If you have been searching for a low cost yet feature rich and fully customizable theme for your WordPress Blog, then this Generatepress theme review is for you.
That’s a huge claim to start off with. Isn’t it?
I was using Generatepress on this blog until about 2-3 years back before I switched over to Thrive Themes because I wanted a complete suite that can help me manage my course platform, landing pages, optin forms etc. (You can read my Thrive Themes review here)
In fact, my first purchase of the Generatepress theme was way back in 2017. Here are some of my purchase and renewal receipts.
And this is my latest renewal receipt.
If you are planning on going with the premium version, then I have a very nice little trick here which will help you renew the license for a discounted price every time.
The folks at Generatepress run discount offers of about 35% twice in a year – the first is during Black Friday sales and the other one is during their anniversary.
You can renew the licenses during this discount offers. And the best part, you can renew it for multiple years and the years just get added to the balance tenure in your subscription.
That is one of the reasons I love this company. They truly care for their customers.
Now back to our discussion and the Generatepress Review.
WordPress is a blogging platform for people who are not tech savvy.
There are thousands of bloggers who can afford to blog today, in spite of the fact that they do not know a single word in HTML, all thanks to WordPress and it is this simplicity that has made WordPress the most popular blogging platform.
In spite of WordPress being such a simple blogging platform, there wasn’t a single WordPress theme that could pass on this same simplicity over to the users.
If you are not tech savvy, it is unlikely that you will be able to customize your WordPress blog design and make it unique for your Blog.
You could pay a designer to design a custom WordPress theme for you. or, if you did not want to compromise on speed and hence wanted a theme with clean codes, then the only other option was to pay a WordPress designer to custom create a theme for Thesis or, Genesis framework.
Both of these are costly affairs and if you do not have the budget to afford this, then you wouldn’t opt for it and might just decide to stay with the general common theme.
I was on the lookout for a theme that had easy customization options to help me create a unique theme for my blog.
That is when I stumbled upon this theme called Generatepress.
But before I tell you about this theme, let me show you 5 blogs that are running the same theme but have different designs.
There are a few more such blogs that have a design of its own. And the best part about all of this is that none of them took more than 20 minutes to customize.
[Note: some of these blogs are not active right now. I run a business where I build blogs and then flip it. Some of those blogs that you see above were flipped and I am not really sure about their current status]
All of those designs are based on the single theme – GeneratePress.
The first design you see up there is this blog as it was about 5 years back.
Since then my business has grown and so have the requirements. I switched over to Thrive themes a few years back because it made sense to use the Thrive Suite (which is a collection of tools) to manage my business. You can read my Thrive themes review here!
But I still continue to use GeneratePress on a lot of my other websites and blogs.
Now, before I get into some of the details of this theme and a quick review of its features, let me tell you some really important facts about the theme.
- GeneratePress is a FREE theme if you are looking for something basic. But if you are looking for customization, then GeneratePress comes with a premium option
- The Premium option of GeneratePress is a plugin that you install and comes for a low cost of only $59 which is the lowest priced WordPress theme you will ever find. You get numerous customization options, if you go with the Premium option.
- GeneratePress is developed and managed by an enthusiastic team who puts in a lot of efforts into consistent development of the theme, unlike a lot of the other so-called low cost theme developers who mushroom with the rains and then cannot be found after you have completed the purchase
- Even Andre Chaperon uses this theme.. (happy face)
Now that we know what this theme is and why is it that I am a fan of the theme, let me take you through some of the features of the theme that made me fall in love with it.
GeneratePress Review Summary
This review is going to be slightly long because we need to cover a lot of aspects. But if you are short of time, then this summary could be helpful.
Overall, I believe that Generatepress is probably the most affordable WordPress theme out there. It is good for both beginners and experienced WordPress users.
Some of the best things about the theme is:
- It has clean code that doesn’t lead to bloating and consequently loads pretty fast. You are sure to see excellent PageSpeed Insights score.
- The lightning fast loading speeds are in spite of the fact that there are tons of features and customization options available.
- You can customize any part of the theme using the native WordPress Customizer making it as unique as you want it to be.
- You can use the theme to build an entire custom WordPress theme for your blog, provided you are comfortable using the block editor in WordPress.
