Choosing the perfect WordPress theme for your blog or business website is not an easy task. There are countless themes out there that may look good, but when you start using them, you realize that they are not the right fit for you.
Despite this, many theme developers recommend using your own theme framework, but this is also not a good option because after a year or two, the framework will become outdated due to lack of regular updates.
So it is crucial to know about these themes and frameworks that will be around for many years. For a long time, Genesis used to be one of such frameworks and now I feel it is the time of Astra theme .
I recently used the Astra theme for one of my niche sites (I switched from Genesis to Astra) and it turned out to be a great decision. I think now if you have to choose a theme for your next project, Astra should be your choice.
but why?
Well, you'll find it soon enough...
Today, I’m going to share a detailed review of the Astra WordPress theme and help you decide if Astra is the right choice for your website.
The best thing about Astra is that it is a free WordPress theme run by some of the smartest people in the WordPress industry. The team is based in Pune and I happened to spend some time with their inspiring story.
I might share this story in the coming days, but for now, let’s learn more about Astra WordPress theme.
You’ll learn more about some of the biggest reasons why Astra is so popular. Then, I’ll take you on a hands-on tour and show you how it works, as well as help you choose between the free and pro versions of Astra.
Introducing the Astra Theme
Astra is one of the most popular free WordPress themes out there. In fact, if you go to the WordPress.org theme directory, Astra is the highest ranked third-party theme — the only theme ahead of it is the default WordPress theme:
Astra is a multi-purpose WordPress theme , which means you can use it for almost any type of WordPress website. You can use it for a tech blog, a fashion store, or guitar lessons… it can meet your needs.
In my opinion, there are four factors that explain Astra’s success:
- Performance – Astra is one of the fastest WordPress themes out there. Having a fast loading WordPress site is essential, so this alone is already a huge advantage.
- Starter Sites – Astra comes with hundreds of importable demo sites to help you get started quickly. This is part of what makes Astra so flexible.
- Customization Options – Astra allows you to customize everything about your website using the live WordPress Customizer. This allows for easy code-free customization.
- Integrations – Astra is designed to work perfectly with the WordPress page builder. It also includes detailed integrations with popular plugins like WooCommerce , Learndash , and Elementor .
Astra Theme Pricing
The Astra theme is available for free at WordPress.org.
If you want more functionality, you can purchase Astra Pro, an official plugin that extends the free theme with new tools, styling options, and layouts.
Astra Pro costs $59 and lets you use it on an unlimited number of websites.
Later in this Astra theme review, I’ll show you the new features that Pro offers and help you choose between Astra Free and Pro.
Four Reasons to Love Astra WordPress Theme
In this section, I’ll detail four features that I think make Astra so popular. Then, I’ll walk you through how the Astra theme works in the next section.
1. Performance
As the foundation of your website, your theme plays a major role in how quickly (or how fast) your WordPress site loads.
Therefore, one of the first things you should focus on when considering any theme is its performance optimization .
When it comes to performance optimization, Astra is one of the fastest WordPress themes you can find.
Astra is less than 50 KB, follows coding and performance best practices, and doesn’t use jQuery. For reference, most “regular” WordPress themes are between 250-350 KB in size.
To evaluate Astra’s performance, I built a test website and ran performance tests for two scenarios:
- An out-of-the-box theme that can be used after first installing it on a new WordPress website.
- One of Astra’s free importable demo sites.
For each test scenario, I ran six separate tests using WebPageTest and calculated the average page load time.
With its out-of-the-box settings, Astra loads in just 0.769 seconds and weighs in at 52 KB ( for the entire site ):
These page load times are impressive. However, this isn’t a very realistic testing scenario because Astra’s initial setup is very basic. On a real website, you’d have a lot more content.
Using the full demo site, my test site still loaded in just 1.377 seconds , with a page size of 1.720 MB and 50 HTTP requests.
All in all, Astra is one of the fastest WordPress themes .
