Divi vs Elementor: which page builder should you choose?

WordPress page builders divide people into two categories: some hate them, others swear by them. Whatever side you're on, they're here to stay.

WordPress remains a leader in website design, used both as a professional tool for world-class sites and by individuals for personal websites. WordPress is so popular because of its endless customization options, its active community, and the fact that it's open-source: that's what made the rise of site builders possible, among which two stand out: Divi and Elementor.

Today we'll look at Elementor and Divi to highlight their differences, their similarities, and maybe determine which one will suit you best.

Divi

Divi is a WordPress themealso available as a plugin, with more than 700,000 sales (and therefore used by millions of sites): it is arguably the most popular builder for WordPress. Divi is aimed at everyone: agencies, individuals, and independent freelancers, helping them build professional-looking websites.

There are many reasons for Divi's popularity; here are the main ones:

Elementor

Like Divi, Elementor is one of the most popular builders and claims 5 million active websites. Known for its blazing page speed and an interface that is easy to use even for beginners, it offers a free version of its tool. However, if you need all the features, you'll have to get the premium version…

Elementor offers almost everything Divi does, except for a few differences here and there that we will examine later. Among Elementor's strengths is an easier learning curve, which makes it simpler to use and therefore particularly suited for beginners.

Divi vs Elementor: Similarities

Visual drag-and-drop interface

Both Elementor and Divi offer a visual drag-and-drop interface: you can design your page with a real-time preview of what it looks like and even edit text by typing directly on it. While they are similar in substance, they differ in form:

Divi offers a full-screen editor, free of interface clutter, although a button at the bottom of the screen opens a few options. To add and edit a module, you hover over the page and use the buttons that appear on hover. Divi represents each page element with different colors: large sections, smaller ones, and inside them, modules. When editing an element, the contextual window that opens can be resized and moved (by drag-and-drop).

On the Elementor side, users have a fixed sidebar on the left of the screen, visible at all times, that contains all the building elements needed: simply pick from it and drag-and-drop the element onto the page. Although this reduces the feeling of immersion, some users find it more convenient to interact with a fixed sidebar rather than the system of buttons that appear and disappear in the Divi interface.

If you consider the convenience factor, Elementor's interface may appeal to you, especially since it proves to be problem-free and faster than Divi's. But if you prefer an immersive experience with a clear workspace, then Divi is the right choice.

Numerous styling options

Regarding the available styling options, Divi and Elementor are evenly matched, although there are still some differences between the two. Overall, both competitors offer many more designs and styling options than all the others.

It's hard to objectively compare this aspect, both having a lot of tiny features grouped under 'style and design'. So here is, in broad terms, what Divi and Elementor offer in this area:

Responsive design

Divi and Elementor ensure that everything you build is responsive by default. That means your work will look good on smartphones, computers and tablets. Of course, both also let you customize the responsive settings of your designs. You can hide certain specific modules (for example large images on smartphones).

Theme builder feature

These two page builders aren't limited to the content of a single page — they are site builders, allowing you to design an entire WordPress theme. There are indeed WordPress elements that come from the active theme, and often page builders stop at the content of the page being edited without touching those other theme elements.

For example, with Divi and Elementor you can create 'templates' that will deploy across your entire site to:

Right-click support

Both Divi and Elementor support right-click, and they are the only builders to offer it.

The ability to right-click may seem trivial, but it's really convenient and saves a lot of time: with a right-click, for example, you can:

Divi vs Elementor: Differences

Now that we've seen similarities between Divi and Elementor, let's explore the major differences between the two tools.

Elementor includes a popup builder

One of the most noticeable differences between Divi and Elementor is that the latter offers a popup builder, which Divi does not.

Elementor's popup builder lets you create popup windows and display them wherever you want on your website: you can use all of Elementor's widgets inside the popup, which means you can design:

Okay, if Divi doesn't provide a built-in popup builder you can still use third-party plugins — in fact you get free access to the Bloom 'email opt-in' plugin when you buy Divi. But it's still less flexible than Elementor's feature.

Divi offers a built-in A/B testing feature

If you want to build a marketing-focused or e-commerce professional site, you'll love that Divi ships with built-in A/B testing. Just right-click on a module to bring up an A/B test and see how each variation performs. With this feature you can test different images, headlines, CTA buttons — anything you want.

If you plan to design landing pages, this feature will be extremely useful.

Elementor doesn't offer built-in A/B testing, but you can run A/B tests via third-party solutions (like Google Optimize) or 'Split Test for Elementor'. Sure, it's not as convenient as Divi's built-in option.

Divi is available as a plugin or theme

Elementor is just a plugin. Although the Elementor team offers their own theme ('Hello theme') meant to be used with it, it's still a standalone plugin.

Divi, on the other hand, is shipped as either a plugin or a theme. While many don't see this as a major difference, it matters: if you choose the Divi theme, you can be sure your page builder and theme work perfectly together because they are the same thing. With Elementor, that's not always the case.

Templates and layout packs

Elementor and Divi provide a large number of pre-designed templates you can use to save time, so they are similar in that respect. But the way they offer those templates differs.

Divi offers what are called "layout packs," which are themed kits designed for specific niches. For example, if you want to design a site for an auto garage, the Divi layout pack for garages will do most of the work for the pages a garage might need.

With more than 150 packs, Divi therefore offers over 1,000 page templates.

Elementor, for its part, is gradually rolling out its own version of packs, but it currently only has a few site kits.

Elementor and Divi: pricing

The final differentiating element between the two tools is their pricing policy.

Divi costs $80 per year for all features, and for as many sites as you want. You can opt for a one-time lifetime payment at the price of €249.

Elementor offers a free (but limited) version. The Pro version is based on the number of sites, and costs between $49 per year and $999 per year.

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