GeneratePress is a free WordPress theme created by Tom Usborne, a developer from Canada. I've actually seen it for years in the WordPress repository. Most of you know that I am pretty picky when it comes to web performance, so I have a tendency to dismiss everything in the repository. Typically because a lot of stuff on there is not that good, or not encouraged for long. However, in this circumstance, this was a mistake. The motif now has over half a million downloads, 80,000+ active matches, with over 500 5-star evaluations. So clearly Tom is doing some thing right here.
I Actually set up the free version of the theme and in a matter of 15 minutes purchased the premium version. I could tell right off the bat, the programmer was thinking precisely how I was imagining a theme should work. And I will go into that more below, but let's first look at a number of the features. I'm going to be covering the premium version of the theme, since it's worth . Actually, Tom, if you ever read this and are visiting Scottsdale, Arizona, coffees on me.
The Documentation can be unbelievable. Besides have great documentation on their site, the theme has been around long enough that what I wholeheartedly throughout the setup procedure was found within a few seconds from their own forum.
Now it's Time for the fun part! I always test a new theme right out of the box without any customizations to just see how quickly the base is. This tells me a lot of what I can expect by the time that I add everything to it. Running the inventory GeneratePress WordPress motif on Kinsta hosting clocked in at a whopping 265 ms loading time. I was quite impressed.
This is a developer that cares about functionality! And I've Seen the same throughout each the premium add-ons. They're as small as possible get them. In reality, Font Awesome is probably the largest file contained. And that is not even his. With Font Awesome 5 arriving around the corner, we could anticipate this to secure smaller also.
The premium add-ons Are installation in what I would call a modular design. You can activate/deactivate anything you aren't using to ensure they don't load on your website. Since the co-developer of the perfmatters plugin that has a script supervisor built-in, I felt at home for this. Everything should be made this way.
The WordPress customizer choices is where GeneratePress really shines! Remember, lots of these choices are enabled by the superior add-ons. I can't show you everything, otherwise, we would be here all day. However, allow me to show you couple which really come in handy.
You May Want to Also grab his amazing WP Display Posts plugin also. See my featured articles on the sidebar of this site? That is using the WP Show Posts plugin. I have it set to display posts from a specific"featured" category. You can also have it show last modified/updated articles, recent articles, etc.. I'm using the free version and it works terrific.
The Segments add-in in the premium version of GeneratePress allows you to do all sorts of things concerning design. Think of it like a webpage builder without the bloat. GeneratePress is definitely not only for blogs! I am in fact utilizing GeneratePress to our ecommerce website (perfmatters.io) which is running Easy Digital Downloads. Don't hesitate to look it over. However, as you can see below, it looks like a site.
For all those Of you that are regular readers, you probably didn't even notice I changed the entire motif that forces woorkup.com. It only took me about an hour to get GeneratePress to mimic my MyThemeShop motif which I had spent annually customizing. Here's a comparison under.
My older MyThemeShop motif was pretty fast, but I invested a great deal of time customizing it. In fact, I've gotten a lot of emails from you guys asking me to publish all my customizations. My advice now is, simply get GeneratePress!
Together with the New GeneratePress theme I managed to attain faster speeds and 600 fewer lines of code! And remember, I do not have a child theme. Each of the customizations were made using the wonderful GP hooks and snippets plugin (both CSS and PHP).
Like the WordPress theme I've running on woorkup? You are in luck. Tom asked if he can create a replica of woorkup for the brand new GeneratePress site library. I'm pleased to let you know that you can now put in my woorkup motif on your own GeneratePress site with just a single click! It is called the Marketer theme. Get started using a fantastic blog design instantly.
I also Moved over my private site, brianjackson.io, to GeneratePress. Previously I was using a theme from Array Themes. It is a pretty basic minimum website, as I don't use it for much. As you can see it already loaded pretty fast.
I was Able to replicate the whole look 100% in GeneratePress in under one hour. And as you can see it loads even faster! Amazing. I was able to eliminate a few plugins that weren't needed because of GP.
I was Able to move everything over and get it looking exactly how I needed it in under an hour. And since you can view it loads even faster! Amazing. I was able to get rid of a total of four plugins and it dropped my whole page weight 2x!
I can not express my Excitement about finding GeneratePress and I am moving over all of my websites for this (which includes some EDD e-commerce sites). Once I have my 9 sites all running in GP with no child themes, my life is going to be a breeze! The programmer has restored my faith in multi-purpose subjects , which when done the right way, can actually perform quicker.
Because Of that, those who build WordPress sites for a living love GeneratePress. They will typically pair it with a WordPress site builder and use it for literally any kind of website.
So To create GeneratePress look how you want it to, you will almost certainly will need to go in and personalize matters. And though the substantial benefit of GeneratePress is how customizable it is, some users, particularly casual users, do not like having to make those changes themselves.
The Free variant of GeneratePress provides you adequate possibilities, but should you have GeneratePress Premium, you will be able to customize nearly all about your site.
All Whatsoever, GeneratePress will give you much more customization options in the WordPress Customizer than most other topics. This amount of detail may be a bit overwhelming if you are a beginner. But as soon as you realize how the preferences come together, you'll have complete control on how your site appears.
Across All of its attributes, GeneratePress always includes a focus on excellent performance and clean code. The entire theme is less than 30 kB, and it will be about as little as you are ever going to find for a WordPress theme. Even most other optimized WordPress themes are still 200+ kB. And a few poorly coded themes can even surpass 1 MB!
To Remain lightweight, GeneratePress also provides you a modular port where you can select and choose what characteristics you would like to trigger.
Earlier In 2018, however, the developer added a fresh Site Library feature for GeneratePress Premium users that lets you easily import any among those 25+ pre-built demonstration websites .
With Most topics, each post and page will use the very same settings for the most part. You may have some custom formats or templates — but you do not have very much control beyond that.
Nevertheless, If you're seriously interested in using GeneratePress, I believe you should purchase the GeneratePress Premium plugin, as that's what produces the theme so elastic. The free version doesn't give you almost as numerous configurations in the WordPress Customizer. And you will also miss out on the premade Site Library.
GeneratePress Premium can be still quite affordable. It costs just $39.95, which provides you use on unlimited sites. You'll also get a 40% discount if you want to renew to continue receiving support and upgrades following the initial year (you can, of course, keep using GeneratePress following the first year without beating — you just won't receive any more updates).
However, If you're ready to spend time altering settings, GeneratePress' style controls give you the flexibility to turn it into any type of WordPress site. Or, you might even have the ability to locate a starter site that fulfills your needs to save some time.
Additionally, It's among those fastest-loading WordPress themes that you will find. Therefore, if you're looking for the best performance possible, using GeneratePress as your WordPress site's foundation is a great decision.