Avada theme review – is this the best WordPress theme?

With well over 350,000 (and counting) purchases from theme directory ThemeForest.net, Avada bills itself as the number one best-selling WordPress theme of all time.

Here we take a close look at what Avada offers, and whether being the best-selling theme also makes it the best WordPress theme full stop.

Since it was released in August 2012, Avada has become one of the most popular premium WordPress themes ever. The theme demo page does a very good job of selling the various 'easy-to-use' features of Avada, and convincing both new and experienced WordPress developers that they to can quickly build a professional-looking business website.

However, we all know the reality of unzipping a theme and working on it is often different to the promises made in the promotional material, so we've broken down Avada to see whether it lives up to the hype.

About the Avada theme

Avada is made and maintained by the US-based web design team Theme Fusion, who say:

Avada’s set of features, options and tools make it the most versatile theme on the market by allowing you to take control of virtually every aspect and section of the site. The powerful customization options & features give you flexibility to create the site you want.

What type of WordPress theme is Avada?

There are two main types of WordPress themes - one that is designed to fit a specific website with a specific aim, and has a limited set of customisable options and functionality. These tend to be marketed in line with the industry they are suited for e.g. 'wedding photographer WordPress theme' or 'news/magazine WordPress theme'.

The other type of themes on the market are 'multipurpose' themes which include an array of different features, customisation settings and templates so they can be adapted into any type of website the user wants to make.

Avada is definitely one such theme, and is one of the most feature-rich multi-purpose WordPress themes available. Avada has a lot of features, options, layouts and a host of third-party plugin integrations to give you the freedom to create all sorts of different websites.

As always, there's a fear with such themes that the sheer volume of options and features makes using the theme a 'clunky' experience. But if you're looking for a flexible theme that can easily be modified, then Avada is well worth taking a look at.

Avada theme features

It claims to be one of the most feature-rich WordPress themes, and on that score Avada certainly doesn't disappoint. The demo site lists all of the different features, but we have outlined the main ones below:

• Custom (Fusion Builder) page builder tool with a large selection of elements
• All demo content and separate prebuilt page templates
• Unlimited designs
• Fully responsive
• Video backgrounds for full-width containers
• Side headers (left or right as opposed to just top headers)
• Set header background opacity with independent widths
• Custom background colors and images for individual columns, posts, and pages
• Background image blur and fading effect on scroll
• Testimonial, portfolio, and skills publishing tools
• Built-in styles for popular plugins (WooCommerce and Gravity Forms)

The extensive list of features can be expanded upon by the huge amount of different settings and theme options.

Avada theme options panel

One of the most important aspects of a premium theme you should consider before buying it is the theme options panel.

This is the part of the theme where you will be spending most time, and as anyone who has worked with a theme that has a poor control panel will tell you - it can be a massive drain on your time if it doesn't work very well or is poorly labelled.

As you can see below, the Avada theme options panel is extremely extensive and gives you control over every aspect of your website.

As well as General settings, the theme options panel also gives you control over aspects on a sitewide basis, including:

• Header
• Sticky header
• Site width
• Logo
• Menus
• Page title bar
• Sliders
• Footer
• Sidebars
• Site background
• Typography
• Styling
• Shortcode styling

As with all multi-purpose WordPress themes, if you choose to buy and install Avada the first thing you should do is familiarise yourself with the extensive control panel and work out exactly what you can change and how it works.

Plugins included with Avada

Most WordPress plugins come with third party plugins included, and Avada is no different. One of the big features of Avada though is that it offers seamless integration with the plugins it includes - which means they can be styled to fit in with your website design as part of the theme styling, rather than having to alter CSS files.

The plugins included with Avada are:

• Woocommerce
• Gravity Forms
• Fusion Builder
• bbPress
• Contact Form 7
• Revolution Slider
• Layer Slider
• The Events Calendar

Avada documentation and support

With years of experience working on their theme and directly with the WordPress community, the Theme Fusion team have been able to fine tune and optimise their theme documentation so that it includes everything you need to set up and start building your website.

Every feature of the theme is explained in the documentation, and also contains step-by-step guides to help you get to grips with everything.

In terms of support, Theme Fusion claim to offer the "BEST after sales support around", and the comments and reviews they have received on ThemeForest certainly back up that claim.

Conclusion

As a multipurpose WordPress theme, Avada is certainly one of the best around when it comes to features and customisation options.

It has an intuitive theme control panel and the impressive Fusion page builder will enable you to make any kind of webpage you want quickly with an array of prebuilt layouts.

In terms of pricing, at $60 it is at the expensive side for a WordPress theme - but considering all the features you are getting as well as the stellar documentation and support it's actually a reasonable price.

The only area that lets Avada down slightly is that it becomes a victim of trying to be too much to too many different customers. The wealth of features means the theme can feel quite heavy and clunky to work with, and as such there is quite a learning curve to go through before you could call it 'easy to use'.

Once you've mastered it though, Avada becomes a very powerful theme with almost unlimited potential to build whatever you want.