I’ve built several Elementor sites and have settled upon a set of plugins that I feel get the best out of the builder, both in terms of design and performance. Here I’ll outline the plugins I use and my reasons why.
- Elementor Pro
- PowerPack
- Yoast
- WP Fastest Cache
- Updraft
- WP Advanced Database Cleaner
- Shortpixel
- WordFence
- GDPR Banner
Elementor Pro
Let’s start with the one you’re probably familiar with – Elementor Pro. This is the paid-for version of Elementor and expands the number of widgets available. It’s made by the same people as Elementor and therefore works well with the main plugin.
You won’t find this on the Add Plugin page as it requires a paid for licence, so to download it go to elementor.com.
Elementor recently changed their subscription options so the cheapest one won’t get you the full suite of widgets so it will depend on your budget which subscription you go for.
Once you’ve paid and downloaded the plugin it’ll need to be manually installed. Instructions here.
What it gets you:
- Header and footer template creation
- Widgets
PowerPack
This is a other paid plugin but for me, this really fills in some of the gaps that Elementor Pro doesn’t cover so is the perfect addition as my standard tech stack for clients.
Subscription for one site is £ , which isn’t bad.
To subscribe and download go to powerpack.com.
What it gets you:
- A better, more flexible mobile menu (which is one of the main draws for me)
- More advanced widgets including
Yoast
This is my go to SEO plugin as it’s lightweight and easy to use. It also sits well with Elementor and you can access it directly from the Elementor editor.
If you’re unfamiliar with SEO plugins they basically tell Google what to show to the world when you come up on a Google search. You can also set how the site looks when someone shares your site on Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms. I talk more about Yoast and SEO setup here.
WP Fastest Cache
If you’re not sure what cache is, don’t worry. Simply put, when browsers load your site they talk to the server and download all the files they need. To speed things up though you can use a caching plugin to instruct the browser not to download everything each time, but to show the user a saved version if they’re visiting the site more than once. The benefit of this is that your site loads quicker which is great for SEO and keeping your users happy.
I talk in more detail about the settings I use here.
Updraft
Updraft is a back-up plugin I use when I’m updating sites. With a few clicks it’ll back-up all the site files for you to either download or sync with cloud storage. In the event of an update going wrong you can roll-back to the update point so nothing gets lost. Super important.
For a run through of the settings, check out this blog.
WP Advanced Database Cleaner
Ever had the dreaded “Server error 404” when trying to update you page in the Elementor editor? This can be caused by a few things but one thing that does cause it is having a bloated database. That’s where this plugin comes in.
Every time you make changes to your site it stores what are called Revisions. Over time these revisions take up more and more space and eventually cause some issues. With this plugin you can flush out these revisions (and other stored items) and get everything running smoothly again.
This is a more advanced plugin and a might be a bit daunting. I’ve discussed it more here.
Shortpixel
This plugin takes all your images and optimizes them automatically. It’ll also crate webp versions too. It’s best to make sure you’re uploading pre-automized images (check out this blog for hints) but this plugin makes them even smaller for a quick loading site.
GDPR Banner
If you’re using Google analytics to track your users then you’ll legally require a GDPR banner to allow them to opt-in to tracking. This is my go to banner and it’s super slick and customisable and I love the pop-up feature that provides the details. It’s recently added the function to simply paste the Google tracking ID into the plugin settings so you won’t need to bother with the full tracking code. Works with
Once set up the banner will appear on your site with buttons to either accept or reject cookies, and only when your user accepts will the tracking be loaded.
Other plugins I like
- Duplicator – if you need to move your site to a new host this is a great plugin to use. There’s a free version and a paid version, but the free version has everything needed to move a normal sized site. I talk more about moving sites here.
- Auto optimize – I used to use this a lot on sites but with recent changes to Elementor I’ve found it’s not quite so necessary. It’s an optimizing plugin that works really well. I’ve talked about optiziming sites here.
- The duplicate post one – sometimes it’s easiest to duplicate posts and this is the plugin I’d recommend for that. It’s lightweight and does the job.
- WP SMTP – if you’ve got a contact form anywhere on your site you might want to consider this plugin. WordPress has a built in email sender but it can sometimes just stop working, so this plugin allows you to connect to your email via an SMTP protocol and send that way. It links up with Google and other providers and unless you use Office 365 you shouldn’t need the paid version.
- WooCommerce – if you’re looking for e-commerce with Elementor then this is the one. It’s a great plugin with it’s own library of plugins to create the shop of your dreams. I go into more detail about e-commerce here.
- Really Simple SSL – if you’re having some trouble getting the site to recognise your SSL certificate then this plugin can help set it up for you. Simply install the plugin and activate and it’ll find the certificate automatically and install it fully on your site.