So far as the cons are concerned, Generatepress could feel a little overwhelming if you are an absolute beginner and are looking to customize the theme to make it look unique.
For you, there could be other themes out there that might be better than GeneratePress. Or, you could even start off by using one of the readymade templates from the theme library in GeneratePress or, use the very basic version which too look nice, clean and neat.
Now let us get into the review in a little more detail.
GeneratePress Theme Review – The Features
Almost all premium WordPress themes come with a ton of features but the fact of the matter is that using all of these features to your benefit is a herculean task in itself.
Take for example, the Thesis theme. I love the theme and can afford to because I have some knowledge of HTML, CSS and also have done quite a bit of customization of the theme. But for somebody who has no clue about all of these, Thesis could prove to be a disaster.
And it is here that GeneratePress wins.
Here is how their http requests data performance.
The combined file size of their CSS file and JavaScript files are about 7.2kb which is the smallest amongst all other themes in this range.
Something that you might want to keep in mind is that this is the performance of the core theme. It could change once you start installing plugins and make other customizations.
But then that isn’t something that we should blame the theme for. Isn’t it?
It is a superb theme “out of the box”. Even if you decide not to do any customization, it is an elegant minimalist theme that anyone would fall in love with.
But the fact that customization is simple clicking, means that your theme can be unique to you without any headaches.
Let us look at each of these features that makes this theme stand out in this Generatepress theme review.
Fast Loading Theme
One of my primary concerns with most premium themes was the loading times. Though a lot of these themes were SEO-ready, they somehow consumed a lot of resources and dragged down the loading times of my blog.
And with Google considering the page load times in search engine rankings, you just cannot afford that.
So I wanted a theme that was fast loading, had simple codes and still offered customization options.
GeneratePress lived upto these expectations. We were able to cut down page load times by almost 64% after we switched the theme to GeneratePress.
Simple Customization
Customizing the theme is all about clicking until you are satisfied with the design.
You can customize pretty much everything in the theme using the WordPress customize dashboard and hence it makes all the more simple. The highlighted area that you see in the below image is where you customize pretty much everything in this theme.
And since there is no coding involved, you don’t really need to know HTML or, CSS unless you want to do a lot of advanced customization, which also is pretty easy if you follow the GeneratePress documentation.
This customization option makes this theme a multi-purpose theme.
You can build:
- eCommerce websites
- Online courses
- Simple blogs
- Landing pages
- Membership sites etc.
..everything using the one single theme.
Customization options – Layouts, Typography and Colors
These are some of the customization options that are available in the FREE version. They will help you design your blog’s layout, pick unique colors for pretty much every element in the theme and also decide on the typography.
The premium version adds a lot more enhancements to these basic features and you will be able to find them when you go a little deeper into each options.
The theme also offers multiple options to pick colors and typography for your theme. This is available in the FREE version of the theme as well.
Here is how it looks –
The font manager gives you the option of adding your own custom fonts. But in my opinion, you won’t need that because there is enough and more fonts variants available by default.
There are a lot of options for picking and styling using colors as well. And you can customize every one of the elements like the body, the navigation bars, the footer widgets, the sidebar etc. depending upon your brand colors.
Header and Navigation options
One of the things that a lot of bloggers would want to customize is the appearance of their headers and navigation bars.
Generatepress gives you a ton of options to do that (though a lot of this is only available in the premium version).
The FREE version will give you basic customization options, but I would recommend going for the premium version if you are too inclined on customizing your theme headers.
Here’s how the customization panel looks for the header and navigation bars:
The navigation customization options gives you the ability to customize both the primary and the secondary navigation bars, including adding backgrounds to both of them.
The ability to customize your header and navigation in itself gives the blog a unique look.
But it doesn’t end there.
Blog Layout!
When it comes to customization, you might also want to customize your blog layout – the look and feel of how the various blocks look, the design etc.
In fact, you can customize every aspect of your blog including the single blog post pages, the archives pages etc. You can see a glimpse of how these customizations work in the below image.
There are a lot more options than what you see in those images.
The dropdowns give you other options to customize the layout and give your blog a complete unique look.
Page Level Customization
In addition to all of those site level customization option, you also get the option to customize at a page/post level.
