Generate Press Review 2024 - Is It The Fastest WordPress Theme?

Planning to launch your own WordPress site? You will require a good theme for it. A theme that is not only lightweight, but fast too. 

Nowadays, there are millions of people running their WordPress blogs/sites. In order to stand out from the crowd, your website must look appealing to its target audience. It must grab their attention and compel them to take action. 

So, if you are looking for the fastest WordPress theme, I bet GeneratePress won’t disappoint you. Go through this GeneratePress review and help yourself make an informed decision before you build a WordPress site or blog. 

You will get everything here, right from the overview, features, pricing to installation, comparison, etc. 

What is GeneratePress? 

The most important part of this GeneratePress theme review is knowing what it is. 

It is a free-to-use, lightweight, customizable and highly responsive WordPress theme developed by Tom Usborne. It is especially designed to handle any kind of web project.

It currently has over 2 million downloads, 3,00,000 + active installs, and more than 1000 5-star ratings. 

While being customizable, it ensures that your website is secure, stable and well-optimized. 

Once you understand the free version, you will be lured to upgrade to the premium version that offers better customization for building a website.  

Is It Really A Superfast Theme? 

The loading time of any website matters a lot. As it determines the number of visitors a site will attract and retain. 

A fast-loading website leads to:

• Better search engine rankings
• More conversions 
• Higher user engagement
• Increased sales
  

You can use the Pingdom speed test to check the speed and performance of the GeneratePress WordPress theme. 

To further improve the speed of your WordPress website, you must use a premium caching plugin like WPRocket that offers a range of features to up your loading speed. 

GeneratePress Features 

As you already know that this theme offers various customization options, we can’t ignore its multiple features that make it an excellent choice to build a website. 

In this section of GeneratePress review, we are going to dive deep into its main features and modules, and what these can be used for. 

1. The Customizer

It offers a WordPress’ default customizer, which means users don’t have to worry about learning its user-interface. It consists of various elements required to refurbish the look & appearance of your website. 

This is the place where you get the settings for colour, layout, typography, background images, widgets, along with other layout & customization options for your website. 

Besides, there’s also a separate WooCommerce customization section for those who have a  WooCommerce store. Here you can modify the look of your product, store and checkout pages for your customers. 

2. Layout Control 

GeneratePress WordPress theme offers three ways to control its layout:

• Via customizer
• Through separate posts/pages
• Through Layout elements 
  

Let’s discuss two out of these options. 

The layout controls via the customizer offers more options than the individual post/page layout controls. The customizer lets you manage all the elements of a site like the colours and typography controls. 

It allows you to control the number of sidebars, the layout & width of the menus, the height, width and padding of each element so that it appears according to the visitors/reader’s device. 

Layout options in page/page editor lets the user configure any page layout or a particular post. It allows you to change the footer widgets, sidebar layout as well as the page builder content container type. 

Moreover, once you activate the Disable Elements module, you can disable various elements such as the header, footer, top bar, navigation, title, etc.

3. Colours & Typography

The premium version of this theme offers a wide range of colour and typography options. 

Colours

It offers around 60 colour choices for customization and configuration. Go to the Customizer, and select Colours to do this. 

The colour panel allows you to edit the colour of the several elements of your site. You can set  and customize the font colour, background colour, link colours, or whatever you prefer to modify that suits your design. 

You can pick the colour of your choice by either the colour picker or by typing a hex colour code. If you wish to go back to the default colour settings, you can easily do it by clicking on the ‘default’ button. 

Typography

You can also customize and change the typography such as the font style, size of any element of the site. It allows you to change the typography settings of the body, header, widget, body, menu, sidebar, and various other elements.

As far as the font family is concerned, you can either pick Google fonts or system fonts. You can change the font size, font weight as well as apply text transformations, etc. 

4. Responsive Options 

The theme is extremely responsive. 

No matter what customization you do, it will stay responsive and support any device and screen resolution that you use. 

It goes a step further by letting you control the typography settings and the responsive layout too. For instance, you can set a different header padding size for mobile as well as desktop screens. 

The responsive option may not be so extensive but it does a great job of allowing you to customize how your site will appear depending on the user’s device. 

Advanced Responsive Controls 

If you wish to enjoy more control over the responsive layout of your site, you can use some more tricks and tweaks. The theme offers helpful documentation to guide you with this. The advanced tweaks are simple. 

5. Schema 

One of the best features of GeneratePress theme is its built-in schema support. 

As per Google, Schema is important for showing the website’s content and SERP rankings. Not only it improves the SEO of a website, but it also boosts the SERP rankings too. 

6. Premium Modules 

Let’s look at the various premium modules offered by the theme. 

• Backgrounds - You can customize the background image here, and configure background options for different elements of the site. 
  

• Blog - Once you activate the blog module, you get to access the advanced layout controls for it. For instance, you can set the visibility of the author’s name, tag, date, category, etc. 
  

There’s a separate option that allows you to choose whether to show an excerpt or not and how many characters it should have. Though, you will have to enable it. 

• Copyright - This module allows you to change the copyright message that appears in the footer of your website. 
  

