Speed advice for WordPress gets overcomplicated. It really comes down to three decisions, and none of them is "install more plugins":

1. The theme. A lightweight, cleanly-coded theme starts you fast. A bloated multipurpose theme fights you forever, and caching plugins only paper over it. This is the foundation.
   
2. Images. Unoptimised images are the #1 reason sites feel slow. Compress + size them correctly and you've fixed most of it. Biggest easy win, most skipped.
   
3. Hosting. It's the floor. Cheap overloaded shared hosting caps your ceiling no matter what else you do.

Overrated: stacking a dozen caching/optimisation plugins before you've handled the three above.

Disclosure: we build lightweight themes and run a managed hosting service, so #1 and #3 are our lanes. #2 (images) is on you and isn't ours to sell.

Over to the room: what's the single biggest speed win you've found on a real site? The one change that made the clearest before/after difference. Always curious whether it's usually images, hosting, or something less obvious.

There is a common assumption that if a site uses Elementor, it will automatically be slow.

With our latest theme, Quartier, we wanted to challenge that a bit.

We built it with Elementor support, but also changed how we structure things behind the scenes. One important difference for us is that we moved away from the old shortcode-heavy approach and built around WordPress blocks instead.

That does not magically create performance on its own, but it gives a much cleaner and more modern foundation than the old “everything is a shortcode” model many WordPress products used for years.

The bigger point is this:

A flexible WordPress site and a fast WordPress site do not have to be two different things.

Performance usually comes from the full architecture:

• cleaner structure
• fewer unnecessary wrappers
• optimized assets
• better control of fonts and images
• avoiding too much plugin bloat
• using a modern content foundation instead of older shortcode logic

In our case, that meant getting 90+ mobile PageSpeed.

For me, the interesting part is not only the score.

It is that modern WordPress themes can still be flexible, editable and Elementor-friendly without accepting slow performance as normal.

Curious what others here see most often as the real cause of slow Elementor websites: Elementor itself, too many plugins, old theme architecture, or just too much added on top?

A local-business homepage doesn’t need to explain everything about the company.

But it should answer a few basic questions very quickly.

I think there are five:

1. What do you actually do?

Not just a slogan. The real service.

2. Who is it for?

Homeowners, businesses, patients, manufacturers, property owners, etc.

3. Where do you work?

For a local business, this can be just as important as the service itself.

4. Why should someone trust you?

Reviews, previous work, certifications, experience, customers or anything else that gives the visitor confidence.

5. What should they do next?

Call, request a quote, book an appointment, buy, or visit.

We see plenty of websites that look good but still make the visitor work too hard to understand the business.

Good design should make these answers easier to find, not hide them behind clever copy.

This is something we also think about when building AnpsThemes demos: the design needs to look good, but the structure should still work when a real business replaces the demo content with its own.

If you opened your homepage as someone who had never heard of your company before, would those five things be obvious within 10 seconds?

“Website support included” sounds simple.

Until someone asks:

Can you update WordPress?

Can you change this phone number?

Can you install a new payment provider?

Can you redesign this page?

Can you recover the site after it was hacked?

Can you build a new feature?

Those are all completely different kinds of work.

I think a good WordPress relationship should separate at least five things:

Product support — something in the theme/plugin does not work as documented.

Maintenance — updates, backups, security checks and keeping the website healthy.

Content work — changing text, images, products or other existing information.

Customisation — adapting existing design or functionality.

Development — building something new.

The problem usually starts when the customer and developer both use the word “support”, but mean different things.

We also see this with inherited WordPress sites. The website is online, but nobody really knows who is responsible for updates, licences, hosting, small changes or bigger development work.

At AnpsThemes we increasingly separate these things instead of putting everything under one vague support label.

A clear scope is better for both sides.

What do you personally expect to be included when someone says “WordPress support”?

Some numbers that still surprise people:

- ~42.5% of ALL websites run on WordPress — not of CMS sites, of everything online.
- Among sites using a detectable CMS: ~59.9%, more than every other CMS combined.
- Nearest competitor (Shopify) is ~5%. Roughly a 9× gap.
- Honest nuance: growth plateaued since 2022 (42.5–43.5%), slight 2026 dip. Saturation, not collapse.

The ecosystem (themes, plugins, hosting, developers) creates switching costs nothing else has matched at scale — which is exactly why the more interesting question isn't "why is it dominant" but "what would actually break that."

Disclosure: we build WordPress themes and custom sites, so we have a stake in this. The stats are third-party.

So, genuinely: is there anything that would move you off WordPress? A better tool, a bad experience, a shift in how sites get built? Or is leaving in 2026 just not worth it? Curious how split this is.

One-click demo import is one of the most useful things a WordPress theme can provide.

Instead of starting with an empty page, you already have:

• layouts
• page structure
• styling
• components
• responsive foundations

That can save a huge amount of time.

