc. for your mobile device.
  • Mega Menu: This helps you to create beautiful templates with the page builder of your choice. You don’t have to make your content according to the pre-made themes from now on.
  • Dedicated Sidebar: This allows you to create page-specific sidebars. Further, you can override your website default sidebar settings.
  • Colors & Typography: Choose colors and fonts that should integrate with your brand. With this feature, you can easily manage the Typography and colors of the entire website. This was not that easy before Astra WordPress theme.
  • WooCommerce Ready: Most of the times, your favorite theme does not support the online store like WooCommerce, and this irritates very much, but Astra helps you to build and design a fast and attractive store easily. It is completely WooCommerce ready!

Site Layouts:

Have you ever thought of having a custom layout in a non-custom theme? Well, now you can have that. Here are the options discussed in details about site layouts.

  • Boxed: You can display your main content in a boxed layout that will help you to distinguish it from the other content available on the page.
  • Spacing Control: Astra WordPress theme has an addon. This addon allows you to manage the paddings and margins around all the elements.
  • Padded: Astra WordPress theme has an addon. This addon allows you to manage the paddings and margins around all the elements.
  • Fluid Layout: You can select the fluid layout that will allow you to stretch the entire site till the end of your screen.

Typography:

  • Google Fonts: You can use As many Google Fonts as you want, this theme gives you an option to select from 700+ Google fonts for your website.
  • Responsive Font Size: You can control the size of typography according to the device and also for all the devices. Set it to responsive, and it will be according to the device.
  • Custom Fonts: You can import any custom font by using the free Custom Fonts plugin.
  • Paragraph Margin Option: You can easily manage the spacing between paragraphs by using the margin option.
  • Text Transform: You can text-transform and can also select a uniform format for a heading tag.

Colors & Background:

  • Primary Header: You can control the Colors & Background on your website, within the primary header, and the same goes for mobile and desktop.
  • Above Header: Set the colors and background for your mobile phones and on your site above header too!
  • Below Header: Astra lets you change the color and background of everything within your below header.
  • Blog / Archive: You can control the colors on your archive pages and blogs through Astra’s color & background customizer settings.
  • Sidebar: You can customize the sidebar colors and background using Astra’s settings in the customizer.
  • Transparent Header: Astra gives you an option to set different colors and change them on the transparent header!
  • Content: You can manage the colors of content from a single place.
  • Footer: Along with various options available within the headers, Astra gives you the control to manage and change colors on the footer too.

Blog Layouts:

  • Grid Layout: Astra WordPress Theme showcases all your blog posts, using the blog layouts, in a grid layout manner.
  • Masonry Layout: You can display your blogs in a masonry layout too.
  • Date Box: You can display the blog published date in style.
  • Blog Structure Control: Astra allows you to control how individual posts/blogs are displayed on a blog page.
  • Post Pagination: You can add stylish pagination for blog posts distribution within several pages.
  • List Layout: You can display your posts in a list layout, i.e. post one after the other.
  • Excerpt Count: You can fetch excerpts (summary of the post) to be displayed with your blog post on the page.
  • Highlight First Post: Astra gives you an option to highlight the first post on your blog list.
  • Blog Content Width: Control the content width of your blog page easily by using the blog content width option.

    Astra Blog Content Layout
    Astra Blog Content Layout

WooCommerce:

  • Grid Settings: Astra WordPress Theme WooCommerce module allows you to display blogs in a grid layout manner.
  • Off-Canvas Sidebar: You can add an off-canvas sidebar that remains out of the screen but can be triggered through a link or button on the Shop page.

    Off Canvas Sidebar
    Off Canvas Sidebar
  • Gallery Options: Astra lets you display (set the list or grid layout) all your products on your Shop page.

    Astra Gallery Layout Options
    Astra Gallery Layout Options
  • Sales Bubble Style: It is advisable to add trendy sales bubbles on your products to boost sales.
  • Infinite Scroll: Astra allows you to load all the products on your shop single page. Choose infinite loading options that will load products all in once when the users scroll down.
  • Dropdown Cart: You can show a cart for Astra Woocommerce that let users see and delete their products, if any, that have been added to the cart.

Integrations:

Astra WordPress theme is extremely light in weight, but it comes with a lot of useful features.

  • LifterLMS: Astra LifterLMS helps you build distraction-free and an attractive online course website.
  • Schema Integrated: The schema markup implementation helps search engines to understand your website in a better way. And Astra is already integrated with the schema.
  • SEO Optimized: Built for speed and following the best coding standards to create a good website structure, Astra WordPress (SEO friendly theme) comes with inbuilt schema markups for you to get better results.
  • Page Builder Integration: In the past, we have seen that many themes were designed without page builder integration, but Astra is not the same and works seamlessly with page builders like:
    1. Elementor
    2. Divi Builder
    3. Beaver Builder
    4. Visual Composer
    5. Site Origin
    6. Thrive Architect

    Supported Page Builders
    Supported Page Builders

The default editor of WordPress is Gutenberg, that has the potential to help people to write better. In short, it is more than an editor. The good thing about Astra WordPress Theme is the inbuilt compatibility with the Beaver Builder. When designing pages with Beaver, Astra automatically chooses the Full-Width layout without Page Title and Sidebar to allow the user to start creating their pages immediately and without changing all the settings. Check out the video that explains how it works:

Astra starter sites:

Making a unique website from scratch involves a lot of creativity and many hours from your day. But with Astra WordPress theme, you get Astra Starter Sites that are already created by the developers and give you a ready-made site to work on. You have to edit the data. You can also customize the whole Astra starter site using page builders.

