We compare the 2 most popular themes of the moment here. Only Astra has a free and a pro version. Divi just has a premium version. Astra vs Divi, which is the better theme? We start with Astra which does not mean it would be better.
The Astra Theme
The Astra Theme has been very popular for years. In other words, the free version of Astra is firmly in place on WordPress.org. In addition, Astra also has a very well-selling pro version which is mainly known for its beautiful demo websites that are pre-prepared for various page builders. Over a million websites currently run on Astra. Let’s start this Astra Theme review with its rating as I always do.
Astra's Rating 5/5
Below you can see the fantastic rating and comments that Astra gets from users. Where it says “Astra theme and Element” Elementor is of course meant, indeed a more than great combination to use Astra and Elementor together within 1 website. Obviously anyone giving a 1 star rating to the number one theme on WordPress.org has no clue about theme or works for the competition.
Astra Theme Review Demo Websites
Let’s go straight to one of the strongest points of the Astra Theme, namely the many demo websites. These demo websites, the so-called Starter Templates, are made to further embroider with your favorite page builder. The demos were made with Elementor, Beaverbuilder, Brizy and Gutenberg. Well, I’m not that impressed with the last one, but the others are 3 top page builders. This means that if one of these 3 is your favorite page builder, the Astra theme can be your favorite theme.
As seen above one can just choose for which page builder demo website will be shown. Astra has one of the best full website demo’s that I have ever seen in themes and plenty as for just elementor there should be like 180 different designs already.
Astra's Woocommerce Possibilities
The WP-Astra Theme was built from the start on having super fast loading times and it had to excel in the possibilities and beautiful designs for webshops and that intention has been successful. The options that Astra offers for E-commerce websites are unprecedented and practically surpass any other theme, including specialized Woocommerce themes.
Below I´ll show a few of the many features Astra offers for Woocommerce that make your webshop to a professional looking online store.
Infinite scroll
Off canvas sidebar
Quick view
The Astra Theme has about 15 such features for webshops. It simply has all the gadgets one could wish for.
Astra comes with Schema Mark Up
WP-Astra comes standard with Schema Mark Up which adds rich snippets to your articles. That way your articles will be displayed in Google’s search result in a more effective way as seen in the image below, with or without Schema. I have tried it on an HTML-website, and implementing Schema by hand is just to much work and errors will be made. Astra adds the snippets automatically and if your article changes, so will the Schema Mark Up.
Do you want someting even better than Astra’s basic Mark Up, then go for the more professional version of it:
Astra Speed
WP-Astra’s basic code is only 25kb which makes Astra one of the fastest themes out there, if not the fastest. Have a look at the images below, if necessary give them a click to enlarge them. On the left we see a speedtest done at GtMetrix with stunning results. On the right you see what one of the most famous SEO companies thinks of the speed of the Astra Theme.
Astra Theme Extra Info
If you are planning to set up a website with WP-Astra for teaching courses, it is good to know that the theme is fully compatible with Learndash and LifterLMS. In addition, Astra has an excellent SEO, is 100% responsive on all devices. It’s all too much to explain here in this review so I advise you to take a look at the Astra website itself.
Astra Theme Review Conclusion
The Astra Theme excels on several fronts, including speed, countless options for webshops, beautiful designs that can be installed with 1 click and that for 4 different page builders. In addition, Astra has built-in Schema as standard and is compatible with all commonly used plugins. This makes Astra one of the best-selling themes of the moment and I can recommend it to everyone, especially in combination with Elementor Pro.
Let’s continue this Divi versus Astra Review with the Divi Theme.
The Divi Theme
There has been no theme that sells better than Divi in recent years. In this Divi Theme Review, we’re going to see if that’s the case again this year. Divi Theme does not have a free version so all its popularity is only due to their pro version which is remarkable. Most of the best-selling themes also have a free edition with which they have made a name for themselves. Divi is just so good, it sells itself.
Divi's Advanced Gradient Builder
So let’s get straight to the point and start with one of the two remarkable new features in Divi. The first is the Advanced Gradient Builder. With this tool you can create the same gradients for your background and the like as in Photoshop. Divi’s gradient tool does not mix 2 colors like the gradient tools of other themes, but as many colors as you want. Check it out below in the image or directly on the Divi site.