This is very powerful if you want to customize individual pages. You get all the flexibility in the world to design your pages the way you want.
Using Elements for Advanced Customization
Generatepress premium gives you an additional feature called Elements.
These are broad features that you can add based a different criteria that you can pick.
Take a look at how I have used elements in one of my blogs –
You can see how we have created a uniform footer that appears sitewide, a hero section that appears on the blog pages, a post title that appears only on the post layout and so on.
Elements are of 4 different types as you can see below –
It can be:
- Block – it uses the powerful native WordPress block editor and helps you create any kind of custom content.
- Hook – this is something you can use to insert custom code into the theme. It gives you the option to insert it anywhere with in the theme using the different WordPress hooks
- Layout – you can use this to setup custom layouts. For e.g.: designing your sidebar, footer etc.
- Header – if you want custom page headers for different pages, you can use this option.
Once you pick the element type, you get multiple options including rules that define where you want to display it, add exceptions and define which users you want to display it for.
Locations will help you define the pages, posts, types of pages etc. This is good if you want to create custom pages like sales pages, optin forms etc.
Exclude is the exceptions rule. For eg: if you want to add an element to all pages except your terms and conditions page, you can do that here.
The users rule helps you pick who you want to show the element for. This can be helpful for creating login-logout headers, special sections that you want to show only your paid subscribers etc.
So with all of those controls you can create pretty much anything that you want.
Doubles up as a Page Builder and a Theme Builder
GeneratePress offers you many other features like page sections, page headers, custom spacing between boxes, backgrounds etc., with the help of which you can easily build beautiful landing pages.
And we just saw how the designing flexibility gets extended with all of the elements and the control you have over how to use them.
With all of these you can design landing pages, sales pages, thank you pages, course website etc.
Now another option you have is to build a theme for your blog or, website using another powerful addon that comes with GeneratePress.
This add-on is Generateblocks.
Theme Building Support with Generateblocks
Generateblocks extends the already powerful capabilities that Generatepress has and gives you even more options and controls on designing your website.
Generateblocks are a collection of WordPress blocks that can help you further extend the capabilities of your website/blog by customizing the look & feel and display options.
What you see above is the FREE version of Generateblocks which gives you some of the basic options. This too is extremely powerful and should be more than enough to design a custom blog.
But if you are looking for even more options, then you have Generateblocks Pro.
Now that is one amazing collection of blocks. Isn’t it?
Generateblocks Pro will cost you about $59/year for a single site and about $69/year for 10 sites.
So with the addition of Generateblocks, it makes Generatepress a 3-in-1 WordPress theme – a simple blog theme, a theme builder and a landing page builder.
And the best part is that you can easily do it from within your WordPress editor.
Friendly Support
One of the biggest worries with most WordPress theme is the support. And most low cost theme often end up with zero support.
The folks at Generatepress are a friendly lot. They have a very good support forum where you would be able to find solutions to most of your problems. But if for some reason you are not able to find one, then their support team will be able to help you.
They have extremely good response times and I have seen responses coming in less than 6 hours.
Import and Export Customizations
This is a feature I like the most. I am somebody who doesn’t like spending a lot of time customizing blogs. I like to keep my blogs pretty simple from a design perspective and hence prefer following the same foundation for all my blogs. Since I run a lot of blogs, the pain of having to do it over and over again was a big one for me.
The export feature in GeneratePress solves this problem for me. I customize one of my blog and then export the customization. I can then import this into all the other blogs and that takes care off it.
The result is a lot of hours saved which I was otherwise spending on doing an unnecessary repetitive activity.
WooCommerce Support
Are you planning to setup a store on your blog?
Then Generatepress addresses that issue as well with its WooCommerce add-on.
In one of the sites that we were managing, we wanted a store option and we also wanted it to look similar to our primary site. We had struggled with doing that with our earlier theme. In spite of WooCommerce support, customizing it to have the same look and feel throughout was a pain.
But with GeneratePress, our worries were taken care of. The store page looked exactly like the rest of the site and customizing it was, again, just a matter of a few clicks.
Value for Money
There are a ton of other features that you wouldn’t even find in some of the most premium themes around like,
- You can customize every individual page and post and every one of the element on it. For eg: you can disable footer widgets, headers, both primary and secondary navigations, featured image, content title etc. All of this gives you the flexibility to design your post or, page just as you want.