Once you have installed the Astra WordPress theme, you will see a tab with “Astra sites”. Here you have to select your favorite page builder. After selecting the page builder, you will see the Astra starter sites that are compatible with that page builder. In one click you can install that starter site, and now you can edit that. Astra Starter Sites are available with WordPress default editor Gutenberg and page builders – Elementor, Brizy, and Beaver Builder.

Astra Starter Sites
Astra Starter Sites

A starting point and a little setup are always helpful. Create professionally designed websites in minutes with the best plugin that gives the user access to 90+ pre-made website demos. You just need to select the demo, import, tweak, and go live!

Full Website Templates For You’ll find the complete starter sites for

  • Various types of agencies
  • Restaurants
  • Financial advisors
  • Interior designers
  • Pet services
  • Makeup artists
  • Health-based sites (doctors, dentists, etc.)
  • Fitness and Sport
  • Construction
  • Education and courses
  • Food and drink

These starter sites are built with different page builders and can be imported in your new website with just a few clicks, and then you can customize them as per your requirements.

Free Plugins for Astra

You can do a lot using free plugins for Astra. Many plugins for Astra are different from the regular WordPress plugins.

Go to the options page for Astra WordPress theme; here you will see an option, You can extend Astra with Free plugins.

Astra Plugins
Astra Plugins

Let’s review these plugins that are specially designed for Astra WordPress theme.

One of them is Astra Hook. This plugin gives you a shortcut on the customization page to add codes and content quickly.

The other useful plugin is the Astra Bulk edit. This plugin gives you the freedom to edit something on as many pages as you want in a single click. Thus save a lot of your time.

Astra customizer is another fantastic plugin to reset all the customization settings if anything goes wrong.

Sidebar manager is a plugin for those who love to add sidebars in their websites. Using this plugin, you can easily create and manage different sidebars.

Pricing: Free vs PRO

The Astra WordPress theme comes in free (limited features) and pro version. The free version has excellent speed and is downloadable from the WordPress directory. However, Astra Pro is a powerful multipurpose version that makes Astra the perfect theme.

Free and Pro Version Features
Free and Pro Version Features

At WP inCare, we understand the value of premium version when designing a website. By opting for an Astra Pro Theme, you come out of limitations imposed by the free version. Astra Pro offers more advanced features and helps you customize your website in a unique manner. There are a number of packages available for the pro version.

Annual vs Lifetime packages

The annual version: Renewed every year

Lifetime version: One-off purchase.

Astra Packages
Astra Packages

Have a look at the number of Astra Theme bundles:

  1. Astra Pro ($59)
  2. Mini Agency Bundle ($169)
  3. Agency Bundle ($249)

You can choose the bundle according to your needs and budget. As a one-off buyer (web designer), the Pro version of Astra is probably suitable for you. But if you’re a repeat designer or own a web design agency, then the Agency bundle will help you go long-term because of its countless possible functions. The agency bundle will also allow you to access the full starter site design library.

Astra Pro Features
Astra Pro Features

Money-Back Guarantee:

You can get a refund on your Astra Pro package, if not fully satisfied with the features.

What Industry People are Saying About Astra?

Astra got the attention of the WordPress community right after launch because of its extraordinary and most demanded features. Here are the testimonials of some famous people.

Astra Reviews
Astra Reviews

Have you ever read or watched WordPress Tutorials? If yes, then you must familiar with Adam Preiser. Look what he is saying about Astra WordPress theme.

Adam Preiser Opinion
Adam Preiser Opinion

Support 24/7

When you own a business website or an eCommerce store, you sometimes face problems on the site that could harm your goodwill and might lead to a potential loss of revenue.

At Astra support, your issues are resolved soon they are reported, and the team even add new features as per your request. Also, you can join Astra user forums on facebook to give your feedback, ask questions to the authors, and help other members of the group.

Astra Support
Astra Support

Final Thoughts

Without any doubt, Astra is one of the best and widely used free WordPress themes around.

For professionals, a minimum of $59 per year gives you hundreds of styling and layout options. So, what are you waiting for? Give wings to your website by a good selection of Astra WordPress Theme pro version.

Here is a brief and complete review on Astra Theme!Click To Tweet

WP inCare can develop your website using Astra for you. Contact us today, We will be more than happy to serve you.

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