Can omitted features in free versions of themes typically be added with plugins?

  • [A newbie question that has probably been asked and answered many times, but I have no idea how I’d phrase a search string. Please just point me toward existing answers.]

    Looking around at the free versions of commercial themes I’m seeing that they generally omit features that you’d need to start really customizing the theme. Pretty basic things like menu styles. I’m also seeing free plugins that apparently provide some of the same features that have been omitted from the free versions of themes.

    So before i dive blindly into this, is it generally true that free plugins can fill in most of the gaps for customizing pretty basic features that have been purposefully left out of the free versions of commercial themes? Or are the free versions set up to block that kind of customization?

    I don’t mind spending a few bucks for a solution that’ll work, but I hate to pay to head down a dead-end street. I’ve already bought and given up on Avada (well, basically Fusion Builder) when I ran into “Fusion Code”. I’ve bought Elementor Pro on faith and a 30-day trial, but now I’m looking at Free and Pro versions of themes without knowing what kind of roadblocks I might run into when I get deep into a given theme that I’ve paid 50 bucks for.

    I realize this is a pretty non-specific question, but I’d love to be pointed toward the common wisdom on this sort of thing.

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  • There’s no answer that fits all situations. The only thing that can be said is “maybe”, and the only way to find out is to try the themes and the plugins together to see if they do work, or if they crash everything. Every theme is different and can do things in different ways, so without knowing exactly what you want a theme/plugin to do, it’s going to be impossible to know if it will or won’t fit your needs.

    To be honest, if you’re not quite so sure of doing the programming work yourself, you’re mostly better off going for a commercial theme that does what you want it to do, and utilising the support from the author/vendor for things that yu can’t figure out from the documentation.

    Thread Starter dtronvig

    (@dtronvig)

    That sounds pretty reasonable. It’s just about inevitable that I’ll resort to some odd plugin or add some HTML and CSS at some point, but I may as well keep that to a minimum.

    Thanks,
    Drew

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)
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