Astra Theme Fastest Growing Theme of All Time

The Astra Theme Is A Free Multipurpose Lightweight Theme. It comes with various starter websites and great customizable options such as page styles and header options. Astra makes it very easy to get your website up and running in a few clicks. It’s a great theme if you are using elementor or brizy.

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Contents

Astra Theme Pros

Comes With Tons Of Free Templates
Made For Page Builders
Tons Of Theme Features In PRO
Offers A LifeTime Plan
Light And Well Coded

Astra Theme Cons

Lacks Header Styling Options
WooCommerce Features Can Be Better
Lifetime Plan Is Expensive

The Astra theme is a popular theme for WordPress that touts itself as a fast and highly-customizable theme. It integrates with major page builder plugins as well as WooCommerce.

In this review, we’ll explore how easy to use the Astra theme is as well as go over the theme’s features, pros and cons.

Ease of Use – 4.5/5

For the first part of this review, let’s take a look at the installation process and using the starter sites offered by the Astra theme.

Installation

The Astra theme follows the standard theme installation process. Start by going to your WordPress dashboard and then go to Appearance > Themes > Upload theme. From there, upload the zip file of the Astra theme and then activate it.

If you have purchased the pro version of the Astra theme, you’ll need to install the Pro plugin and enter your license but once that is done, the Astra theme is ready to be used.

Importing and Using Starter Sites

The Astra theme looks pretty bare bones after your first install and activate it. As such, importing one of the pre-made sites is highly recommended. Luckily, the Astra theme makes this process easy.

First, you’ll need to install their importer plugin. Once that plugin has been installed and activated, you’ll need to choose your page builder plugin.

Astra theme choosing a page builder plugin

You’ll then be able to see all the available starter sites, filter through various categories, and preview them.

Once you’ve found a starter site you like, you can click on the Preview button and then the Import Site button.

The import process will then begin and after it’s done, you’ll be able to start customizing your site.

You can easily edit page layouts and replace dummy content with your own using a page builder plugin that’s installed on your site. It’s worth mentioning that if you don’t have a page builder plugin installed the Astra theme will import the free version of Elementor for you so you’ll be able to take advantage of that.

You can add various page builder elements to your site, style each element to your liking, duplicate elements and even save layouts to reuse them on other pages of your site.

An advantage of the Astra theme is that Elementor, Brizy, and Beaver Builder all have a front-end editor so you can easily see the changes as you’re making them.

All things considered, the Astra theme is easy to install and use. The fact that it works with major page builder plugins is another plus since each of those plugins have intuitive interfaces and make building sites easier.

Features – 4.5/5

The Astra theme offers a number of different features, even on the free version. Let’s discuss those features below.

Page Builder Integration

As mentioned earlier, the Astra theme was made to work with Page Builder plugins. At the time of this review, the theme integrates with Elementor, Gutenberg, Brizy, and Beaver Builder. As such, you can turn off the page title and sidebar in order to create full-width pages and custom page layouts.

Customization Options

You can customize your site using the WordPress Live Customizer and set global options for colors, typography, and more. You can also change the layout of your header, upload your own logo, and more.

On top of the customization options offered by the Astra theme, you can also customize the styles for each element individually using the settings in your page builder plugin like Elementor.

Starter Sites

The Astra theme comes with tons of templates, both in the free and the pro version. Currently there are a total of 110+ pre-made sites to choose from. The templates can be sorted into business, commerce, and blog sites.

Pro Features

While the Astra theme does have a free version, it’s worth mentioning that the premium version of the theme comes with more features. Premium features include:

The ability to control the layout width of your site, from boxed to full-width, fluid, and more
More customization controls available in the Live Customizer
Better integration with WooCommerce
LifterLMS Integration
LearnDash Integration
More blog layout options which include grid, masonry, and list layouts
Multiple header designs and Flexible footer Layouts
The ability to white label the theme and use it on client sites

Reliability – 5/5

The Astra theme boasts over 600,000+ users and has 5-star ratings on the official WordPress theme repository.

The Astra theme allows you to create any type of website. With 110+ templates to choose from, you’d be hard pressed to walk away without finding a template that suits your site.

When you take into consideration the integration with plugins like WooCommerce, LifterLMS, LearnDash, it’s easy to see how powerful this theme is.

Pair that with the fact that this theme was built to work with page builders, building a site becomes even easier, especially for beginners.

Downside of the Astra theme is that the lifetime option is expensive, especially if you want to buy one of the Agency bundles.

Support – 4.5/5

If you’re using the free version of the Astra theme, you can take advantage of the WordPress support forums to find answers for any potential issues. You can also browse their extensive knowledge base and a Youtube channel with 49 tutorials to help you get the most out of the Astra theme.

Once you purchase the Astra Pro theme, you get access to one-on-one email support. Aside from that, premium users get access to exclusive training.

Pricing – 4.5/5

As mentioned earlier, the Astra theme has a free version which is a great option if you’re just getting started. The premium version of Astra, Astra Pro offers two different plans: annual and lifetime. Each plan comes with 3 different licenses.

Astra Pro comes with 20+ starter sites, pro features mentioned above, one-to-one support and unlimited website usage. The annual license is available for $59 while a lifetime license will set you back $249.
Mini Agency Bundle comes with 60+ starter sites, everything included in the Astra Pro plan, a WP Portfolio Plugin and a choice of one page builder plugin addon for Elementor or Beaver Builder. The annual license is available for $169 while the lifetime plan is available for $499.
The Agency Bundle includes everything in the Mini Agency Bundle as well as all the current that the team behind the Astra theme has released and any future plugins. The annual license is available for $249 and the annual license is available for $699.

When compared to other similar themes, the Astra theme is on the pricey side, especially when you compare their lifetime plan with other theme shops that offer lifetime licenses.

Final Thoughts

The Astra theme is a versatile theme that’s easy to use and loads fast. It can be used with your favorite page builder plugin making it incredibly easy to edit and create custom page layouts. Thanks to its integration with WooCommerce, you can also use this theme for an online store.

Another point in favor of Astra is that it comes with lots of free templates so it’s a great starting theme if you don’t want to invest in a premium theme yet.

However, keep in mind that once you upgrade you get access to even more premade templates as well as a few extra perks like full integration with LifterLMS, LearnDash, Easy Digital Downloads, and other plugins, one-on-one support, and more.

The biggest downside of the Astra theme is the lifetime pricing which is on the pricey side. Nevertheless, the Astra theme is an excellent theme for any type of website so be sure to check it out.