Plugins - WP Hive

MailPoet Review: Features, Performance, Pricing and more

If you are looking for an easy way to send a newsletter and that too from your WordPress dashboard, then you have to rely on an email newsletter plugin.

Today, more than 34% people use email. That’s about 2.5 billion people.

Therefore in 2020, there is no denying the fact that email marketing is more important and effective than ever. It is a personal way to reach your targeted customers. It is more effective than social media, it’s economic and cost-effective, customizable, measurable, action-oriented, and more.

However, without an efficient email marketing solution, these are not possible. So, if you are still confused about whether or not to choose an email marketing solution, today we are going to do an in-depth MailPoet review, a popular email newsletter plugin for WordPress.

We are going to cover all the features, pros and cons, compare it with another popular email newsletter plugin so that you have all the right idea whether to choose an email marketing solution and that too MailPoet.

Role of An Email Newsletter Plugin & Features You Should Look For into It

Before jumping onto the MailPoet review, we will first talk about the role of an email newsletter plugin plays, along with what features you should look for before choosing a newsletter plugin.

Basically the main role of an email newsletter plugin is to help you collect email addresses from website visitors. You can create attractive sign-up forms that connect directly to your email marketing service. Also, this plugin helps you create email marketing campaigns through your WordPress site.

Now, there are many email marketing plugins out there. So, before choosing any of them you have to know what features these plugins should have in order to get the best service.

Any email marketing plugin should have,

Drag n Drop editor
Form customization
Attractive built-in email templates
Segmentation
Managing subscriber’s list
Detailed Reports and Analysis
Reliability
Integrations.

So, when you are choosing an email newsletter plugin, make sure your solution has all these features.

Basic Features & Functionalities of MailPoet

Now, let’s discuss the basic functionalities and features of MailPoet in this part of the MailPoet review article.

This email newsletter plugin lets you create and send an email newsletter right from your WordPress dashboard. The process is very simple and straightforward. As you are already using WordPress so you are already familiar with the interface. That’s not all, it has other features. Like,

Beautiful Email Templates

With MailPoet you can create professional-looking emails in minutes. All you have to do is select the email type, choose the right template, customize to your liking, and send. That’s it.

MailPoet is fully customizable, so you can add your colors, backgrounds, and add your logo. And if you don’t want to use the template, you can create an email from scratch.

Built-in Signup Form Builder

The technique that most email marketers use to collect subscribers is signup forms. They put attractive yet simple signup forms to encourage customers to signup to their email newsletter.

MailPoet gives you the opportunity to create signup forms and you can put them anywhere in the website. Although, the forms might not be as complex like other form builders. But they are simple yet effective.

You can easily use CSS to customize the forms if you have design skills.

Subscriber List Segmentation

List segmentation is a crucial part of email marketing. You can categorize your subscribers into different groups based on their interests and behaviors. Then send them personalized emails.

With MailPoet, segmentation is easy. You can easily track the subscribed, unsubscribed, and bounced subscribers. You can also import and export subscribers in both CSV and Excel formats to make moving from your current email outreach provider a breeze.

Google Analytics Integration

We all know about the importance of Google Analytics to track the performance of a website. MailPoet uses this feature to help you gain deep insights into your subscribers so you can leverage data to get better results with every email.

You can view your analytics by going to the ‘Emails’ section of MailPoet.

You can analyze your email campaigns’ performance and learn more about your subscribers.

You can track opens, clicks, and unsubscribers. You will also get an idea of how your newsletter is performing. That way you can rectify your mistakes and optimize them for better engagement.

WooCommerce Integration

MailPoet directly works with WooCommerce. You can do things like segmentation, automation, abandoned cart notifications. You can also check click rates, along with which customers opened your email, and even track invoices.

The best feature, however, is having all this built-in to WordPress. You don’t have to go back and forth between apps and worry about missing something because everything is under one dashboard.

These are the main features of MailPoet. However, it also has some basic features as well,

Simple database import from spreadsheet or direct from MailChimp
Database export as a CSV file or Excel file
Easy-to-manage subscriber database
Ability to manage multiple lists on one site
Template import
Drag-and-drop editor.

Advantages of Using MailPoet WordPress Plugin (Pros)

If you are looking for an easy way to manage email newsletters and basic email outreach, then you can benefit from using MailPoet. That’s why it’s such a popular and highly-rated plugin.

However, if you still want to know why you should choose MailPoet over other email marketing solutions, here are some advantages of using this plugin.

You can easily manage email marketing campaigns from start to finish, including analytics, within your WordPress dashboard
High-quality design tools for signup forms and emails
Pop-up and slide-in functionality for signup forms
Automation for specific types of email marketing
Easy subscriber import and export
Well-organized subscriber database
Ability to manage multiple lists on one site
Segmentation capabilities
High deliverability
It is quite a good option for eCommerce sites.

Issues You May Face While Using MailPoet (Cons)

There is no software without glitch or issues in the world. MailPoet is no different. It has also some issues that you may face while using. These issues may put off many email marketers from using MailPoet. Here are the issues,

MailPoet lacks advance functionality
Forms are very basic
No split testing
Only does basic automation
UI could use an update
Limited scheduling functionality.

How Does MailPoet Actually Perform?

It’s one thing to know about a plugin’s features, advantages, and disadvantages. But it’s whole another thing to know how the plugin will affect the site. That’s why it is important to know the technical features of a plugin.

Otherwise, you will end up choosing a plugin that will lower the performance of your site. Although it has great features. Luckily, WP Hive does the trick.

WP Hive has multiple parts. One of them is a very powerful crawler. The crawler crawls all the plugin from WordPress.org, blindly activates it, and logs many crucial data such as page speed, memory usage, JavaScript issues, activations issues and more.

So, we are going to put MailPoet through WP Hive and see how it actually performs.

Initial Test

Now, if we see the initial results, you can see the plugin passes all the tests with flying colors. There is no PHP errors or JavaScript issues.

Memory Usage & Page Speed

If we see the use of memory for MailPoet, it is relatively high. It stands at 3430.56KB. That is more than almost 99% of the plugins. However, the page speed is much faster than 99% of the plugins.

Download & Other Stats

You can also view all the stats for MailPoet from the beginning of it’s release almost 4 years ago.

MailPoet Vs MailChimp: Head To Head Comparison

Mailchimp is one of the earliest email marketing solutions. So, you can easily understand the depth of its popularity. Mailchimp offers a lot of useful email marketing features, such as segmentation, social media integration, and eCommerce features (such as an abandoned cart, product recommendation, and order notification emails).

However, MailPoet holds it’s own for it’s unique features as well. That is why people have been calling it an alternative to Mailchimp in some level. But is it true?

Why don’t you see the below comparison and decide for yourself.

Comparison	Mailchimp	MailPoet
Learning Curve	You have to go through a whole lot of configuration while setting up Mailchimp for the first time. For beginners it is a daunting task.	MailPoet installation is as simple as installing a WordPress plugin. You just need to decide on your email delivery partner.
Analytics	Mailchimp analytics provides insight like receives email, Open rate and bounce rate of your email campaign	MailPoet provides you only insights like open rate and click rate in its free plan. For a detailed analytic feature, you will have to pay for the analytic plugin.
Post Notification Emails	Mailchimp sends post notification emails by splitting the RSS feed of your WordPress site. However, there is an option available in which you can send only the post summary instead of the whole content.	MailPoet allows fetching the post information directly from the database of the WordPress. Which ultimately offers a myriad of customization options in its Automatic latest content module.
WooCommerce	Mailchimp allows a user to integrate WooCommerce through their plug-in. However the reviews of that plugin are sub-par, so there is an issue of reliability on that WooCommerce plug-in.	MailPoet have created Woo-commerce features to add in the MailPoet which facilitates online store owners to ease their email marketing.
A/B Testing	You can experiment with subject line design and link placement.	There is no provision for A/B testing in MailPoet.
Pricing	Mailchimp is free up to 2000 subscribers and 12,000 mail per month. But you will have to pay for selecting a plan other than the free plan.	MailPoet offers unlimited emails a month to 1000 subscribers.

Compare the technical issues between Mailchimp & mailpoet

Our Verdict

Mailchimp has more advanced analytics and eCommerce based features in compare to MailPoet. What Mailchimp offers in its free plan, MailPoet offers in its premium plans. However, if you are looking for value for money then MailPoet is the right choice.

Mailchimp has inflexible pricing plans. MailPoet’s free plan supports sending more than 12,000 emails per month (which is Mailchimp’s limit). However, Mailchimp offers more pre-built templates and a more rewarding design interface.

So, we can say MailPoet can be a serious alternative to Mailchimp if you care about email deliverability. But if you had to pick one, then it’s up to you and your requirements. You need to keep in mind the budget as well.

Final Words

Thus we end our MailPoet review. We have tried to cover all the essential details and hopefully give you the necessary information regarding the MailPoet plugin.

So, if you are looking to start using a new email newsletter plugin, we hope this MailPoet review article will help you make the right choice.

Download Mailpoet now!

Beaver Builder Review: Should You Consider This WordPress Page Builder to Develop A Website in 2020

Website building becomes so simple these days. Even you don’t need to hire any developer or freelancer to do this. Well, you might be wondering, how is this possible?

You can do this using a WordPress page builder plugin. But the problem is which one you should consider as your website developing tool?

Here we would like to discuss the Beaver Builder- one of the top WordPress page builders out there.

Let’s get started.

Why You Need a Page Builder Like Beaver Builder?

As you already know, WordPress is very popular among technical, non-technical, and beginner users all over the world. With the WordPress default version, you can change the necessary part of your websites, like color, images, text, and buttons.

But there are certain things that you can not customize using the WordPress default customization options. You are not able to create a customized new page, add widgets, customize header or footer, menu, and more.

Luckily, you can solve this problem by using the popular WordPress Page builder plugins like Beaver Builder. With this advanced plugin, you can change the whole website without coding knowledge.

How Beaver Builder Helps to Design Your Website

How Beaver Builder Helps Your Website Design

Have you ever wonder why over 300000+ people around the world have chosen the Beaver Builder for creating their WordPress website? Allow me to explain.