I’ve tested a few themes that are slightly faster than Astra. However, when you combine Astra’s flexibility with its performance , I think you’d be hard-pressed to find another theme that offers a better combination.
2. Entry Site
Most people don't have the time or knowledge to design their website from scratch.
To help you quickly launch a great-looking website, Astra includes hundreds of pre-built demo sites that you can import with just a few clicks.
What’s unique about Astra starter templates is that they are built using either a page builder or the native WordPress block editor.
This means you can easily customize all demo content using a visual drag-and-drop editor - no code required.
Most of Astra’s starter sites use the Elementor page builder. However, there are also a number of starter sites to choose from that are powered by:
- Native WordPress Block Editor (aka Gutenberg)
- wpbeaverbuilder
- brizy
In total, the Astra theme gives you access to over 280 importable demo sites ( although some of these demo sites are duplicated in different tools ).
You can find demo sites for various niches and use cases. For example:
- Travel Blog
- Gym
- Digital Agency
- WooCommerce Store
- …and more
If you want to see what options you have, you can browse all the demo sites here .
3. Customization options
Astra is a multi-purpose WordPress theme, which means you can use it for everything from blogs to eCommerce stores to online courses and more.
What’s more, you can adapt it to different niches – Astra can work just as well for a fashion and lifestyle blog as it does for a technology blog.
So why is Astra so versatile?
You already know one part of the puzzle—the hundreds of starter sites you can import. But another thing that makes Astra so flexible is the detailed options in its native WordPress theme customizer.
In the Customizer, you’ll get a ton of options for controlling your site:
- color
- typesetting
- Header
- Blog Posts (and Blog Lists)
- footer
- Sidebar
- Content Width
- ETC。
Since all of these settings are available in the live WordPress Customizer, you’ll be able to use the live preview to see how each choice you make affects your website:
4. Page Builder Integration
Astra is designed to work perfectly with WordPress page builder plugins, giving you the option to design your content using drag and drop functionality.
Whenever you create a new post or page, Astra provides you with detailed options to control the page builder’s canvas.
First, you can choose between different layouts. For example, you can disable the sidebar and use a full-width canvas, which allows you to take over all the content using your favorite page builder.
Second, you can disable specific parts of a post, such as the post title or site title.
All in all, if you want to use a page builder plugin (such as Elementor , Beaver Builder , Brizy , etc.), then Astra’s page-level controls can help you make the most of your chosen plugin.
How Astra Works - A Hands-On Theme
Now that you have learned about some of the outstanding features of the Astra theme, let’s get more practical about the review of the Astra theme.
In this section, I will show you how the Astra theme works on a real WordPress site.
Importing a starter site
After installing Astra, the first thing you’ll want to do is import one of the hundreds of starter sites.
The interface for importing a demo site is very user-friendly and gives you some handy options for choosing what to import. For example, you can:
- Select specific pages to import. For example, you can import your home page and about page, but not your contact page.
- Only the Customizer settings are imported . This allows you to make your theme’s header, footer, and general layout/style options look like the demo site. However, it does not import the demo content itself.
To access the starter sites, you need to install the separate Starter Templates plugin from WordPress.org .
From there, you can go to Appearance → Starter Templates .
First, you’ll be asked to choose your preferred content editor. If you decide to import demo content for your website, it will be built using the editor of your choice:
The list of starter sites for each tool is different — Elementor ’s starter site collection is far ahead. If you want to use the native WordPress block editor, then the options are more limited.
Once you select Content Editor, you will see a list of all the starter sites available for the tool.
You can use the filters and search box at the top to help narrow down your starter sites.
Once you find a design you like, you can click on it to open a larger preview and view the import options.
As I mentioned before, you can:
- Click the Import Complete Site button to import the complete demo site.
- Select a specific design from the list of page templates and import that Elementor template.
If you choose to import a complete website, you will be given further options to choose exactly what to import:
Using the WordPress Customizer
Once you’ve imported your demo site (or decided to design a site from scratch), you can manage all of Astra’s other settings from the live WordPress Customizer:
This makes it easy to change the design of your site without having to know any code. When you make changes, you'll immediately see them appear in the live preview of your site.