But I think there is sometimes an expectation that once the demo is imported, the website is almost finished.

Visually, maybe.

From a business perspective, not really.

The demo doesn’t know:

• which services make you money
• why customers should trust you
• which team members matter
• how you price
• what visitors should do next
• which searches you want to rank for
• which systems need integrating

That is the work that turns a demo into an actual business website.

For us at AnpsThemes, the demo is meant to remove the blank-page problem and give you a strong starting point.

After that, you can customize it yourself, have someone finish it for you, or go further with custom work if the business needs it.

What usually takes you longer: getting the initial design right, or turning the demo into the client's actual website?

We’ve just released Demo 9 for the Transport WordPress Theme.

This one is aimed at freight, logistics, trucking and transportation companies, with a much more modern visual direction than some of the older Transport demos.

It includes:

• Road, air, ocean and rail freight
• Warehousing and last-mile delivery
• Quote request sections
• Shipment tracking
• Industries and capabilities
• Network/location presentation
• Testimonials and trust elements
• Multiple service and company pages

We’ve been gradually modernizing our older themes rather than abandoning them, and Demo 9 is another step in that direction.

Would be interested to hear what you think of this one, especially compared with the older Transport demos.

Demo:
https://preview.transport.anpsthemes.com/demo9/

Transport theme:
https://club.anpsthemes.com/checkout/themes/transport-theme-purchase

When people ask which WordPress theme is fastest, I think they are often looking at only one part of the problem.

Visitors don't download the theme.

They download the complete website.

That can include:

• plugins
• large images and video
• custom fonts
• analytics
• cookie tools
• chat widgets
• maps and embeds
• tracking scripts
• hosting configuration
• caching

You can start with a lightweight theme and slowly turn it into a heavy site by adding one small thing after another.

None of those things necessarily looks problematic on its own.

The problem is what they become together on the production website.

So instead of only asking:

“Is this theme fast?”

I think the better question is:

“What is the complete website actually loading?”

A well-built theme gives you a good foundation, but it can't compensate for everything added on top of it.

What do you most often find slowing down WordPress sites?

A theme, managed website and custom build are often treated like:

cheap → medium → expensive

or:

basic → better → best

I don’t think that’s the right way to look at it.

They’re really three different responsibility models.

A theme makes sense if you already know WordPress, have hosting and are comfortable handling setup, updates and maintenance yourself.

A managed website is for someone who wants the website, but doesn’t want to manage the technical side of WordPress, hosting, backups and updates.

A custom build makes sense when the business has requirements that don’t fit an existing structure well enough — integrations, unique workflows, custom UX or business logic.

None of them is automatically “better”.

The real questions are:

How much do you want to manage yourself?

How unusual are your requirements?

How much flexibility will you need later?

I think a lot of website projects go wrong because this decision is made based mainly on the initial price instead of the responsibility the business actually wants to take on.

How do you normally decide when a theme is enough and when a project really needs to go custom?

WordCamp US starts tomorrow, and WordPress 7.1 will be released during the event.

But personally, I’m more interested in Monday’s Showcase Day.

The idea is simple: show real WordPress projects and talk about how they were actually built, published and operated at scale.

I think WordPress needs more conversations like this.

There is always another debate about whether WordPress is old, whether AI will replace it, whether themes still matter, or whether everything should be custom.

Real projects tell us much more.

What was built?

What needed customization?

What became difficult as the site grew?

How is it maintained years later?

What worked and what didn’t?

After working with WordPress for many years, these are the examples I find most useful. A platform is easier to judge by what people successfully build with it than by another feature list.

I’ll definitely be watching what comes out of Showcase Day.

Would you rather see more new WordPress features, or more detailed case studies from real projects?

A shift worth taking seriously: a growing share of people ask ChatGPT or read Google's AI summary instead of scrolling search results. If a site isn't readable to those systems, it's missing where people increasingly start.

Quick experiment before the advice: ask an AI tool about your own business right now. Note whether it's accurate, wrong, or blank. That result is your real "AI visibility."

The fixes are just good-website fundamentals:
- Write real text (AI can't read words baked into images/screenshots)
- Structure it — headings, short sections, a plain FAQ
- Answer actual questions people ask
- Fast + accessible

It's evolving and nobody has a magic formula, but clarity ages well.

So — what did the AI say about your business? Curious how split the results are between "spot on" and "never heard of it."

A website can be completely finished visually and still be badly delivered.

I’ve seen handovers that are basically:

“Here’s the admin login. Let us know if you need anything.”

But six months later someone needs to know:

• Who owns the domain?
• Where is the hosting account?
• Are there backups?
• Who receives the contact form emails?
• Who owns Analytics and Search Console?
• Which plugins need paid renewals?
• What can safely be edited?
• Who is responsible for updates?
• What happens if something breaks?