Beaver Builder is a powerful drag & drop front end page builder that allows you to design a website using some clicks.

In addition, it has the full capability to make any type of website that you need for your personal or professional use.

However, it has many amazing features and functionality including visual editor, Gutenberg support, custom post types, 40+ pre-build templates, WooCommerce compatibility, SEO optimization, and etc. So you don’t need to worry about your site-building, it will take all the responsibility of your site.

Let’s dive into the Beaver Builder review and find out the most valuable information about this page builder.

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Step By Step Beaver Builder Review for WordPress Users

Now it’s high time to explore the Beaver Builder. We would like to take a step-by-step look at the special features, pros and cons, performance, and price of this page builder plugin so that you can understand it correctly.

Beaver Builder Feature Review

Like other popular page builder WordPress plugins, Beaver Builder also comes with many exclusive features that make your website development easier. Among the complete components, we need to verify the sort of top features and functions of this plugin.

Drag & Drop Page Builder

One of the main features of this page builder is the option to drag and drop elements. That means you can design your website with some clicks by dragging block elements to your site. Therefore, you can view the current design of your site and visually create & change the design structure of your website.

Responsive Design

Responsive design not only important for your better user experience but also helps in SEO optimization. That’s why Beaver Builder always focuses on responsive design so that your users can see the best results when visiting your website using small devices like mobiles and tabs.

Easy Import/Export Feature

Using this amazing function, you can efficiently migrate your site as well as share the layout of your website with others. In doing so, you’ll take full advantage of using WordPress import and export tools to save your content for the future. In addition, it will protect your site and reduce the time and effort required to redesign it.

Ability to Handle Multiple Sites at Once

Sometimes you may have to handle multiple websites at the same time. However, most page builders do not have the ability to handle multisite. Thanks to Beaver Builder for getting this amazing feature. It saves work stress and also reduces the time for you.

World-Class Customer Support

When you’re working on a page builder plugin, you might need support from the existence page builder provider. Here, we see Beaver Builder offer top-notch support to their valuable customers. And always try to satisfy their users.

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Pros & Cons of Beaver Builder

While Beaver Builder has many advantages on the other side, it also has some disadvantages in its pocket. And when you are considering a page builder plugin, you should look at the pros & cons of your plugin.

So find out some valuable pros & cons of Beaver Builder.

Pros	Cons
Visual front end page building options	Slower than other page builders
Pre-made template & block library	Pay extra using the Beaver-Builder theme
Amazing design features	Form maker is not available
User-friendly interface	3rd party addons required for extra features
Top-notch support	Makes website slower

Beaver Builder Pricing

Pricing is an important part that you must understand before purchasing a page builder plugin. In Beaver Builder, with having a free version you’ll see three types of pricing plans- standard, pro, and agency.

You find their plan details in the image below.

Beaver Builder Performance Review with WPHive

As we already mentioned that a page builder plugin offers tons of advanced features and ready-made templates, that’s why your site might be slower sometimes. So you need to have a clear idea about the speed and performance of the page builder.

Now it’s time to test the Beaver Builder performance and speed. I hope that you will get clear information about this plugin.

Basic Info Test

The basic info shows the current WordPress rating, total download, active installation, and support thread of the Beaver Builder.

Performance

Here in the Beaver Builder performance, you’ll find the total memory usage 840.37 and page speed of 0.01s of this page builder. And it shows 99% faster than other plugins.

Speed

In the speed test, we find the page speed as well as memory usage of the plugin. And it seems to be perfect.

Stats

In here, you’ll see the current stats of the plugin. This test shows the consistency of download history, current versions of the plugin, and some error.

WPHive Rating for Beaver Builder

Here, we have rated the Beaver Builder.

WP Super Cache: Is It the Best WordPress Caching Plugin

Check Beaver Builder Performance with WPHIVE!

Beaver Builder vs Elementor: An Easy Comparison

Like Beaver Builder, Elementor is also a powerful page builder WordPress plugin that loved by over 5 million users worldwide. If we compare these two amazing plugin side by side, you’ll see the complete picture of these plugins.

Most importantly, you will understand which one you should choose for your future website.

Feature	Elementor	Beaver Builder
Drag & Drop Editor	Yes	Yes
Pre Designed Template	300+	20+
WooCommerce	Yes	Yes
Theme Builder	Yes	Yes
No Coding	Yes	Yes
Form Widget	Yes	No
100% Responsive	Yes	Yes

Comparing Beaver Builder with Elementor using WPHive

Let’s see the test result below.

Beaver Builder vs Elementor side by side compare

In the test results, we see the memory usage of theses two plugins are different +840.37KB (Beaver Builder) and +1148.38KB (Elementor). Similarly, we also notice their page speed -0.01s (Beaver Builder) and +0.09s (Elementor).

Overall, we find both of these plugins are best in their own criteria.

Check out the complete comparison here!

Individual Plugin Review: Dokan Multivendor Marketplace

Verdict on Best Possible Page Builder for Your WordPress Site

You might be thinking which page builder plugin is the winner in this race. In our research, we see these two-page builders are both experienced and consistently performing.

Beaver Builder is an advanced, easy to use, responsive, and SEO friendly page builder WordPress plugin that allows you to build a website in minutes. Besides, it has exclusive pricing plans for different users’ needs. But its developing process is slow and not update its features frequently.

On the other hand, Elementor has awesome design tools that include consistent performance, tons of premade pages or blocks, animation, popup builders, and more that’s all you need for making a stunning site. Besides, it has so many 3rd party addons that also help you a lot. In fact, if you face any issue using the Elementor, you’ll find tons of resources on the internet including videos. But Elementor has a speed issue, it makes your website a bit slower.

Conclusion

Finally, we have come to the closing statement on the Beaver Builder review.

We tried to cover the valuable features of Beaver Builder and compare the plugins with another powerful visual page builder Elementor.

Now it’s your turn to give Beaver Builder a try along with Elementor and make a final decision. Hope, this comparison helps you get a clear picture.

Try wphive to compare any plugins!

Individual Plugin Review: Dokan Multivendor Marketplace

Dokan multivendor is one of the popular WP marketplace plugins with powerful features to turn any online shop into a multivendor marketplace in a few steps

People are choosing WordPress and WooCommerce for building their online shop. But they are still facing many problems to build their eCommerce multivendor marketplaces like Amazon and eBay.

Today We’re going to talk about one of the popular WordPress multi-vendor marketplace plugins, Dokan.

With Dokan Multivendor, you can easily create your dream multivendor shop. Besides, it also helps you to solve all your problems you may face while building an eCommerce multi-vendor marketplace.

Why you Need a Multi-Vendor Marketplace Plugin?

Best WooCommerce Multi Vendor Plugin For WordPress

Using WooCommerce and WordPress, you can easily launch your dream eCommerce store. Moreover, when you’re thinking big like making an eCommerce marketplace that has a lot of vendors, you’ll be dealing with so many problems.

Without a multivendor plugin, WooCommerce does not have the capability to create a multivendor eCommerce marketplace.

If you want to earn a commission from each sale of your vendor, you’ll need a multi-vendor WP plugin. A WordPress multivendor plugin has a lot of powerful functionalities that can help you to make your multivendor marketplace.

There are many WordPress multivendor plugins in the market. Moreover, it’s very difficult to choose the right one for your ultimate solution.

Which one will you select?

The Dokan Multivendor Plugin can be the perfect solution. Most importantly, it has those advanced features that you’ll need to launch your stunning multi-vendor eCommerce marketplace.

Let’s give a complete review of Dokan.

Quick Navigation

Why Choose Dokan Multivendor To Build Your Marketplace?

why use Dokan to build an Online Marketplaces

Dokan Multivendor Plugin is a progressive multivendor WordPress plugin that has been chosen by more than 40,000 people worldwide to create their multi-store shopping mall. Plus, it’s one of the best WordPress multi-vendor front-end plugins that work with WooCommerce.

By using Dokan, you can easily build your eCommerce marketplace like Amazon, Shopify, eBay, Aliexpress, Magento in less than 30 minutes. Most importantly, it saves hundreds of valuable work hours while making an eCommerce marketplace.

In addition, you’ll experience a lot of modern features such as best frontend experience, easiest customization option, world-class customer support while selecting Dokan.

In fact, it is also compatible with any WooCommerce themes so you don’t need to worry about choosing a theme.

Dokan Success Stories From All Over The World

How Dokan Works

Dokan mainly works in four steps to create an online multi-vendor market.

First, you need to download and install Dokan on your WordPress website. You may easily download it from wordpress.org plugin directory or you can visit their official website.

Second, you have to customize your marketplace as you like it.

Third, it’s time to welcome your vendors to sell their products on your marketplace. If you want, you can sell your own products on your marketplace.

Fourth, you’ve created your own multi-store marketplace. Now it’s time to start earning from the commission.

See, how easy it is. If you follow the above four steps you’ll be able to make your own marketplace. Know about the working procedure of Dokan, to build your dream marketplace.

Give a read to this article, Create an electronic marketplace with Dokan

Powerful Features of Dokan Multivendor

When you think of building a multi-vendor marketplace, you need tons of powerful modules and features. Likely in Dokan Plugin, you’ll find most of the essential features and functionalities.

In addition, it has 20+ additional modules that are easy-to-use as well as lightweight for your website. Besides, it has vendor-independent store compatibility, stunning frontend dashboard for vendors & customers, awesome report management, and coupon management.

Moreover, you’ll find product reviewing options, WooCommerce payment gateway options, shipping management, and other more necessary features. Most importantly, you’ll be able to see and control who sells and who doesn’t.

Lets see some advanced features of Dokan in the below list.

