We compare two of the fastest and most popular WordPress themes for the construction of webshops the moment here. Both of these themes hace a popular free version, and also a very good pro version. Neve vs Astra, 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 Neve versus Astra Review with the Neve Theme.
The Neve Theme
In this Neve Theme Review, let’s see if this theme is really as multi- functional as its builders claim. The theme should be lightning fast, suitable for blogs, corporate websites and webshops. Like many other well-selling themes, Neve has built up a name as a popular free theme to start with.
Neve's Rating 4.8/5
The Neve theme has built up an impressive rating on WordPress.org as shown in the image below. In addition to the rating figures, you can see a few comments from users, the opinions about this theme are on average very good.
Neve Review Starter Sites
Neve is full of starter sites, also called demo websites that can be installed with 1 click. As is the case with Astra, Neve offers starter sites specially made for the various top page builders. In this way, everyone is catered for with designs for his favorite page builder from which he can start his project. These are features that we have to give full marks for, beautiful!
Neve Theme's loading Speed
Websites today need to load quickly to attract visitors and to get good results in Google’s search results. Below you can see a test where I tested Neve. The test was performed after installing WP-Rocket, the best cache plugin out there for WordPress, and with optimized images. The test was done at GtMetrix.
Neve Theme Review: Woocommerce
Neve is a multipurpose theme but is less than a little specialized in the field of webshops. There are many features that make an online store look really professional. In addition, there are many settings to adjust product pages, check out et cetera. There are also several layouts provided for these types of pages that you can choose from.
Neve Footer & Header Builder
The Neve theme has a fantastic system for styling your header and footer down to the last detail. Also very nice is the incredibly extensive documentation that Neve provides not only for the Header Builder but for all the features we covered in this Neve Theme Review. You can find the documentation by clicking on “Docs” in the main menu under “Support”.
Neve Extra Information
There is so much more to tell about Neve. For example, the theme has an Elementor Booster, a Blog Booster, Flipcards as shown below and a large number of other features. I want to keep this Neve review short and to the point, but if it piqued your interest, just continue reading on their own website.
Neve Theme Review Conclusion
The Neve Theme has several impressive features including the beautiful demo layouts that are already prepared for the different page builders. The many features for web shops also immediately catch the eye. There is also the complete series of boosters (plugins) that make it a great theme. Neve deserves its top rating and is definitely recommended for building any type of website.
Neve vs Astra Conclusion
Thank you for reading my Astra vs Neve comparison. Both Neve and Astra are the cream of the crop when it comes to WordPress Themes. This applies in both cases to the free and pro version. Both themes are lightning fast, have beautiful layouts and are prepared for all top page builders. Also, both are great for building web shops. If I had to choose either one… my preference is slightly Astra.