Divi's Lay-Out Cloud
Immediately the next spectacular feature is the Divi Cloud. Immediately the next spectacular features is the Divi Cloud. As you already know, you can use Divi on as many sites as you want after purchasing it. From all these websites you can access your cloud where you keep all your important building blocks that you may need on these sites. The photo below clearly shows what kind of things you should think about. This feature saves both professionals and do-it-yourselfers a lot of time. Immediately view the information that Divi itself provides about their new Cloud.
Divi Theme's Rating
The Divi Theme was created by Elegant Themes which is a company that treats everybody right. This count for the clients that buy their themes, and also affiliate marketers. That everyone is extremely happy with Elegant Themes is easiest shown on a good review website like Sitejabber.com. On the image below are also the numbers from 2 other review site. They just score everywhere more or less 5 out of 5 on average.
Divi Theme Review Demos
Divi offers a very large number of demo websites and demo sections. The image below shows that for “Business” designs alone, there are 603 total layouts to choose from. With such an abundance of well put together designs, it is easy to find a suitable layout for every niche. Here you’ll find their complete demo library.
Divi Theme & Woocommerce
Have you always wanted to be able to customize all Woocommerce pages such as the product pages, check out and cart pages? With Divi that is all a piece of cake these days. Divi uses the so-called WooBuilder for this, the top of the line in this area.
Stunning examples of Woocommerce product pages can be seen here if you scroll down to half of the page and click on the 9 different demos there.
The DiviBuilder
Of course, the WooBuilder discussed earlier in this Divi Theme Review is part of the DiviBuilder. A lot more can be said about the DiviBuilder. For example, it has the best inline text editor on the market and is a well-oiled machine for the rapid construction of websites and webshops. Below is a quick demonstration of some features. The DiviBuilder can be tested by yourself here.
Divi Theme Load Speed
The loading time of websites is now of global importance and the latest speed upgrade that they have implemented at Divi is a good improvement, although Divi was already fairly fast. You can read more about this speed upgrade here.
Divi Theme Review Shape Dividers
You can create beautiful transitions between the different sections on your pages with this advanced tool. The same applies to backgrounds with, for example, transparent images. Here you can read more about Divi’s Shape Dividers (including video).
Divi Theme Effects
All wonderful what the Shape Dividers above can do, but with Divi you can apply many more effects and filters to your images, with Divi’s Effects. Here you can read more about Divi’s Effects (including video).
Divi's Split Testing
Split testing, also known as AB testing, is great for people who want to get the most out of their pages in terms of leads and conversion. Complete pages or parts thereof such as sections, images, or buttons can be made into 2 or more different versions that are alternately offered to the website visitors. Your own website keeps track of the statistics for you which version was more successful. Read here more aout Divi’s Split Testing.
Divi's Bulk Editing
Save a lot of work with this feature. In the past, many tasks within web design were performed countless times, which is of course very boring and tiring. What are the “Save as Global” and “Templates” with the Elementor page builder is called Bulk Editing with Divi. Read more about Divi’s Bulk Editing here.
Divi's Transforms
In the past, images were often modified in Photoshop before uploading them to a website. With Divi’s Transforms, that is no longer necessary. Standard images can be skewed and rotated in many ways. The handy thing about this is that you can make other adjustments later, just within the website itself. Here you can read more about Divi’s Transform (including video).
Divi Theme Review Conclusion
You will have noticed my enthusiasm for this theme in this complete Divi Theme Review. With Divi everything is possible and it is full of features that other themes do not have. It is not for nothing that Divi is the best-selling theme today, it is highly recommended. There is so much more to tell about Divi, but if your interest has been piqued, read on on their own website.
Divi vs Astra Conclusion
First of all, I would like to thank you for reading my Divi vs Astra review in its entirety. As a web designer I obviously have both memberships in my arsenal because both Divi and Astra are perfect themes to quickly create beautiful websites. Both excel in many and beautiful demo websites. Astra is more specialized in building shops and is even faster than the already very fast Divi. Divi excels in an unprecedented number of features with which one can make very striking and good websites. Both are highly recommended.