Marketplace with Independent Stores: With Dokan Multivendor, every vendor can easily customize their storefront.
Compatible with any WooCommerce Theme: Dokan has full compatibility with any type of WooCommerce WordPress themes for designing your new multi-vendor shopping mall. You can also use the Dokan Theme while making your marketplace.
Stunning Frontend Dashboard for Vendors and Customers: While using Dokan, your vendors and customers can use their own stunning frontend dashboard to manage their information.
Start Earning from Each Sale as an Admin: That’s the power of Dokan. As an admin, you can easily earn a commission from each sale of your vendor’s product sales.
Coupon Management: It also comes with the full integration of coupon management systems.
Product & Store Reviews: Product & Store Reviewing is an important feature of every eCommerce store. That’s why Dokan supports the review options.
Easy Withdraw System: Dokan has full integration with WooCommerce based payment systems. That includes Stripe, PayPal, Cash on delivery, Bank Transfer, etc.
Shipping Management: It also comes with easy shipping management systems to ship its products to valuable customers.

For more information, you may visit their website where you can find all the modules and features they have available.

Dokan Free & Pro Price Comparison

Like the other multi-vendor plugins, Dokan also set their pricing with several types by keeping in mind their users. So you can easily select your desired pricing plan along with your needs.

Dokan Multivendor Plugin Pricing — Dokan Pricing

Dokan vs Other Multivendor Marketplace Plugins

It’s very important to compare your chosen plugin with the other multi-vendor plugins. If you do, you’ll find the best.

In this segment, we will show you a complete comparison of Dokan Multivendor with the other popular multi-vendor plugins.

Features	Dokan Lite	Dokan	WC Vendors	Yith	WC Marketplace	WC Product Vendors
Price	Free	$149	$199	$79	$80	$95
License Type	Free	Pro	Pro	Pro	Pro	Pro
Frontend Product Management	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Paid
Individual Vendor Stores	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Seller Management UI	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Seller Statement Reports	No	Yes	No	No	No	No
Shipping Management	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Multiple Commission Types	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
Support	wordpress.org	1 Year	1 Year	1 Year	1 Year	1 Year

If you want to see more, you’ll be able to see the comparisons here.

Common FAQ

Questions You May Have on Your Mind about Dokan (FAQ)

While using and before using Dokan Multivendor, you may have many questions that come to your mind.

It’s natural.

Let’s cover some common FAQs of Dokan.

Dokan Plugin FAQ

What are the system requirements?

The server requirements that you need while using Dakan is PHP 5.6 or later and MySQL 5.6 or later. You may also work with share hosting and be able to change your hosting later.

Is it multisite supported?

Honestly, Dokan is not supported with multisite. You can use Dokan only 1 database. But if your site is on the subdomain, you can use it.

Is there any limit on the product, category, and tags?

No, there is no limitation of adding products, categories, and tags.

Can I use the WooCommerce shipping plugin with Dokan?

No, Dokan has their own shipping method.

Can I use cash on delivery with Dokan?

Yes, you can.

Does Dokan have a per-category commission feature?

Yes, you can add your commission plan per-category.

Which payment gateway can be used with Dokan?

Yes. Besides, you also can add any WooCommerce payment gateway to withdraw your money.

Can I set the withdrawal threshold?

Yes, If you set 7 days then the vendor would not be able to send you any withdrawal request before completing the order.

Does Dokan support RTL?

Yes, it is fully supported by RTL.

Is it possible to use your plugin for the wholesale marketplace?

No, you can use Dokan for the wholesale marketplace.

Can I charge a vendor monthly or yearly?

With Dokan, you can easily charge your vendor monthly or yearly.

Can a vendor deactivate their store?

No. Only the admin can deactivate vendors’ stores.

Is it possible to upgrade the license from a single site to five sites?

Yes, you are allowed to do this. For more information follow this line here.

If you are still stuck, you may visit their FAQ page where you’ll find the solution to all of your questions & problems.

Bonus: Building a Multivendor Marketplace Using Dokan

How to Build an Online Marketplace Dokan

Great, it’s time to build your own multi-vendor shop using one of the suitable WordPress multi-vendor plugin Dokan.

In the section, you’ll learn how to build an eCommerce marketplace using Dokan.

Before doing this, make sure that you’ve all the things below.

Besides, you have to optimize your website using the popular WordPress caching plugins. In addition, you can also optimize your site SEO.

In this ultimate guide, you’ll easily learn to build your multi-vendor marketplace step by step.

Conclusion

We hope it’s been a great experience to know about the Dokan Multivendor WordPress Plugin. In this ultimate review, you find all the information about this amazing plugin.

Most importantly, you can learn a lot of essential information about creating a multi-vendor marketplace. In fact, you also know how to make your own multi-store marketplace using Dokan.

What you want to say about Dokan? Is Dokan the Best Multivendor Plugin?

Please give your answer in the comment below. We hope it clarifies many people’s ideas about Dokan.

TURN YOUR shop INTO A MULTIVENDOR MARKETPLACE!

Honest WPForms Review for Marketers

Since 2016, WPForms has become an icon in the WordPress Community as a form builder plugin.

Today, the plugin boasts a user base of more than 1 million. The success of this plugin comes from a very clever, and a group of dedicated team who are constantly updating the plugin to stay up to the market standard in the WordPress community.

Yet, it has become a challenge for newcomers to understand how suitable this plugin is. That is why today we are here to give you a review of what this plugin is all about.

This article covers the advantages, drawbacks, features, and discusses some tricks which WPForms is not openly known for although it is clearly there.

Features That Define WPForms

WPForms is a lot more than a form. You can create forms for the following purpose:

Newsletter
Survey
Donation
Registration and
Payment Form

Actually there is more, the plugin boasts having more than 100 templates to choose from. Have a look at the image below, you can select your form by filtering your needs.

Honest WPForms Review for Marketers 1 — List of templates you can choose and view them by clicking on Demo.

It is great that users can create and customize their form but honestly, most people do not have the time and energy to actually build a form from scratch.

This is why the WPForms is so popular, a lot of the tasks are automated for you if you rely on forms heavily. Even the data of the form is analyzed for you.

For example, you can use the subscription forms and connect them to your email marketing service. This way you know your subscription insight while working on your email marketing. The plugin lets you view all your leads in one place.

It is not uncommon for users to fill out forms on their smartphones. For such a scenario, forms will need to be adjusted. WPForms once again shoulders this burden for you. In addition, your forms are secured because it has the ability to protect your form’s data.

Do keep in mind that you need these features mostly in the pro version of the WPForms plugin.

The Interface Of WPForms Plugin

So when you install the WPForms plugin, you will be surprised by how simple it is to use.

I remember installing the lite version and not using any guides or watching any videos on how to implement forms on a WordPress site.

The plugin features are easy on the eye so you do not feel this is a complicated thing to use. Glancing around the interface will give you an idea of what to do. You can easily create a quote form for a digital marketing agency.

This is a plugin where you basically drag and drop blocks of field or select options from the drop-down list.

In contrast to the elementor plugin, which takes a while to learn how to use it, the WPForms plugin is more likely to turn out to be a better introduction to WordPress for beginners.

This is the very reason why it has been able to thrive for such a long time, despite updates- the interface stays loyal and comfortable to its users. WPForms caters to a wide variety of users such as bloggers, email marketers, designers, photographers, and even developers.

Pros & Cons of WPForms

Let us dive into the WPForms plugin by examining the Pros and Cons of using this plugin.

Pros of Using WPForms

Easy to use even for beginners
Simple Interface: Just drag and drop to build forms
Ready-made template forms for instant use
Video Tutorials and Documentation for help
Create an unlimited number of forms

Cons of Using WPForms

Expensive if you are looking for large scale solution
The free version is very limited
If you want to build a form from scratch, you have to figure out on your own.
You cannot upload files all at once.
There is no trial offered to try out the paid version.

WPForms Pricing

With having a free version, there are 3 categories of the WPForms pro version. They are:

Elite
Pro
Plus

Elite: This version of the WPForms plugin is meant for those who own a business. You can embed the forms in unlimited sites. The version for this covers all the features. So if you are a heavy user who depends on forms a lot, then this is the option for you. Also, this version will allow you to integrate analysis for you to analyze your videos

Pro: This version has a lot of features included including payment options. You can also work with forms that work offline. The pro version is the most popular at an individual and business level. It pretty much covers everything you need for your work. The only thing this does not cover is the Active Campaign Forms.

Plus: This version is also for those who run a business. It has fewer features but is an affordable option for businesses. The plus version covers the basics of the pro version. However, it does not have many features included. For example, there is no payment gateway, signatures, offline forms, and so on.

For more information on the different features available based on price, please click on this link.

Analyzing WPForms with other Competitors Using WPHive

Despite the popularity of WPForms, it is not without competition. There are several alternatives to it. There is a list of the competitors:

These plugin forms are equally as good as WPForms.

For an even easier way to compare and decide on this plugin, there is a smart and quick way to compare these forms.

WPHive is an online platform that lets you compare 2 plugins simply by typing the name of the plugins and let the system compare the results.

But the platform can do a lot more- it can compare memory, technology features, and more. When you scroll to the bottom of the page, WPHive declares a winner between the 2 plugins.

Let us compare WPForms with Ninja Forms via WPHive.

Here is the following result we got by using WPHive:

Comparing Page Speed (WPForms vs Ninja Forms)

Honest WPForms Review for Marketers 3 — An example of one section of the WPHive that compares the speed page of WPForms with Ninja Forms.

As you can see, based on the analysis using WPHive, Ninja Forms has a higher page speed loading time. This means if you are looking for a plugin that loads faster, WPFroms would be a priority.

But WPHive does not stop there if also lets you dig out the memory usage as well. We will let the image speak for itself.

Comparing Memory Usage (WPForms vs Ninja Forms)

A proper plugin will attempt to reduce memory usage on its own. It should not load your server and slow down your WordPress website.

As you can see, WPForms wins again in terms of memory usage.

Let us move onto the other CRITERIA section of the WPHive comparison page.

As seen from the above snapshot, both the plugins score well in almost all the criteria.However, in terms of rating and support threads, WPForms has the upper hand.

WPHive lists many other factors all of which are presented visually. It’s not just the main factors that are compared, other criteria such as database error, Javascript issues, etc are also compared.

If you would like another example when you can check out the review we did on Contact Form 7. Be sure to check it out if you are looking to choose the right plugin for inserting forms.