For example, if you open the settings for your header, you can choose from several different layout options:
There are a lot of options here, so you need to fully explore this area.
This is one of the parts where Astra can feel a little overwhelming, because there are so many options.
Instead of trying to configure everything from scratch, I recommend that you find a pre-made starter site whose basic design you like. Then, you can just import the WordPress Customizer settings for that demo site.
Once you have these Customizer settings as a foundation, you can go in and make minor changes as needed.
Explore advanced features
If you upgrade to Astra Pro, you will have access to many new features. All of these features are modular, which means you can enable/disable each one.
This modular approach helps keep the Astra theme lightweight by letting you disable features you don’t use.
To control which features are enabled, you can go to Appearance → Astra Options :
For example, if you enable the Blog Pro module, you’ll get new layouts and options to control the look and feel of your blog archive pages.
You get three different layouts, as well as the option to enable certain metadata, control featured image size, and more:
Other Pro modules offer similar levels of customization options:
- color
- typesetting
- spacing
- Header
- Navigation Menu
- footer
Astra Free vs. Pro: Which One Do You Need?
As I mentioned before, the Astra theme is available for free on WordPress.org.
You then also have the option of purchasing Astro Pro, a plugin that extends the theme with new features and options.
So… when it comes to Astra Free vs Pro, which one should you use?
Of course, you can use the free version to create a great-looking website. The free version is still performance-friendly and gives you access to a large number of starter sites.
For example, if you find a free blog starter site you like, there’s no reason you need to upgrade to Astra Pro.
So, what are some reasons why you might want to upgrade to Astra Pro?
First, if you want to build your own design from scratch, or want to make extensive modifications to one of the starter sites, Astra Pro will generally give you more flexibility in terms of:
- color
- typesetting
- Other styling options
- Layouts (for blog posts, headers, footers, etc.)
For example, the Pro version comes with a number of new blog layouts that give you more control over the appearance of individual blog posts and blog lists.
Overall, if you want to customize your site beyond what the free starter site offers, you’ll be more satisfied with the Pro version.
The second great reason to upgrade to Astra Pro is integration.
You’ll definitely want to upgrade to Astra Pro if you’re building a site based on:
While the free version offers limited integration for all of these plugins, the extra features and integration capabilities in Astra Pro are definitely worth the money.
Finally, if you’re a developer, Astra Pro also gives you some other useful options, such as the ability to inject code into Astra’s many hooks.
You can see a detailed comparison of all features of the Free vs. Pro versions on this page.
Astra Theme Review Final Thoughts
Overall, there’s a reason why the Astra theme has grown so quickly, being active on over 800,000 websites while maintaining a perfect 5-star rating across nearly 4,000 reviews on WordPress.org .
It’s versatile, fast, flexible, and integrates with popular page builders and plugins.
One thing to consider is that if you don’t see a demo site you like, it might feel a bit overwhelming trying to set up all of the Astra customization options yourself.
When you first install the Astra theme, it looks very basic, which can be confusing to some people. When using Astra, you don’t get a beautiful theme right away.
If you’re not planning on using a demo site, that means you’ll need to spend some time exploring all the options in the WordPress Customizer.
However, this fact is also one of the important reasons why Astra is so popular:
Because it is so flexible, you can use it to create any type of website.
If you feel overwhelmed by Astra’s many customization options, you can import one of the hundreds of pre-built demo sites to simplify the setup process. In just a few clicks, you’ll have the beautiful website you’ve imagined.
Or, if you want total control, you can control every part of your theme using the live WordPress Customizer. It’ll take some time to explore all of the options Astra offers, but you can customize nearly every aspect of your site without writing a single line of code ( especially with Astra Pro ).
All in all, if you’re looking for a high-quality WordPress theme, you can’t go wrong with Astra.
Have you used Astra theme? Please share your review about Astra theme in the comment section below.
Here are some WordPress themes I’ve reviewed recently:
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