Brainstorm Force is an Indian online solutions business that created the WordPress theme Astra. Since its 2014 inception, it has become extremely popular among WordPress users and website owners because of its remarkable performance and adaptability. It is a speedy and lightweight theme that is designed to offer a strong framework for creating websites quickly and simply.
What does “Astra” signify to you?
Astra is a highly flexible theme that works well for personal blogs, WooCommerce businesses, and portfolio websites. Better more, it offers a plethora of SEO-focused tools to assist you improve your search engine ranking.
Furthermore, it offers you almost complete control over your website’s appearance. To set up quickly, there are several pre-built startup templates available. You may also set up several blog page layouts and access global font and color preferences.
Additionally, you may use Astra Pro to create unique looks for different sections of your website. To add a call to action (CTA) box at the end of every blog post (or blog post from a specific author or category), you might build one.
Astra’s Characteristics
1. Lightweight and Fast
The lightweight design and quick performance of the Astra WordPress theme are two of its best qualities. Astra’s minimum CSS and JavaScript files and well optimized design assist to speed up your website’s loading time. Higher conversions, better search engine rankings, and an enhanced user experience may all come from this.
2. Customization Options
Astra is an adaptable theme for a variety of website kinds since it provides a large number of modification possibilities. You may import and alter the many pre-made beginning templates that are included to create a bespoke website. Moreover, it has a robust theme customizer that lets you alter your website’s layout, fonts, colors, and other elements without knowing any coding.
3. Responsive Design
A responsive website is essential in the mobile-first world of today. Astra guarantees that your website works flawlessly and looks fantastic across all platforms, including PCs, tablets, and smartphones. Because of its responsive design, your content will look great on a variety of screen sizes and offer a consistent user experience on all devices.
4. SEO-Friendly
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a key component of Astra’s design. It adheres to SEO best practices, which include the use of optimized header tags, clean and valid HTML code, and schema markup. In order to help you optimize your website for search engines and increase its exposure in search results, it also supports well-known SEO plugins like Yoast SEO and Rank Math.
5. Accessibility Ready
The Astra WordPress theme’s accessibility readiness is yet another noteworthy feature. All users, even those with impairments, may use it because of its design. It makes your website more inclusive and user-friendly by adhering to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 requirements and including features like keyboard navigation, skip links, and optimal contrast ratios.
Installing and Configuring the Astra WordPress Theme
It is simple and easy to install and configure the Astra WordPress theme. Here is a detailed guide:
- Get the Astra theme from the WordPress theme repository or the official website.
- Go to “Appearance” > “Themes” after logging into your WordPress admin panel.
- To upload the downloaded Astra theme file, select “Add New” and then “Upload Theme.”
- To activate the Astra theme on your website when it has been uploaded, click “Activate.”
You may use the integrated theme customizer to alter the theme to your liking after it has been activated. Without knowing any coding, you may alter the header and footer styles, colors, fonts, and layout. To get your website design process started, it also offers a ton of beginning templates that you can import and modify.
Cost and Schedule
Astra provides the theme in both free and paid editions. While the subscription edition, known as Astra Pro, unlocks more sophisticated features and functionalities, the free version only offers basic functionality and customization possibilities. Three price levels are available from Astra Pro:
- Astra Pro: For $59 a year, you have access to all of Astra Pro’s features, such as more beginning templates, priority support, and sophisticated customization choices.
- Mini Agency Bundle: $99/year; ideal for freelancers and small agencies, it includes Astra Pro along with additional robust plugins like Schema Pro, Convert Pro, and WP Portfolio.
- Agency Bundle: This package, which costs $199 a year, gives web developers and agencies access to Astra Pro, all Brainstorm Force plugins, and upcoming versions.
You can test out the premium edition of Astra risk-free and see whether it suits your needs thanks to its 14-day money-back guarantee.
Benefits and Drawbacks
Astra has advantages and disadvantages like every other theme. Let’s examine them in more detail:
Advantages
- Extremely customizable: With Astra’s extensive customization possibilities, you can design a distinctive website that perfectly suits your business and aesthetic.
- Performance-oriented: It has a faster loading time and a better user experience since it is speed-optimized and adheres to performance best practices.
- SEO-friendly: With its clean code, schema markup, and support for well-known SEO plugins, it was developed with SEO in mind, which will assist to raise your website’s search engine ranks.
- Accessible: Because it complies with accessibility guidelines, all users, including those with impairments, may easily navigate and enjoy your website.
- Connectivity to well-known page builders: It gives you greater design versatility by integrating easily with well-known page builders like Beaver Builder, Gutenberg, and Elementor.
Drawbacks
- Restricted features of the free version: Astra’s free edition offers some basic customization choices, but other more sophisticated capabilities are exclusive to the premium version.
- Additional add-ons must be purchased for greater functionality: For more sophisticated features like giant menus and custom layouts, it provides a number of add-ons, but they are not part of the main theme and must be purchased separately.
Astra WordPress Theme in Comparison to Other Well-Known Themes
There are several WordPress themes on the market than Astra. To evaluate how Astra compares, let’s look at some other well-known themes:
- Astra vs. GeneratePress: Astra and GeneratePress are both performance-focused, lightweight themes with comparable customization possibilities. While GeneratePress provides a free edition with less capabilities, Astra offers more pre-made beginning templates.
- Divi vs. Astra: Divi is a well-liked theme that provides greater design versatility than Astra thanks to its drag-and-drop visual builder. Divi, on the other hand, may have a higher learning curve and might be intimidating for novices.
- Astra vs. OceanWP: Astra’s characteristics are comparable to those of OceanWP, another lightweight and adaptable WordPress theme. But compared to OceanWP, Astra performs better and is more SEO-friendly.
- Avada vs. Astra: Avada is a well-liked and feature-rich WordPress theme that offers a visual builder and a plethora of customization choices. It is not as lightweight as Astra, though, and it can cause your website to load more slowly.
Astra is a well-liked option for WordPress users since it provides an excellent mix between flexibility, performance, and SEO friendliness.
Final Thoughts
It is a WordPress theme with many features and capabilities that is very configurable and performance focused. It’s also critical to safeguard your website; WP Login Lock Down guards against brute force login attempts, and WP Force SSL guarantees a secure connection. It is a great option for any website because to its SEO friendliness and accessibility, and its integrations with well-known page builders offer creative freedom. Because of its reasonable price options, it is a good option for agencies, freelancers, and small enterprises. Even though it could have certain drawbacks, its features and overall advantages make it a formidable competitor in the WordPress theme market.
How to get Astra?
Astra is a popular customizable WordPress theme. Click here to select a package. Starting price is just $59.