Our Verdict

Never choose a plugin without judging your needs. Remember, plugins that are not free have to be paid monthly or yearly.

wpforms plugin — Choose wisely when you decide to install a paid plugin.

Are you looking to have forms for simple tasks? Or are you looking to implement forms on your site that need sophisticated features?

WordPress is commonly portrayed as easy-to-use websites for those who come from a non-technical background. However, your WordPress site can slow-down if there too many plugins.

So it is important to think first what you need.

Free vs Paid Version Of WPForms: Which One To Use

If you are simply looking to create a humble form for users to fill up, then there is no need at all to use the pro version. Use the lite version which is free to use.

You may not even need WPForms at all. You can simply use a google form to collect your feedback. If you do not have a WordPress website then simply switch to google’s forms.

On the other hand, if you are the kind of person who relies heavily on forms that require signatures and payment then it would make sense to upgrade your WPForms plugin.

If you are making a decent income and you need forms that are flexible to your complex needs then you can go ahead with the paid version.WPForms are also frequently on sale so it should not cost you too much if you decide to make a purchase.

Last Thoughts

Although WPForms is a plugin that maintains its standard, it is a good idea to know the alternatives. Many plugins let you go a long way simply by making use of the free version.

In some cases, a plugin may let you get far by using the free version alone. However, getting quality feedback when you are stuck is also vital.

Some plugins have great features but do not have a strong support team that can assist you when you are stuck. This is where WPForms stands out, despite the weight of its price, It has a lot of content in the form of videos and blogs to help you make the best use out of your forms.

It really has stepped up its game by automating almost a lot of its hectic activities involved with creating forms.

So what do you think about WPForms? Is this the best or are there better alternatives?

If you want a full overview of WPForms or make a comparison with any other plugins for a clearer judgment then try using WP Hive to judge plugins without the need to research for hours.

Click to Download Wpforms

5 Best Free WordPress SEO Plugins Listed & Compared With WP Hive

Search Engine Optimization(SEO) plays a major role in content writing. It increases search and visibility, exposure of your brand through organic search results. However, it is not as easy as it sounds. And it is certainly impossible without any SEO tools.

But Why You Need a SEO Plugin

Every website needs an SEO plugin. No matter how important social networks can be for a site, SEO is often the most important factor for a site’s growth. Not following SEO best practices, or not doing SEO at all, can be quite detrimental to your site’s performance.

Fortunately, there are quite a few efficient SEO plugins available in WordPress that will help your cause and we are going to list the 5 best free WordPress SEO plugins and compare them with WP Hive so that you can choose the best one.

Why WP Hive?

Well, you may have heard the news about the new upgraded version of the WordPress repository WP Hive. It is a platform where you have the opportunity to not only download a plugin but also

Get an in-depth review of the plugin
See the test results based on different performance metrics
Compare plugins to see which one is best
Discover plugins using various categories.

Visit wp hive Now!

So, you have probably have guessed that we are going to use the Compare option of that platform to find out the best free WordPress SEO plugins out of the 5.

But first, let us list the best 5 shall we?

5 Best Free WordPress SEO Plugins

SEO plugins are the extension modules for content management system. It has features that impact website analysis, online marketing, and of course search engine optimization. However, you only need to use one SEO tool as they all have quite similar features with exceptions. So, we are going to list the best SEO tools for you also give you an insight to their features.

Yoast SEO
All In One SEO
Rank Math
SEOPress
Google Keyword Planner

Yoast SEO Plugin

The first on the list of best free WordPress SEO plugins is Yoast SEO. It one of the most popular SEO plugin with over 5M active installations and 4.7 ratings from 15000+ reviews.

It offers a detailed analysis of your content based on the keyword you have chosen. You can easily get a detailed insight to your writing to make sure it’s SEO optimized. Also, it lets you add Open Graph Metadata and social media images to your content.

https://wphive.com/seo/optimal-yoast-seo-settings/

It has a smooth import system, so you can easily transfer your previous SEO data from the old plugin. Yoast SEO automatically creates an XML sitemap for all your content. Therefore it is easy for search engines to crawl your website.

It has a premium version for $89 that has,

Internal linking suggestions
Content insights
Redirect manager
1 year free access to 24/7 support

However, the free version has enough essential features to help you if you are on a budget.

Get More insights to yoast seo

All In One SEO Pack

Next on our list of best SEO tools is All In One SEO Pack. With over 2M active installations it is easily among the best free WordPress SEO plugins.

It lets you add SEO title and meta tags, open graph meta tags, XML sitemaps, image sitemaps, and more. The setup process is easy as it has a feature manager that lets you control different settings. All In One SEO pack support SEO on custom post types. Also, if you make any changes to your site it will automatically notify search engines like Google, Bing.

It has 3 kinds of paid version Individual, Business, Agency with different prices. Those paid versions offer,

Image SEO Module (Business Plan and above)
Advanced Support for WooCommerce
SEO for Categories, Tags and Custom Taxonomies
Social Meta for for Categories, Tags and Custom Taxonomies
Support for Google Tag Manager
Advanced Google Analytics tracking

It is a more affordable than Yoast SEO, so you can easily go for it.

Get insights to all in one seo pack

Rank Math

Rank Math is one of the most popular SEO plugins in WordPress with a perfect 5-star rating and over 300k active installations.

It allows you to optimize your website search engines and social media. It has an efficient setup wizard that helps you not only to install the plugin easily but also help you import data from previous SEO plugin. You can add meta title, description, and Open Graph metadata to your blog posts.

The plugin allows you to generate XML sitemap, connect to Google Search Console.

Rank Math is currently free! But they plan on releasing a pro version soon. But the free version has enough features like,

Module Based System
Smart redirection manager
Local business SEO
SEO optimized breadcrumbs
Deep content analysis test
404 monitor

Which is enough to get you through.

Know More about rank math

SEOPress

With over 100k active installations, next on our list of best free WordPress SEO plugins is SEOPress. It has got a perfect 5-star rating from its user.

It includes all the features you would expect from a SEO plugin like meta title, description, open graph support, image and content XML sitemaps, redirects, and more.It is comparable to any other top SEO plugins in the market. Beginners can find an easy settings while for the experts, there are some complicated settings.

It has a pro version for $39 with features like,

Import & Export SEO metadata from a CSV file
Import Redirects from a CSV file
Backlinks
Google XML Video Sitemap
Google Structured Data Types
Robots.txt

Get more knowledge about seopress

Google Keyword Planner

All the effort we are putting into Search Engine Optimization so that, Google recognizes us. SO, a tool from them will obviously make our list. That is why we will be including Google Keyword Planner.

No one on the planet has more data on what people are searching for than Google. This tool offers it’s own keyword ideas from Google itself. It’s free! It is mainly to show their advertisers the keywords they can bid for their campaigns. It gives them an estimate of search volume, number of results, and difficulty level.

More importantly, it helps the bloggers to find keywords that will help them outrank all other sites.

Now, we have listed the 5 best free WordPress SEO plugins for you. But, which one you are going to choose?

Comparing Best Free WordPress SEO Plugins Using WP Hive To Find The Best One

Yes, the concept is exactly how the title shows. One of the main functionalities of WP Hive is that you can compare a plugin with a similar plugin, and based on different metrics it will declare a winner. So, we are going to use that feature and show the best SEO plugin among the four as Google Keyword Planner is an online tool.

This will not only help you choose the best one but also save your valuable time. As you don’t have to go and give a trial one by one.

We are going to start with the process of finding the best SEO tool.

First, go to wphive.com. There on top the menu, you will find an option called Compare.

compare plugins for best free wordpress seo plugins

Second, you need put the names of the plugins you want to compare.

Yoast SEO vs All In One SEO Pack

We are going to start with Yoast SEO comparing with All In One SEO pack. Type their name on both text boxes.

After you hit the Compare button, you will see the comparison based on memory usage, page speed, and other criteria. You can see the metrics.

All In One SEO Pack vs Rank Math

Onto to comparing All In One SEO and Rank Math to find out which one is the best free WordPress SEO plugins among the two.

Write their name in the compare box and hit the Compare button.

On to the next page to see the winner.

Rank Math vs SEOPress

Last but not the least, we are going to compare Rank Math and SEOPress.

The winner is,

End Result

So, we can say the best free WordPress SEO plugin after comparing using WP Hive among the 4 is ,

Rank Math SEO plugin.

You can try with any other SEO plugins than the listed ones and you may get different results.

Compare plugins with wp hive

Final Word

We used to ask Google, expert opinions , ask questions on forums to determine the best plugin. We are not saying it is a bad practice. However, you would get different opinions every time.

That is why we have come up with WP Hive. The answer to all your questions. You can get all the performance metrics and decide for yourself which plugin to choose.

We hope you found our solution to your liking. Do share your opinion.

Elementor Review 2020: Is It Still The Best Page Builder?

Well, whenever you think to design any WordPress site or webpage, clearly Elementor is the first tool that comes to anyone’s mind. And there are several reasons why people rely on using this plugin. The answer is pretty easy. For its easy drag and drop facility and the detailed customization ability; it becomes the default choice for most.

But before going to the Elementor plugin review, let’s shortly recap about its journey & how it has been contributing to the WordPress community.

Basically, Elementor is an all in one WordPress site-building solution that replaces the primary WordPress editor with a visual frontend editor. Back in 2016, it started its journey and now empowering websites in more than 180 countries, with over 4,000,000 active installs, and 3,000 five-star reviews. Overall we can say, its the best tools for all types of WordPress users who have never written a single line of code.

Okay enough with the introduction, let’s dive directly to the Elementor Plugin review & some interesting points that could motivate you to use it as a primary website building tool.

Key Features & Addons of Elementor

Elementor Review 2020: Is It Still The Best Page Builder? 6

Let’s have a look at some of Elementor’s most powerful features.