• Colour - The colour module offers a plethora of colour options which are discussed above.
  

• Disable Elements - This allows you to disable various elements on a specific page or post. Do this by selecting the layout options on a post/page, and then click on the Disable Elements option. 
  

• Elements - This module allows you to easily add advanced tweaks as well as customizations to your website. It is mostly used by high-end developers/users. 
  

There are mainly three types of elements - Hook, Header and Layout

1. Hook - It lets the user add content to any hook available on the site. This feature is especially beneficial for advanced developers as it allows them to customize the output of the site without using a child theme. 

2. Header - It allows you to insert a custom header. A custom header can be built using CSS and HTML. 

3. Layout - It allows you to add a specific type of layout to a page, post or any other part of the site. 

Each element comes with a display rule that can be configured. The conditions of the display rule have to be set for the elements to be displayed. Furthermore, you can display on the entire site or on only certain posts, pages, tags, etc. 

• Menu Plus - You can configure extra options such as mobile menu, sticky navigation, off-canvas panel, mobile header, etc. 
  

• Sections - Once you activate this module, you can access a mini page builder, and can enable/disable different sections on a page or post. 
  

It provides a panel for arranging and adding the sections while it removes the sidebars. 

Once you click on the Add Section button, you’ll be able to insert a new section block. You can use HTML and CSS to configure the section blocks. This feature allows web designers to create lightweight pages. Besides, you can use plugins such as TinyMCE Advanced to build blocks easily. 

Each section block comes with its own settings to configure the block’s layout, background, colour as well as custom CSS options. 

• Typography - This means all the extra typography options that we already discussed.
  

• Spacing - This module allows you to add spacing and padding options. 
  

• WooCommerce - You can only activate this module, if you have WooCommerce installed on your site. This is how you will manage your WooCommerce store, products, colour & typography, layout of the checkout pages, etc. 
  

• Secondary Nav -  This module works for adding the secondary menu location. 
  

7. Site Library

This module allows access to hundreds of ready-made templates. These templates help in creating a website as it offers the basic page and demo content. 

A filter will let you pick the template that is created with either Beaver Builder or Elementor. If you do not wish to use these templates, select option ‘None’ as shown in the image above. 

It also shows that they haven’t used any page builders. However, at first glance, it may appear to you that the templates are created with the help of page builders, but it isn’t the case. 

If you select a template, you’ll be able to see various details like the type of plugins that are used. It also allows you to determine whether you should import the demo content or not. 

Some of the templates offered by Site Library:

• Prime - Developed by LH Consulting, this template looks like Amazon. If you wish to start an eCommerce store, this is the best choice for you. 
  

It uses various plugins including Contact Form 7, AJAX Search for WooCommerce, Simple CSS, MailChimp for WordPress, Responsive WordPress Slider - Soliloquy Lite and WooCommerce. 

• Head On - This is a good template if you wish to have a powerful landing page. It contains a big header landing page that immediately grabs the visitor’s attention. It uses lesser plugins and is lightweight too. 
  

• Vibe - Created by Flint Skin, Vibe is a template that allows you to beautifully present your work or services. It is ideal for agencies, freelancers as well as studios who wish to display their services. 
  

Though it's built using Elementor, it offers a free version so you needn’t worry about paying for using another WordPress product. 

• Volume - The Volume template has been built keeping in mind all the content creators out there. It mainly focuses on the clarity and readability aspect of a site. It uses GeneratePress Premium. 
  

• Uno - Uno is a superb landing page template. It uses the free version of the Elementor plugin. 

• Studio - Developed by Paul Lacey, Studio is a template that uses contrasting colours. It uses quite a few plugins like Beaver Builder Plugin (Pro Version), MailChimp for WordPress, Lightweight Social Icons, Menu Icons, WP Show Posts, and PowerPack Lite for Beaver Builder. 
  

• Aspire - A minimalist template, it helps in displaying a brand. It uses plugins like WP Show Posts and Elementor Pro. 
• Pivot - Pivot is the best option for people who prefer a corporate style template. This uses different plugins such as Beaver Builder Plugin, Google Map, Lightweight Social Icons, Black Studio TinyMCE Widget, WP Show Posts and MailChimp for WordPress. 
  

• Branded - Branded by Paul Lacey was designed depending on the feedback given by various branding experts. It also uses a number of plugins including Beaver Builder (Pro Version), Power Pack Lite for Beaver Builder, Menu Icons and WP Show Posts. 
  

Customer Support & Documentation

Besides being packed with powerful features, GeneratePress also offers phenomenal support as well as documentation. 

Support 

In terms of customer support, both the free and premium versions of GeneratePress are quite good. 

If you remember, earlier when you Googled your queries or any issues related to GeneratePress, the top of the SERP was either a link to its support group or the official documentation. 

If you search phrases like ‘How to add JavaScript GeneratePress’ or ‘how to add a custom sidebar GeneratePress’ without putting the quotes, and you will find that the top Google results are the documentation/support forum. 

You can check the quality of its support by visiting the support forum. 