- You can create sections within your post which is very helpful if you are writing a review post or, even if you are designing a page for your company.
- You can customize your post or, page by disabling the sidebar or, adding more sidebars to each of those specific post or, pages.
Overall, you will find that GeneratePress is a complete value for money.
Generatepress Free Vs Premium
Generatepress has a free option and a premium option.
The free option is good enough for anybody who is started a blog or, a website and wants just the basic elements to design a good looking blog.
It has pretty much all the required features like customization options, typography options, font variants etc. that you can use and customize your blog.
Here’s how the dashboard in the FREE option looks.
In comparison to the FREE version, the premium version has some additional features that extend the functionality of the theme.
Here is what is included in the premium version:
- Theme builder which helps build every element in your blog design
- A full fledged site library which you can use to import readymade templates and theme inspirations
- Additional styling controls
- Better functionalities for your mobile optimized version
- Woocommerce support
- More features and design elements
These are the additional modules that are available in the Premium version of the theme.
You can see that there are many more options now available like the backgrounds, elements, additional menu options, spacing etc.
The premium modules help you do much more with your theme.
If you are confused on which one – Generatepress Free Vs Premium, then I would recommend that you start with the Generatepress Free version and see if you want anything additional to that.
Then you can go for the Generatepress premium version.
The best part about Generatepress is that, you don’t have to uninstall and install if you upgrading to the premium version from the FREE version.
You just need to add their premium plugin, add your license and the rest is automatically taken care off!
At the same time, I don’t believe that $59 yearly is a lot of money to pay for a fully-functional WordPress theme like that of Generatepress.
So, between Generatepress Free Vs Premium, my choice is always the premium version.
Generatepress Premium Pricing
When it comes to premium versions, Generatepress is probably the most affordably priced themes, especially if you look at all of the features that the theme comes with.
The premium version of the plugin gives you a lot more options in comparison to the FREE version.. and this includes custom backgrounds, a theme library from where you can pick readymade themes, the elements feature, secondary navigation and much more.
The pricing for the premium is pretty straightforward and comes in 2 options which are yearly payment and one lifetime payment option.
The most affordable and the best option according to me is the lifetime option.
Because for a one time payment of $359. The one time payment option doesn’t show up directly on their page but is usually made available through an upgrade option.
They have very recently introduced another option which is the GeneratePress One bundle.
The GeneratePress one bundle comes with both the Premium version of the theme and the Generateblocks Pro. The combined price will give you a massive discount of about $50, if you buy the GeneratePress One bundle.
The GeneratePress premium yearly version is priced at $59/year and the GeneratePress One bundle is priced at $105/year.
GeneratePress Pros and Cons
Finally, let us take a quick look at the pros and cons of the GeneratePress theme review!
Pros 👍
- My first requirement has always been customer support. And I can confidently say that their support is the best that you can find when it comes to any theme support
- The theme is extremely lightweight and performance-friendly which is also the core belief behind the theme. So you can rest assured that your Page loading times and PageSpeed insights rank will definitely see a jump.
- GeneratePress elements gives you a lot of power in terms of customizing your website and the theme. So for the price, you get a lot of features.
- Customizing your site by using different layouts, font types and colors is a breeze. And the best part is that the options that you get, are all performance friendly and doesn’t impact page load times.
- The combination of Generateblocks Pro, GeneratePress premium and the multiple elements option gives you a lot of power in terms of building your website.
- They have an extensive pattern library that makes it even more easier to customize your website, without really needing to fiddle with the entire website.
- The developers behind this theme are quite efficient and they regularly update the theme with not only new features but also security updates and code fixes.
- The documentation is pretty detailed and you will get almost everything you need to know about designing your website/blog in these documentations.
Cons 👎
While I don’t see a lot of negatives in the theme, there are a few I think can be called as the Cons, though it is more of knit-picking.
- The free version is a little limiting in the features and considering it has no advanced elements included, you might find it a little limiting in designing your blog
- A lot of beginners would prefer a ready made template which they can then use to customize their blogs. But the non-availability of these templates and demo websites in the FREE option means that you will have to go for the Premium version if you want to access them.