Inline editing: Using this feature of Elementor, you can directly edit the text on the live screen. And it is so easy to customize both for the blog post and other content as well.
Templates & blocks: Using any kind of pre-design template on the website is a bonus. Because it can save huge time in designing or creating new things on the website. So unlimited templates & blocks of Elementor can help you to do that easily.
Mobile Responsive: Elementor websites are totally mobile responsive. You can alter any feature to make them 100% mobile responsive.
Detailed Layout Control: Using Elementor, you can have detailed control over each and every layout, such as margin, padding, position, colors, etc.
Header Footer Editor: Header or footer is a very important part of any website. And also if it is used smartly it can easily grab customer’s attention. You can do that in many ways. Manually or directly using the pre-built header or footer.
Compatible with any WordPress Theme: Elementor is flexible & 100% compatible enough to work with any WordPress theme.
Easy Redo/Undo & Full Revision key: This feature allows users to take a recap on their mistakes in design. Yes, if you make any mistakes or aren’t satisfied with your design, you can easily redo that and get the previous version of your work.
Global colors and typography: If you want to set colors that match globally, this feature will let you do that easily. And also you can set typography on your design to make it lucrative.
Translation and RTL Ready: Good News! Now you can translate your Elementor site with 23 languages. That way you can translate and connect with the people all around.
Extensive typography options: You use can 800+ Google fonts to modify Elementor websites. That means you can create your own custom Typekit forms and utilize them on your website.
Third-party integrations: Now Elementor is integrated with other features to increase website workflow and enhance activities. For example, MailChimp, Drip, ActiveCampaign, Zapier, and more.
Maintenance mode: You can easily set maintenance mode using Elementor’s upcoming features and other things beautifully.
eCommerce widgets: Using WooCommerce widgets or other things you can easily use them with the Elementor site. Such as pricing tables, price lists, product layout and other pre-built things with the Elementor.
Affordable Pricing: Well, Elementor comes with the 3 basic pricing. Personal, plus and expert. From that, you can choose the suitable one for your website.
24/7 Support: As a prominent page builder plugin, it’s expected to be the first-class support procedure. Yes, you’ll get 24/7 support from Elementor.

To know more about Elementor features & addons, read the article on ‘90+ Elementor Addons Collections‘

Pros and Cons of Elementor

After knowing about the features & addons of Elementor, let’s know shortly about its pros & cons.

Pros of Elementor

The main file is 100% free
Easy user interface
Widgets are amazing
Open-source
Active Facebook group
Super easy customization
Regular updates come in real-time
Full documentation with a proper guideline
Integration with 3rd Party Plugins
Theme builder facilities & WooCommerce builder
100% theme compatibility

Cons of Elementor

Easy but outdated User Interface
The website doesn’t look good at all in editing mode
Default margin & padding process
Templates & blocks are pretty boring
Support is not as expected and takes time to get back to you
Unavailability of lifetime Options.
Pressurize to pay every year to keep your website up
Forced styling by default
Confusing global vs static templates
Lack of some marketing-oriented features

Anyways, Is It Still The Best WordPress Page Builder?

Elementor Plugin Review — Elementor Features You Should Consider For Website Design

If you’re a regular WordPress user and also have used Elementor before, then the scenario may be common for you. But if you’re a starter and have not idea about, in that case, we’ll tell you about it.

Well, again, Elementor is a first and foremost page builder for WordPress users that has a unique style to build, customize, and produce amazing designs. For instance, we can say, the main purpose of Elementor is to provide all the website design materials. So that people from all fields, non-tech to experts can create a professional website with a few clicks.

And the other reason we want to mention, in WordPress default option, you’ll not get any suitable opportunity to customize, edit or do any kind of experiments. On the other hand, if you can collaborate with Elementor with your WordPress site, then chances of customizing, editing will be very easy for you.

Okay, in the next section, things will get clear to you. Because we’ll know how WordPress users are using Elementor for up growing their business.

How WordPress Users Are Utilizing Elementor?

We have already acknowledged about Elementor & its popularity. As time goes on, its importance will increase day by day. And there is doubt about it. Again, if you’re new to WordPress & Elementor as well as, you may ask, how to use Elementor or how people are using Elementor for their website. Right?

Nothing to worry about it, we’ll shortly give you an idea about it. And surely, it will help you get a proper dimension about it.

Okay, let’s find out how WordPress users are utilizing the Elementor by the following points.

First of all, install WordPress
Install Elementor Free & Pro (If needed)
A good hosting plan for Elementor
Header or footer
Template library
Widgets
Addons & Features
And themes

This is how WordPress users are utilizing Elementor by following these points step by step. So if you’re willing to start using Elementor like a pro, you can also read how to create a professional website using Elementor or you can watch the video tutorial below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43j6h3oCm0U

How To Use Elementor – Basic Functions You Can Use

What’s More, You Can Get with Elementor? (Extended Elementor Addons)

Elementor Review 2020: Is It Still The Best Page Builder? 7

Throughout this Elementor plugin review, we have already known some useful features and other things very well. But did you know that you can do more with Elementor for your WordPress site? Yes, in this section, we’ll talk about this. What’s more you can explore with Elementor for beautifying your WordPress site by the following extended addons.

Okay, let’s get started:

Happy Addons: It is a collection of useful, well-organized and powerful widgets. It is designed specially to work collaboratively with Elementor Page Builder.
Premium Addons: Premium addons will allow you to create or beautify websites with a prominent look. Moreover, it gives you control over the widgets you are using for faster performance.
Essential Addons: This ‘addons’ allows you to design your website with pre-built blocks. It has 57+ elements, which help you to create WordPress pages and posts easily.
Livemesh Add-ons: It offers easy to use yet highly practical extensions for Elementor Page Builder to improve the outlook of your site.
Anywhere Elementor: You can make your Elementor more potent by adding this add-on to insert elementor pages, library templates, and global templates anywhere just using shortcodes.
Elementor Addons and template: It offers both excellent add-on and templates that are intended to be used with the Elementor Page builder.
Element Pack: This ‘addons’ has the highest number of superior and super flexible widgets for Elementor.
JetWidgets For Elements: This addon includes extensive modules for Elementor live page builder, allowing you to develop different kinds of content easily.
Elementor Extra: This addon provides plenty of unique and remarkable facilities that are not available on core Elementor. It has 30+ easy to use and custom widgets and extensions.
Ultimate Addons: This is a combination of the rich library of unique widgets to add more specialties and versatility to the Elementor Page Builder.
PowerPack: This Elementor addon extends the design chances for your website without altering the loading time and helps you to sustain your personal brand value while developing client’s sites.
Envato Elements: In this addon, you can easily download countless themes, plugins, graphics, photos, fonts and more. You can import a premium photo right into your site without leaving WordPress.

Final Consideration in This Elementor Plugin Review

So, after a thorough review of Elementor plugin, we can reach to an agreement that this plugin has all the useful and handy features. And also it lets you do all kinds of experiments to customize website and give it a proper look.

Overall, we can say, this plugin is for all. That means, people of all ages who cherish to design a website for their business, blog or whatever it is, Elementor takes that place as a major website page building plugin. And in this Elementor plugin review blog, we tried to focus on that matter so that any WordPress users can get a proper idea after seeing it at a glance.

Best Landing Pages Plugin for WordPress Compared

How to Add A Search Bar in WordPress (3 Easiest Ways)

A search bar can help visitors find exactly what they’re looking for on the website. And you have a website with a lot of contents, then a search bar is really necessary. If you have a website built with WordPress, then adding a WordPress search bar is very easy.

A search bar can help visitors find exactly what they’re looking for on the website. And if you have a website with a lot of content, then a search bar is really necessary. If you have a website built with WordPress, then adding a search bar is very easy.

You can place a search bar in your site’s Home sidebar, Blog sidebar, Header sidebar, or even the Footer sidebar. It helps to find anything that exists within your site in the shortest possible time.

So, today, in this blog post, we will show you how you can add a search bar in your WordPress site within moments. Keep reading.

But first, you should know the,

Role of A Search Bar in Your WordPress Site

Search bar acts like Google within your site. Your user can find what they’re looking for without leaving your website. It helps improve user experience, builds trust with your customers, and boosts engagement.

Usually, a website carries a number of items for its users. When visitors visit a website, he/she is undoubtedly looking for something. But, if there is no search option on your website, he/she will get confused and ultimately end up leaving your site.

That is why it is important to have a search bar on your website.

It improves the bounce rate of your site and impresses the users so that he returns to your site again. When visitors pass a bit longer time on your site, it improves your SEO score too.

3 Ways to Add Search Bar to Your WordPress Site

We are going to demonstrate to you 3 ways to add a search bar in a WordPress site. You can do it yourself choosing any of the ways as per your need.

Using the Default WordPress Search Bar Widget
Using WordPress Search Bar Plugin
Using CSS Code (for Advanced Users)

Let’s get started.

1. Add A Search Bar Using The Default WordPress Search Bar Widget

The most convenient way to add a WordPress search bar to your website is to do it right from your Dashboard. WordPress comes with an in house search widget, which is fairly simple to set up. Follow the below steps to get it done.

Step 01: Navigate to the Widget Tab

Go to your Admin Dashboard.
Navigate to Appearance > Widgets

Here you’ll see a list of available widgets that you can add to your website.

Step 02: Add the Search Widget

Scroll down to the available widgets, you’ll find the Search widget.
Click on it and then hit the Add Widget button. or, you can simply drag and drop it in the section where you want it to display.

How to Add A Search Bar in WordPress (3 Easiest Ways) 8

Step 03: Add a Title

You can add a title for the search bar. You can change the title of the search bar to say something fun or something more relevant to your website like ‘Search’ or ‘Search the blog’.

How to Add A Search Bar in WordPress (3 Easiest Ways) 9

Then click on save and voila! You have a search bar.

Take a quick look at what you have just did.

2. Add A Search Bar Using WordPress Search Bar Plugin

You can add your WordPress search bar to your website using a plugin. There are several search plugins out there. Some of the popular search plugins are;

Ivory Search: Ivory Search is a highly versatile search plugin for WordPress that manages to be user-friendly to use in spite of its advanced features. This fantastic plugin allows you to create your very own custom search form. You’ll be able to create an unlimited number of search forms and configure each of them individually to suit your needs.