Once you go to the support forum, you will get replies from Tom and his expert customer support team. The staff is always there to guide you through any issues and often go that extra mile to solve your problems. 

Even the free version of this WordPress theme provides excellent support and most of the queries are answered by the support team or Tom himself. I am sure they’ll help with any issue that comes up. 

Documentation 

If you go to https://docs.generatepress.com/, you will get to know a lot of things right from installation and upgrade of the premium version of this theme to how to use filters and hooks, as well as add CSS and PHP. 

Every module/topic is properly explained in the documentation. 

If you see its Typography module documentation, you will find how extensive it is. It contains the basic as well as general options along with few advanced options like customization of Google Font list, etc. 

As I already mentioned, you can anytime Google your query and the top results will be a link to the documentation or the support forum, while making it easier for you. 

GeneratePress Theme Price

The basic version of the theme is free of cost. However, if you wish to use the Premium version, you’ll have to purchase a license for the GP Premium plugin. Once it’s installed and activated, you get access to all the premium modules as well as the Site Library which has attractive ready-made sites to fasten any project you work on. 

The Premium version is used by over 80,000 satisfied users. It offers mainly two plans: 

1. Yearly - It is priced at $59, and includes:

• All premium features
• Complete access to the Site Library
• 1 year of premium support 
• 1 year of updates
• Can be used on up to 500 websites 
• 30-day money back guarantee 
  

2. Lifetime - There is a one-time payment of $249

• Complete access to the Site Library
• All Premium features
• Lifetime premium support 
• Lifetime updates 
• Can be used for 500 websites 
• 30-day money back guarantee
  

GeneratePress Premium Review 

This WordPress theme is being used by millions of users worldwide. A lot of them have reviewed it as the highest-rated WordPress theme due to its extensive range of exceptional features and functionalities. You can easily build a website of your choice using this theme. A GeneratePress theme works amazingly well especially for bloggers. So, if you are considering building a blog of your own, it is the best choice. 

So, if you’re wondering whether you should opt for the GP Premium version or not, it is ideal if you wish to build a business website. As we know, the premium version will require you to pay an amount of money. 

Opt for the premium plugin if:

• Want to access premium modules, functionalities and features
• You wish to create a WooCommerce site
• You want a theme for lifetime with excellent features
• You wish to opt for a lightweight, mobile-friendly, SEO-optimized and quick-loading theme
  

What Do The Users Have To Say About It? 

As far as the users’ opinion is concerned, there’ve only been positive reviews about this theme. 

You can check this just by going through its support forum and see how it helped solve different problems faced by different users, and how satisfied they were. You don’t even have to search for testimonials or feedback elsewhere. 

Clearly, more than 95% of its users are quite happy with the theme. 

Frequently Asked Questions

1. How to use GeneratePress Premium? 

To use the premium version, the first step is to get a license for it. Once it’s downloaded and installed, you will be able to use it like any other WordPress plugin. This gives you access to all the GP Premium modules. In order to make the theme work faster, enable only those modules which are of use. 

2. How does the Lifetime subscription work? 

The Lifetime plan provides a lifetime access to all the plugin’s updates as well as premium support. You don’t have to worry about renewing your license key. 

3. How does the Yearly subscription work? 

If you go for the yearly subscription, you’ll have to renew the license key to receive more updates as well as premium support. 

4. What kind of customer support is offered? 

You are offered excellent support with the premium support forums anytime. 

5. Will my website break if I don’t renew my license? 

Not at all. Your website won’t get damaged. Once you buy the premium version, you can use it lifelong for free. 

6. How many sites are supported by GP Premium? 

You can activate your GP Premium license on upto 500 websites, for your clients or yourself. 

7. What all is included in the updates? 

The updates include new features and modules, performance improvements as well as bug fixes. 

8. What’s the refund policy?

There's no-questions-asked 30-day refund guarantee in case you aren’t happy/satisfied with GP Premium. 

9. Can I upgrade from the Yearly subscription to the Lifetime subscription? 

Yes, you can upgrade from the yearly plan to the lifetime plan in the account at a considerable cost. 

10. Will my Yearly Plan license key get renewed automatically? 

No. Once you make a purchase, you’ll never be billed after it. After a year, you can renew the license key. 

Final Words

To conclude, GeneratePress beats a lot of other WordPress themes out there due to its performance, functionalities & features, support as well as pricing. All these factors make it nothing else but a good choice. 

Whether you’re building a simple website, or a professional one, it is an ideal theme. 

There’s hardly any learning curve that comes along with the theme, it can be as complex or as easy as you take it. Though it is a multi-purpose theme, it still doesn’t face baked-in functionality like other themes. 

In case of any issues, it offers a support forum, powerful documentation, and a Facebook group. So, there’s always someone to help you out there. 

You don’t have to stress about using page builders with it. It allows you to make content and build anything in a fast manner. Therefore, if you prefer to use any page builder like Elementor, Beaver Builder for building your WordPress site, GeneratePress plays along quite well with these. 

In a nutshell, if you are looking for a feature-packed, fast-loading WordPress theme that offers unlimited website usage and impeccable support, the GP Premium version is worth a pick.