- There aren’t a lot of integrations especially with Shopping Cart plugins other than WooCommerce and Learning Management Solutions, Membership sites etc. which would mean that you will have to find other workaround to run such kind of websites.
- The designing can be a little overwhelming for people who aren’t aware of how to design a WordPress website using the native Blocks feature.
My Final Thoughts
If you are looking for a simple theme that can do a lot of things but doesn’t cost you a bomb, then GeneratePress is the answer. The fact that this theme doesn’t interfere with any plugins adds a lot more flexibility to the theme.
GeneratePress is a recommended theme for every internet marketer and blogger. If you are starting out and don’t want to spend a lot of money, then this is definitely the theme you should go for.
You can find more details about the theme at the this link.
Disclaimer – The above link is an affiliate link. If you choose to buy the theme using that link, I would earn a commission at no extra cost to you.
GeneratePress FAQs
Is GeneratePress FREE?
GeneratePress has both a FREE and a Premium option. The difference between the two is the availability of advanced designing features.
The FREE option should be good enough for anybody wanting a basic website or, a blog. But if you are looking at more customization option, then you will have to go for the Premium version.
How to Install GeneratePress Premium?
Installing GeneratePress premium is pretty simple. All you need to do is download the premium version of the plugin from your account and install it as you would normally install any other plugin.
Once installed, you can enter your license code and the premium version is activated.
You can start by activating whatever additional modules you need.
What are the key features of GeneratePress Premium?
GeneratePress premium comes with additional features like the Site Library, additional layout controls, WooCommerce integration, custom elements, advanced typography, and premium support.
How does GeneratePress impact website speed?
GeneratePress is known for its lightweight and clean code. This helps page loading speeds and consequently in getting better PageSpeed insights score. Which in turn means better SEO!
Is GeneratePress compatible with popular page builders?
Yes, GeneratePress is fully compatible with popular page builders like Elementor, Beaver Builder, and others. This allows for easy drag-and-drop customization of your site.
But if you are using the Premium version along with Generateblocks, then you won’t need any of these page builders, because the bundle in itself is powerful enough to build all kinds of pages.
Can I use GeneratePress to create an online store?
Yes, GeneratePress Premium includes WooCommerce support, making it easy to create and customize an online store with a seamless design that matches your main site.
How often is GeneratePress updated?
GeneratePress is regularly updated to ensure compatibility with the latest WordPress versions, improve performance, and add new features. The development team is committed to continuous improvement.
Is GeneratePress suitable for beginners?
Absolutely. GeneratePress is user-friendly and designed to be easy for beginners to use.
The extensive documentation and helpful support make it easy to get started, even without technical expertise.
What customization options does GeneratePress offer?
GeneratePress offers extensive customization options, including layout adjustments, color and typography settings, header and footer customization, and more.
The premium version enhances these options with additional controls and features.
Does GeneratePress support mobile responsiveness?
Yes, GeneratePress is fully responsive, ensuring your website looks great on all devices, including desktops, tablets, and smartphones.
How do I get support for GeneratePress?
GeneratePress offers comprehensive support through its support forum and extensive documentation.
Premium users have access to priority support, ensuring quick and helpful responses to any issues or questions.
Does GeneratePress need a child theme?
Unlike a lot of the other themes that usually need a child theme, GeneratePress doesn’t need one. The theme itself is enough and all of the customization options are directly available through the native customizer in WordPress
[This review was originally done on 5th May 2018. Now that Generatepress and in general WordPress has gone through a lot of changes, it became imperative that I update this review. So I updated this review on 6th Nov 2024]
GeneratePress WordPress Theme
59.00
Pros
- Tons of Features
- Simple to Customize
- Numerous Customization Options
- Continuous Development & Support
- Extremely Affordable
Cons
- Only Forum Support Available
Great review! 👏 I’ve heard a lot about GeneratePress, and your breakdown really highlights why it’s so popular. The lightweight design and speed optimization are huge advantages, especially for SEO. The customization options also seem perfect for creating unique websites without slowing them down. And have you tried using GeneratePress with a page builder like Elementor? I’m curious how it performs when paired with more complex design tools.
Thanks for the detailed insights—this theme is definitely going on my list to try! 👍