ACF Better Search: ACF Better Search is a simple but effective plugin that can massively improve the search experience for your visitors. This plugin requires your WordPress site to have Advanced Custom Fields enabled and activated.

Advanced Woo Search: Advanced Woo Search is a powerful WordPress search plugin that is designed to add a useful search to WooCommerce powered websites. With this plugin, your visitors will be able to effectively search through all of your products. To make things even better, it is fast, easy to use, and comes with a ton of amazing features.

Ajax Search Lite: If you want a highly responsive live search plugin for your WordPress site then Ajax Search Lite might be for you. Using this plugin, you will be able to include an AJAX powered search form into your site.

Better Search: Better Search is a free WordPress plugin that will replace the default search form with a much-improved version. Not only does it improve the search speed, but it also provides users with more relevant answers. Easily search through posts, pages, and even custom post types with this fantastic plugin.

We are going to use here the Ivory Search plugin to make this tutorial. However, you can choose any WordPress search plugin. But before choosing, compare plugins to know which one is better to choose.

Click To Compare search bar plugins

Step 01: Install and Activate the Search Plugin

Go to Plugins > Add New.
Search for a plugin that adds the WordPress search bar. E.g., type Ivory search and you’ll get the plugin.
Click the Install Now button.

Install the plugin and then activate it.

Step 02: Configure the Plugin

Ivory search lets you decide which content is searchable and which is not. You can choose your preferences from the Include and Exclude tabs.

You can easily toggle settings to include or exclude posts, pages, attachments, dates, comments, authors. If you have other plugins like WooCommerce and LearnDash you’ll also see options to include/exclude products, lessons, topics, etc

Also, within each post type, you’ll see options to narrow down on what gets indexed. For example, under Posts, you can choose to include only certain posts or categories.

The same settings options are available on the exclude tab as well. Once you’re done with adjusting all the settings, don’t forget to click on Save Form.

Congratulations! Your WordPress search bar is ready to use.

3. Add A Search Bar Using CSS Code

If you’re an advanced user, you might be looking for something that will give you more freedom to make your WordPress search bar more stylish and powerful. You can do it using CSS code. Follow the below steps to get your task ready.

Open the header.php or sidebar.php file (where you want to add the search button).
Just add this function <?php get_search_form(); ?> in your code. It will call the search form from your searchform.php template. If there is no searchform.php file, don’t worry. It will create one by default.
Go to your homepage and you’ll see the Search box in the side menu (if you’d added the function in sidebar.php) or in the upper panel (if you’d added the function in header.php).

How to Add A Search Bar in WordPress (3 Easiest Ways) 10

If you want to customize the style of this box, open style.css file and customize the search-form position, size or styling according to your choice.

/* Search */

.search-form {
       position: relative;
}

.search=form .search-submit {
        bottom: 3px;
        padding: 0.5em 1em;
        position: absolute;
        right: 3px;
        top: 3px;  
}

.search-form .search-submit .icon {
        height: 24px;
        top: -2px;
        width: 24px;
}

That’s it. Now you know the procedures. So, make a search bar for your website as per your designing sense and requirements.

Conclusion

A WordPress website without a search bar is incomplete. Visitors get demotivated to visit a site again if the site doesn’t offer a search bar. That’s not a cool thing, right? So, make your site awesome and exclusive by providing a search bar and take your business to a whole new level.

Do let us know in the comment section how having a search bar is beneficial for your site and if you are facing any issues with it as well.

Beginner’s Guide to WordPress Really Simple SSL Plugin

Among the hundreds of thousands of published WordPress plugins, it is one of the few that have already received more than 4 million active installations yet to date.

If you are a WordPress user, then you have heard the name Really Simple SSL plugin. Really Simple SSL lets you automatically detect your settings, configure your website to run over https, scan mixed content, secure cookies, and so on.

Among the hundreds of thousands of published WordPress plugins, it is one of the few that have already received more than 4 million active installations yet to date. Yeah! You heard it right.

However, why users think that the Really Simple SSL plugin is reliable for the WordPress website?

To answer this question we are going to look more deeply in such as performance, simplicity, consistency, pros and cons, features, and limitations. We will take an in-depth look at these points.

So, keep reading.

The Role That Really Simple SSL Plugin Plays In Your WordPress Website

In 2018 Google announced a plan to improve overall web security by encouraging website owners to switch from HTTP to HTTPS. As part of this plan, their popular Chrome web browser started marking the websites without an SSL certificate as “Not Secure.”

Google also said that websites with SSL will also see SEO benefits and higher rankings.

You might have noticed that when you visit an HTTP website using the incognito window, it marks as Not Secure. When you visit an HTTP website in regular mode and try to fill out a contact form or another form, then the website is marked as insecure.

When your readers and customers see this notice, it gives them a bad impression of your business. This is why all websites need to move from HTTP to HTTPS and install SSL immediately. Not to mention, if you want to accept payments online on your eCommerce website, then you need SSL.

In general, an SSL plugin will automatically:

Redirect all incoming requests to HTTPS.
Change the site URL and home URL to HTTPS.
The content is replaced from http:// urls to https://
It handles all SSL issues you might have in the website.

These are the important things that Really Simple SSL plugin can handle for your WordPress website.

Overview Of The Really Simple SSL Plugin Key Features

Really Simple SSL plugin comes with some really cool features for your WordPress website. Once you installed and activated this plugin, enable SSL with a single click. Then get familiar with the below-mentioned features.

Extensive Scanner: It enables you to detect the source of mixed content that couldn’t be fixed automatically, with a fix button. It also shows you what you have to do if you don’t have the secure lock yet

Mixed Content Fixer: With the mixed content fixer in Really Simple SSL plugin you will get the secure lock. It allows you to check for errors that can occur after forcing SSL.

HTTP Strict Transport Security: Most of the visitors request for an HTTP version of a website rather than its HTTPS counterpart. So chances are their browsers load the unsecured HTTP version. That’s why this plugin has introduced HTTP strict transport security, which forces browsers to load the HTTPS version. With the help of this feature, no visitor sees the HTTP variant of your site.

Premium Support: This WordPress plugin also comes with a premium and responsive email support. Whenever you encounter any issues with the plugin, all you have to do is send them a mail. Boom! Your problem will get solved right away as they give the highest priority to their customers’ emails.

Secure Cookies: Http only and secure flags to make cookies secure and encrypted.

Pros & Cons Of The Really Simple SSL Plugin

Pros and Cons of the Really Simple SSL plugin

Pros and Cons is a common part when we are reading or writing a review, right? So, here we will discuss about the pros and cons of the Really Simple SSL plugin for WordPress website.

Pros of Really Simple SSL Plugin:

Checks the website for an SSL certificate
Shows you what you have to do if you don’t have the green lock yet
Provides premium email facility to its customers
Helps you manage the WordPress-side of installing an SSL certificate
Insecure content reference is parsed and fixed automatically
All of the licenses are renewed at 50 percent of discount on the yearly basis & can be canceled at any time
You can get an email when your SSL certificate is about to expire
This plugin works with all kinds of SSL certificates
Handles common issues with SSL on WordPress
Forces WordPress to load HTTPS instead of HTTP
It allows you to check for errors that can occur after forcing SSL.

Cons:

It may not permanently fix old content
You’ll have to keep the plugin active at all times
You might see a slight performance impact

Really Simple SSL Plugin Pricing Plans

If you choose Really Simple SSL plugin pro over free version, you will get these pro features for your website.

There is an option for mixed content fixer for the back end
You can configure your site for the future HSTS preload list
It provides detailed feedback on the future configuration page.
It boasts a certificate expiration check, which means that you can get an email if your SSL certificate is about to expire.

Pro version comes with three pricing plans as shown below.

Beginner's Guide to WordPress Really Simple SSL Plugin 11

Checking Really Simple SSL Plugin Performance Through WPHive

WP Hive was introduced so that users can take data driven decisions while choosing a plugin based on real time data. That is why we are going to check Really Simple SSL plugin’s performance using WP Hive and see if it really worth the trust of all the users.

Really simple SSL plugin performance test

Performance tests alone can make a difference to use or not to use a plugin. So, after analyzing the performance of the Really Simple SSL plugin. We have come to know that it consumes 128.31KB memory on average that is less than 99% plugins. And it has average page loading time 0.07s that is faster than 99% plugins.

You can know more about the Really Simple SSL plugin performance here.

As we said earlier, this plugin can automatically detect all of your settings and can configure your website to go over https. And each of the incoming requests will be redirected to HTTPS.

Unfortunately, the options are a little limited with this plugin but the developers did this in order to keep Really Simple SSL lightweight which will make your site run more smoothly.

Really Simple SSL VS SSL Insecure Content Fixer: A Short and Easy Comparison

You may have heard the name of the SSL Insecure Content Fixer. With 2M+ downloads and 300K+ active users, it is one of the most renowned SSL plugins to compare with the Really Simple SSL plugin.

That is why we are going to use the unique Compare function of WPHive to find out which one is the best choice for your website.

Memory Usage: Really Simple SSL consumes 128.31KB memory on average. On the contrary, SSL Insecure Content Fixer consumes 20KB memory on average. So, SSL Insecure Content Fixer is the winner in terms of memory usage.

performance test of Really Simple SSL plugin

Page Speed: SSL Insecure Content Fixer and Really Simple SSL plugin has -0.06s and +0.07s page speed respectively. So, here too the SSL Insecure Content Fixer is the winner in the case of Page Speed.

Page speed test of Really Simple SSL plugin

Really Simple SSL VS SSL Insecure Content Fixer Overview: Really Simple SSL plugin has 4M+ active installations and 32M+ downloads yet to date. On the other hand, SSL Insecure Content Fixer has 300K+ active installations and 2M+ downloads. Here is the more parameter to look to identify who is the real winner.

We can clearly see that in some cases, the Really Simple SSL plugin is a better choice than the SSL Insecure Content Fixer plugin.

Apart from this one, there are several SSL plugins are available out there for WordPress users. You can make a real-time comparison among those most familiar and top-rated SSL plugins.

