BoldGrid

What it is

BoldGrid is a suite of WordPress tools, and its page builder, called Post and Page Builder, is the product this entry covers. It is a plugin with a drag-and-drop editor, aimed at freelancers and agencies that build and manage WordPress sites. The company says BoldGrid "makes it easy to create beautiful websites on WordPress" and that its tools let a freelancer or an agency efficiently build and manage professional websites. Around the builder sit a theme called Crio, a backup and migration plugin, SEO and caching plugins, and a cloud staging service. The site's footer says BoldGrid is a registered trademark of InMotion Hosting, Inc.

What you build and how

Post and Page Builder works inside WordPress posts and pages. The editor is true WYSIWYG, in the company's words, so you build visually "without shortcodes or coding." You drag text, rows and columns to modify layouts, and a set of design tools covers icons, section backgrounds, column designs, row colors and text settings. Widgets and components, including WordPress core widgets, can be added directly in the editor, and you can switch between visual and text editing modes. The site also describes the builder as a way to preserve a site's design while creative and editorial teams create and edit content.

Blocks are the speed feature. They are pre-built page elements, pre-populated with content, that you edit with the visual editor or by modifying the HTML and CSS. The company says you can build pages in half the time with them, and BoldGrid Premium Blocks add further designs. Favorite blocks can be saved to a block library for reuse, and the company says the builder generates new blocks on the fly so you do not run out of fresh content. Across the whole product, the home page says you can create an entire site from reusable blocks, cutting design time from days to hours.

Other editor features are specific. Sliders and blog widgets render in real time, so you see how they will look before publishing. A blog widget can hold a single post or a list of posts. Tabs put more content in less space; each tab is its own section, with its own text and background colors. Hover boxes show a different set of content when a visitor moves the mouse over an area, with each element set to always show, hide on hover or show on hover. Responsive tables let you drag columns to width and turn each row into a card on phones and tablets so nothing needs a scrollbar. Sliders come in 2 types: a content slider keeps the background static while text and images change on top, and a section slider gives each slide its own background. Custom color palettes make your site colors available right in the editor, and custom backgrounds change columns, rows and sections in a few clicks. There are over 30 animations to assign to any element, and "Instagram-like" filter effects for images. An auto crop tool asks whether to keep the aspect ratio when you replace a picture with one of a different size. Google Maps can be added through the Add Media function, Font Awesome icons are included, and Google's whole font library is available for body text and headings. The feature list also names parallax effects, page gradients, background patterns, image shapes, column shapes and an image editor, plus pre-designed button styles you can adapt.

Responsive behavior is set per block or element. You set conditions for how blocks appear depending on screen size, or hide them entirely for certain sizes. The builder is designed to work with the Bootstrap grid and outputs valid Bootstrap markup, and you can create custom CSS classes on elements and reuse them. Padding, margins and colors have extensive controls. Four page templates can be set for each page: Theme Default, Full Width, Left Sidebar or Right Sidebar.

The company says there is a short learning curve. You should be able to start building "within just a few hours," and many customers created entire websites in a single day. A 9 video playlist on YouTube covers the basics, from what Bootstrap is to dragging and dropping and the responsive device controls.

The wider suite fills in the rest of the job. The home page lists a WordPress Website Builder with hundreds of templates designed by industry, edited in the same visual editor, and Crio, a "SuperTheme" with more fine-grained design control. Total Upkeep handles automated remote backups to Amazon S3 or Google Drive, rollbacks if a theme or plugin update fails, and migration. BoldGrid Easy SEO analyzes your content in real time and makes recommendations. W3 Total Cache is listed with 1+ Million users. Cloud WordPress launches instant WordPress installations for testing, staging, prototyping and sharing, and the page says you can delete an instance and start over. A WordPress Pro Design Suite bundles Crio, the page builder and the backup plugin as a professional design package. BoldGrid Central is the dashboard that gives free access to the community editions of these products.

Plans, licensing and support

Pricing for the page builder is shown as 2 editions. Premium is "$2.50/mo," billed annually, and Free is "$0 to start," also billed annually. The company encourages trying the community edition for free. A Premium purchase is downloaded from BoldGrid Central and installed like any plugin. Asked how many websites Premium covers, the FAQ answers that you may use it on any website directly owned by you or your company. The Premium offer on the page names Premium Blocks, Sliders, Tabs and Premium Support. Premium is also part of the wider suite of plugins, tools and services activated by the BoldGrid Premium Connect Key.

If you do not renew, your premium connect key converts to a free key. The site keeps working, but you lose premium functionality until you renew. Because the builder does not rely on shortcodes, disabling the plugin does not break your site.

Support differs by edition. Premium users get a dedicated ticketing system in BoldGrid Central for 1:1 support. There is also an official support portal, user forums, a learning center, and a user group called Team Orange. For people who would rather hand the work over, BoldGrid sells design and development services for the Post and Page Builder and the Crio theme. On compatibility, the company says the builder is compatible with the majority of WordPress themes, and that it should not affect installed plugins, though running several builder plugins together can cause issues.

Testimonials are on the company's own page. One user says Post and Page Builder took their site designs to heights they could not reach on their own. Another, about Total Upkeep, says "You can easily transfer WordPress installations just by copy-pasting a link."

Who it suits

BoldGrid suits freelancers and small agencies that build many WordPress sites and want a visual builder at a low annual price, with a free edition to test first. The block library helps when you build similar sites again and again, and the cloud staging and backup tools suit people who manage client sites. Because the company says the site is "powered by WordPress," you can take your website to any web host.

The caveats are about scope. The builder is a post and page tool, so a store or app-style data layer is outside it. The $2.50 per month price is billed annually, and the Premium offer centers on premium blocks, sliders, tabs and ticket support. The finished site runs on WordPress hosting you choose, and the company points to hosting partners for people just getting started. It also says WordPress "currently runs 40% of the web."