You will be amazed to know that WPHive lets you compare any WordPress plugin you want to. So, choose any of the plugins and make a real-time comparison to get a more crystal clear idea about which plugin is more suitable for your website.

let me compare other ssl plugins With Really Simple SSl plugin

Final Verdict: Use or Not to Use?

As Google announced that without an SSL certificate your site will not get higher ranking and mark as “Not Secure”. So you must use a plugin that ensures an SSL certificate. That means you need a plugin that redirects every request to HTTPS.

As you know, there are several plugins that can do that job. But among them, we just found out that the Really Simple SSL plugin is the best choice from the comparison segment.

So, we strongly recommend you to choose Really Simple SSL plugin over other SSL plugins. As it comes with a free version, why not give it a try on your website!

Let me try really simple ssl plugin

If you have tried this plugin before, then share your feedback through the comment box below. It will surely be helpful for the new users.

Wordfence Security: A Must-Have Security Plugin for WordPress

Wordfence Security has been the most popular security plugin for WordPress over the years. Here we will explore everything about Wordfence. Tag along for a detail review!

The Internet has become an integral part of our lives. From shopping to reading newspapers, everything is now done online. Billions of websites have made our life easier than ever. However, with every opportunity, there is also a threat lurking behind it.

Websites are not any different. That is why website security has been one of the most important issues for cyber specialists. WordPress, the largest Content Management System also faces the same problem. Because it is an open-source software and anyone can use, study, change, and redistribute its source code.

Therefore, it is not impossible to plant any unwanted line of code to any of the plugins. That’s why many security specialists are now providing security plugin for WordPress websites.

That is why we are going to discuss one of the most popular security plugin “Wordfence Security” in today’s article.

Wordfence Security: A Must-Have Security Plugin for WordPress 12

Quick Navigation

Why does WordPress safety matter?
What is Wordfence Security?
Features of the Wordfence Security
Getting started with Wordfence Security
Pricing
Pros & Cons
Performance of the Wordfence security
Alternatives to Wordfence Security
Our Verdict

Why Does WordPress Safety Matter?

As we said, WordPress is the largest CMS in the world with over 35% of websites in the world built using this platform. This kind of popularity made it a target for hackers and evil-doers. WordPress is well aware of this and they now have a security team of 50 people consisting of security specialists to prevent any attack from happening.

However, after all the security measures being taken by WordPress, the threat is still there and WordPress security issue is still a challenge. This is because WordPress is a platform where anybody without prior coding knowledge can build a website. That’s why many of them don’t even know if a malicious code is planted on their website. And even if someone can, it’s not possible to check all the code every day. So what do we do?

You can follow a step by step guide for WordPress security or we can use an alternative method which can solve all the problem at once.

One of the best ways a WordPress site owner can ensure website security is by using security plugins. There are a lot of security plugins available online, but here we will talk about Wordfence Security, the most downloaded security plugin for WordPress.

What is Wordfence Security?

Like the name suggests, Wordfence Security is a security plugin for WordPress. It has an active installation of more than 3 million where no other security plugin crossed the 1 million mark on the WordPress plugin repository.

So, why do so many people choose this plugin to tackle the WordPress security issue? Throughout this article, we will try to find the answer to this question. If you want to know why Wordfence Security is so popular and If you should use it too, read the next parts carefully.

Basic Features Of The Wordfence Security Plugin

Wordfence Security works as a malware scanner and a firewall for your website. It also has a premium version. But unless you are being very careful, the free version has all the necessary features that will get your basic security covered.

Features in The Free Version

A 24/7 firewall for your website that finds and blocks every malicious traffic of your website
Ensures endpoint security, meaning your connection with an endpoint client can’t be breached
Built-in malware scanner that checks for everything suspicious on your core files, themes, and plugins and eliminates malware, bad URLs, backdoors, SEO spam, malicious redirects, and code injections
Warns you if it finds any dissimilarity in codes on core files, themes, and plugins with their counterpart on WordPress repository
Checks and alerts you for many common security issues and vulnerabilities.

It Also Ensures Login Security For WordPress Websites With Some Nifty Features. Such As:

TOTP based two-factor authentication for maximum security
Prevents bots from signing in to your website by using login page CAPTCHA
Does not allow website administrators to log in with known compromised passwords
Limit login attempts to prevent brute force attacks from happening.

Basic Functionalities of The Pro Version

Real-time firewall and malware signature update that you’ll get in the free version after 30 days
Realtime IP blocklist that blocks all the requests from malicious IPs
Checks and alert you if your site has been blacklisted for spamming or any other security issues
It can block all the IPs from specific countries.

Pros & Cons

Wordfence Security has a tremendous amount of popularity among WordPress users, because of its great functionalities. That doesn’t mean that it has no lacking. So let’s have a brief look at the Pros & Cons of this plugin, shall we?

Pros

Wordfence Security has an array of features on its free version, that makes it capable of being your primary security plugin for a small website
The Premium version offers features like live tracking of your traffic and how attacks are being handled
Provides regular firewalls and malware database updates.

Cons

Wordfence Security is a pretty heavy plugin. Because of this, we have seen a noticeable decline in our site performance after installing it. Although there is an option to limit storage use, it might still feel heavy if your site runs on a shared hosting and low storage
Wordfence Security does have some excellent features, but unfortunately, some of the features are aimed at experienced security professionals. A regular site owner might face difficulties to understand all the options and what they do
Free version delays all security updates for 30 days, meaning you will be under potential threat for the time being. Thus, it is advised to use the premium version if possible.

Wordfence Pricing

The Wordfence Security provides a pretty good job with its free version. But if you want real-time firewall and malware database updates and some more useful features, you can upgrade to the premium version.

The pricing depends on the number of sites you want to protect. The more sites you discount you can avail. A standard premium license for a single website costs just $99/year. You can also get a one time discount of 10% if you buy the license for two years and 20% if you buy for three years straightway.

Other Security Plugins Compare To Wordfence Security

Before you go on to choose any plugin, it’s always a smart thing to compare that with some other similar plugin. Luckily WP Hive made it very easy to compare between plugins.

For your convenience, we have come up with an even more detailed comparison with Wordfence and some of the most popular security plugins. And this is what we found out.

Features	Wordfence Security	Sucuri Security	iThemes Security	All In One WordPress Security	Malcare Security
Malware Protection	Yes	Yes	Yes	–	Yes
Firewall	Yes	Premium	Yes	Yes	Yes
Real-time IP Blacklist	Premium	Yes	–	–	–
Core Integrity Check	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Notifications	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Brute Force Protection	Yes	Premium	Yes	Yes	Yes
Login Page Captcha	Yes	–	Yes	Yes	–
Two Factor Authorization	Yes	–	Premium	–	–
Country Blocking	Yes	–	–	–	–
Active Installation	3 millions +	700k +	900k +	800k +	10k +
Pricing	$99/yr	$19.98/mo	$52/yr	Free	$99/yr

From the comparison table above, you can get a clear understanding of security plugins and their features.

Compare Performance Of other security plugins with wordfence security

Finally, what about our views on Wordfence Security? Is the free version capable of protecting your site? Also, is the premium version worth the price? Let’s head over to the performance test to know more.

https://wphive.com/performance-security/best-wordpress-security-plugins/

Performance Checking of Wordfence Security Through WP Hive

WP Hive has an impressive feature that lets you check the performance of a WordPress plugin. You can check the performance of any plugin that you like before you decide to install or even buy that. This helps you to make a smarter decision. So, we have also done the same and checked the performance of Wordfence Security with WP Hive, and got some pretty contrasting results.

Initial Test

The first part of the performance test is all about the quality of the plugin. And Wordfence Security is passed this test with ease. It is compatible with the latest WordPress and PHP versions. There are no code errors, neither there are any activation error.

Wordfence Security: A Must-Have Security Plugin for WordPress 13

However, as we already informed you, Wordfence Security is a memory-hungry plugin and that reflects on the performance tests.

Performance

Wordfence Security uses as much as 3898.97 KB memory on average, which is more than 99% of plugins. Impressively, it increases the page loading time of your website 0.13 seconds on average.

Wordfence Security: A Must-Have Security Plugin for WordPress 14

Stats

Wordfence Security is one of the most downloaded plugin from WordPress repository. Its 649k installation in a single week when reviewed this plugin, is a testament to its popularity. You can also check some more stats of the plugin below.

Wordfence Security: A Must-Have Security Plugin for WordPress 15

LET ME CHECK THE PERFORMANCE OF WORFENCE SECURITY PLUGIN

Our Verdict

Wordfence Security has been around for a long period. Over time it has become one of the most comprehensive security plugins for WordPress. The free version has some excellent features to keep your website safe. The pro version exceeded our expectations and surely outperformed every other security plugins that we tested. This is one of the best security plugins that you can put your trust in.

If you have a new and small website, we recommend you to continue with the free version, as it has almost all the features that the premium version offers. However, for a larger website, you will not want to have any loopholes. So we recommend using the pro version for a larger website.

So, that was it for our Wordfence Security review. We hope this article will clear your doubt about whether you should use Wordfence Security or not. Let us know what do you think. Also, you can share your experience with Wordfence, waiting to listen from you!

Contact Form 7: Feature Review & Performance Checking (Compared with WPForms)

Read the detailed review of Contact Form 7, the most renowned WordPress contact form builder with over 5 million active installations

Why do you actually need a contact form on your website? It’s easy to display your email address and other contact info, isn’t it enough for your audience?

No! Everyone has a website nowadays. All of them are trying to collect more leads-traffics, more feedbacks from their audience to upgrade their business. So, if you think only displaying email or contact info will get the job done, then you are totally wrong.

To collect customer data, suggestions, feedback, and customer’s opinions you need an efficient Contact Form plugin integrated with your website. While emails would make you vulnerable to spams, a contact form plugin will help you reduce spam, increase security. A contact form makes it easier to generate leads, collect real-time data, and more.

We believe that the benefits of using a contact form are undeniable. Therefore, this post is going to assist you by giving an overall review on Contact Form 7, a popular contact form plugin in WordPress territory.

So, let’s get on with the review😊.

Get Familiar With Contact Form 7

Contact Form 7: Feature Review & Performance Checking (Compared with WPForms) 16

Contact Form 7 started its journey back in 2007. It was developed by Takayuki Miyoshi. Slowly the plugin won the customer’s heart and now it has become the most empowered form builder plugin, leaving behind other form builder plugins of the WordPress ecosystem. For example, Ninja form, Gravity Form, WPForms, etc.

Currently, Contact Form 7 has more than 5+ million active installations and over 1000+ 5 star ratings. So you can imagine how popular this plugin is. Despite having a complicated interface, people are using this plugin as the main contact form on their website.

Basic Features & Functions of Contact Form 7

You can add an online form to your WordPress site without any hassle. This is the main selling point of Contact Form 7 for years.

But only this feature is not enough to justify its uniqueness or popularity. Rather it has more functionalities that could easily persuade anyone to use this plugin as a primary form builder on their perspective WordPress site.

In order to stand out among other popular form builder plugins and make the most out of it, Contact Form 7 also has some unique functionalities and features. That’s what we’ll be discussing in this review post.

So let’s have a look at the main functionalities of Contact Form 7 and how they should be implemented in the right way.😊

01. Easy To Add A Contact Form

Contact Form 7: Feature Review & Performance Checking (Compared with WPForms) 17 — Interface of Contact form 7

Adding an online form with Contact Form 7 is easier than ever. Yes, if you’re a regular user of WordPress, then you will able to create a contact form for your WordPress site. You can also operate everything from the admin area.

Here, as you can see there are four available options in the interface area. “Form“, “Mail“, “Messages“, “Additional Settings“. Each section has individual functionality to customize and insert the essential fields in your contact form.

Contact form 7 functions — Form editor interface

When you are done with the customizing process, hit the ‘Save‘ button. And immediately, you’ll get a shortcode.

Next, create a new page where you want to publish your form and then just paste the shortcode that you copied earlier. Then click on the ‘publish‘ button.

Finally, your form is ready to use. You can watch the final output by clicking on the ‘Preview‘ button. That’s it!

So, you can see that the process is very easy. Therefore, anyone who doesn’t have any coding knowledge can easily create a form.

02. Individual Form Editing Interface For Emails

More than 269 million emails are sent per day worldwide & expected to grow its number more than 320 billion in 2021

Campaign Monitor

Email Marketing is one of the proven ways to actually maintain business communication with customers.

And with Contact Form 7 you have the opportunity to easily set up email functionalities in one place.

In short, it’s a compact interface where you can easily configure everything related to email. For example:

You can customize messages
Easily define where to send the email
Add custom snipped code in the additional settings

03. Advanced Form Building Opportunity

You can add more advanced and complex items with Contact Form 7 which is not easy but possible. Using the buttons on the form editor, you can easily insert the options in the form.

You can also insert the basic elements for the form where you will get a popup after you click on an element. For example, you can mark required fields, add placeholder text, and configure them according to your input.

Advance options for contact form 7 — Advanced settings for contact form 7

04. A Rich Collection of Form Fields

Add_New_Contact_Form_‹_Elementor_—_WordPress

With Contact Form 7, you’ll get some useful set of form options. As you can see from the screenshot above, there are a number of handy form fields that let you create a contact form for your website easily.

The extended form field options of Contact Form 7 includes:

Text
Email
URL
Telephone number
Number
Date
Text Area
Drop-down menu
Checkboxes
Radio buttons
Acceptance
Quiz
File attachment/upload
Submit button

05. Integrations To Improve User Experience

To give users what they want or make their task easier, integrations with other plugins can play a vital role. Contact Form 7 misses some features which are found in other paid form builder plugins, like Gravity Forms, or WPForms.

But still, Contact Form 7 makes up for it by having integrations that can easily enhance your opportunity to add more features into your contact form.

let’s check out the integrations of Contact Form 7 below:

Flamingo: It allows you to save responses/messages submitted by users through the contact forms into the database
Bogo: It helps you easily build a multilingual blog on a single WordPress install
Recaptcha: Helps to secure your WordPress site with added security
Akismet: Prevents spam comments
Constant Contact: Using content contact in Contact Form 7, you can plan powerful email marketing campaigns to reach your business goals.

Additional Features of Contact Form 7

Helpful documentation & support system
Contact Form 7 database addon
Different contact form Skins or layout to make your online form more appealing and amazing
Contact form 7 HTML templates for email
Astonishing style options for the Contact Form 7
Contact Form 7 Honeypot that adds a hidden field to your contact form
Redirection feature for Contact Form 7.

These are the basic functionalities you will get along with Contact Form 7.

check out contact form 7 now

Pros & Cons of Contact Form 7

Contact Form 7: Feature Review & Performance Checking (Compared with WPForms) 18

Despite having some unique functionalities (discussed in the earlier section), Contact Form 7 also has some disadvantages. In order to finalize whether to use Contact Form 7 or not, the following pros & cons will easily help you make the decision.

Pros of Contact Form 7 Plugin

Easy to install on any WordPress site (versions)
It has in-built or ready-made contact forms that can easily be added on any post or page
Different custom fields are available to add
100% compatible with any WordPress theme
Has a facility to add re-captcha for preventing spam action
Auto-updates and upgrades will add more features

Cons of Contact Form 7 Plugin

The interface of Contact form 7 is not as easy especially, for beginners
Support options are limited
The core plugin is unable to perform without the help of third-party addons
No preview options are available to check whether the form is okay or not

Checking The Performance of Contact Form 7 with WP Hive

Well, in this section of this review, we are going to explore something interesting now. We are going to review the performances of Contact Form 7 with the help of WP Hive.

WP Hive, a new take on WordPress repository will assist you to check any plugin’s performance, getting insights, and let you make a data-driven decision. For instance, you can search for plugins, compare with other plugins, and get the test result in the end.

Initial Test

After you type “Contact Form 7” in the search button, you’ll able to see the entire test report one by one. So initially we found some necessary information below.

Here as you can see Contact Form 7 is 100% compatible with the latest PHP version and WordPress as well as. Most importantly, there are no activation errors are found here.

Performance Of Contact Form 7

Next, we’ll check the performance. After you scroll down you can find the performance part very next to the earlier section.

However, you can see the performance here. Memory usage is less than 99% plugins, page speed is faster than 99% plugins, and other related insights are given below here.

Impactful Statistics Of Contact Form 7

In the statistics section, you can see the different insights with a graphical presentation. For example, the number of downloads, last update history, ratings, etc.

Let me Test contact form 7 plugin with WPHive

Contact Form 7 vs WP Forms

As a part of the review, an effective comparison can enhance the overall discussion giving more value & interest. In that case, WP Hive will allow you to compare plugins easily and with providing more impactful insights like WPForms review.

Okay without further ado, let’s see the comparison of Contact Form 7 & WPForms and their overall features:

Ease Of Use

We all know that Contact form 7 is the oldest and one of the most popular WordPress contact form builder plugins. But when it comes to adding a form, it seems a little bit hard for you if you’re a beginner. Because you need to use HTML to format the form in the text area

On the other hand, with WPForms, you can stay relax & calm. Because it’s super cool to add a form. Most importantly, you don’t need to apply or know any HTML knowledge. If you’re a novice user, surely it will be great journey for you with WPForms.

Preview Opportunity

It’s very sad to inform you that there is no preview option in Contact Form 7. So it seems hard to measure whether the designed form looks good or not.

Good news! you can always find an opportunity to check and measure what is going on or how your form looks like. Yes, you can easily preview your designed form with WPForms.

Features

However, we’ve already talked about the features of Contact Form 7 in the earlier section. You can find all the basic items to create a form with Contact Form 7. Such as text, number, data, drop-drown, and so on. These are very common. If you want to extend its functionality, you have to integrate third-party-addons.

On the other hand, WPForms itself a package where you’ll find all the enriched and useful tools for your online form. More interestingly, you can unlock more advanced and features by upgrading into the WPForms Pro.

Support & Documentation

You can submit support request in the WordPress support forum. But it should be kept in mind that support system in the WordPress directory, don’t expect a quick response.

Well, in WPForms you’ll get the most comprehensive support with real-time. They offer support ticket for customers, extensive documentations for an easy guideline including enriched tutorials.

Let’s Compare Contact Form 7 Vs WPForms with WP Hive

Simply navigate to WP Hive compare page, and type the plugin names.

Memory Usage:

If you start comparing Contact Form 7 with WPForms, the first comparison that you will see is memory usage. Here you can able to see their overall memory usage comparison side by side. For example, front page, taxonomy, options, new posts, and uploads.

However, you can see that the average memory usage of Contact Form 7 is +318.18 KB and WPForms is +1105.86 KB. So the winner is Contact form 7

Contact Form 7: Feature Review & Performance Checking (Compared with WPForms) 19

Page Speed:

In the very next part, we’ll get a speed test comparison. You will see comparison including average speed, front page speed, comments, and taxonomy, and so on.

So after running a comparison test, the average page speed of Contact Form 7 is +0.01s and WPForms is +0.02s. Again the winner is Contact Form 7.

Contact Form 7: Feature Review & Performance Checking (Compared with WPForms) 20

Some other useful comparisons:

After you scroll down, you’ll find some other useful things about Contact Form 7 and WPForms.

You will see the comparison of frequent updates, active users, total downloads, WordPress ratings, WP Hive ratings, support threads, issues while testing, etc.

Contact Form 7: Feature Review & Performance Checking (Compared with WPForms) 21

So these are the comparisons you can figure out with WP Hive. Or if you want to explore the comparison by yourself, you can easily do that.

compare Contact Form 7 with WPForms or any other

Final Words On Contact Form 7

Our review has come to an end. Throughout this post, we tried our best to represent each & every possible thing that you should know about Contact Form 7.

In order to make a wise decision on whether to use Contact Form 7 or not, the comparison part will definitely help you. So the gear is in your hand, either you can check other form builder plugins or you can stay with Contact Form 7.

However, let us know this review article helped you out or not. You can suggest us which plugin we should review next. You can tell that in the comment section or you can contact us through the form. We’re eagerly waiting for your feedback.😊