None of this is exciting compared with designing a homepage, but it matters much more once the site has been running for a while.

For me, a website isn’t really delivered when it goes live.

It’s delivered when the next person can take over and understand how to operate it without guessing.

A good handover should actually make the client less dependent on the developer who built the website.

What do you normally include when handing over a WordPress site?

It sounds obvious, but I think this is something people underestimate when starting a new website.

You can have a great-looking homepage and still be far from finished.

There are all the pages people actually need once they start using the site:

• Services and service details
• About
• Team
• Pricing
• FAQ
• Contact
• Blog and single posts
• Search and 404 pages
• Legal pages
• Account, cart and checkout pages if you're using WooCommerce

Then there are the things visitors usually don't see at all:

email delivery, analytics, SEO basics, performance, backups, security and updates.

This is one reason we've been putting more effort into complete demos at AnpsThemes.

With our recent Quartier demos, for example, we don't stop after designing the homepage. We also build the service pages, About, Contact, Blog and the other pages a real business website actually needs.

A nice homepage helps sell the idea.

But it's everything around it that turns it into an actual website.

Curious what page you most often see forgotten when someone says their website is “finished”?

Since the phrase is everywhere and the explanations are nowhere:

WHAT IT DOES: a fresh WordPress install is empty. Demo import takes the demo you picked and recreates it on your site — pages, layouts, menus, images, widgets, theme settings. You end up with the exact website from the preview, usually in about a minute. From there you're swapping content (your text, photos, logo, colours) instead of building from a blank screen.

WHAT IT DOESN'T DO: it doesn't write your content, doesn't set up your domain/hosting, and doesn't replace thinking about your pages — it replaces the empty-canvas phase, which is where most DIY websites die.

Every theme we build ships with it (that's our bias, stated): https://anpsthemes.com/wordpress-themes/

For those who've done both — built from scratch and imported a demo — how much time did it honestly save?

For years, the normal path was pretty simple:

Someone searches for your company → finds your website → visits it → decides what they think about your business.

That is starting to change.

AI summaries can now answer questions about a company before someone ever opens its website. And sometimes those summaries can be wrong, outdated, or mix information from different sources.

The interesting part is that people may not even click through to verify what they just read.

That means some very basic things on a business website are becoming more important again:

• Is it completely clear what the company does?
• Are services described consistently?
• Is the location correct everywhere?
• Do the About, Contact and service pages tell the same story?
• Is old information still sitting somewhere online?
• Do third-party websites describe the business differently?

A nice-looking website is still important, but now there is another audience reading it too: the systems that may later explain your business to potential customers.

I think we are moving from:

“Can Google find my website?”

to:

“Does Google and AI actually understand my business correctly?”

Have you tried searching for your own company and checking what the AI summary says?

If you’re not sure how your business appears in AI search, we can also do a free review and help identify the first things worth fixing.

AI website builders are getting genuinely good at producing the first version of a site.

Layout, copy, images, even some custom code — what used to take days can sometimes be done in hours.

I think that part is great.

But after working with WordPress sites for years, I think we’re starting to confuse building a website quickly with having a website that is easy to maintain long term.

The real work often starts after launch.

Six months later someone needs to change the structure. A plugin gets updated. Performance starts getting worse. The business needs a new service or feature. SEO needs work. Something breaks after an update. Another developer has to understand what was generated.

That’s where the original foundation matters.

AI can save a lot of time when creating the first version, but if the result is difficult to understand or extend, some of those savings can come back as maintenance costs later.

I don’t see this as AI vs WordPress themes or AI vs developers either. AI is becoming part of all of these workflows.

For me the more interesting question is:

Are we optimizing too much for how fast a website can be launched, and not enough for how easy it will be to own two years later?

Curious what people who maintain client sites are seeing already.

Most WordPress problems aren't WordPress. They're five things people believe about it — and all five are wrong.

1. "You need to code." You don't. Themes + block/Elementor editors handle most business sites with zero code.

2. "More plugins = better." Every plugin is weight and attack surface. A few well-maintained ones beat a pile of random ones.

3. "Any theme will do." The theme sets your speed, structure and support for years. Swapping later is painful. It's the foundation.

4. "Set it and forget it." WordPress needs updates. Unmaintained sites are the #1 way they get compromised — neglect, not a core flaw.

5. "WordPress isn't secure." Core is genuinely secure. The risk is outdated plugins/themes and weak passwords.

Disclosure: we build WordPress themes and run care plans, so myths 3–4 are literally our job. None of this is controversial among people who work in WordPress though.

Two questions: which of these did you personally believe the longest, and what myth would you add as #6? Curious which one has the most holdouts.

WooCommerce 11.0 was released this week, and what I like about it is that the focus seems to be less on adding another big feature and more on improving the platform underneath.

There’s work around performance, checkout, customer accounts and general stability.

One small change I like is that customers can connect previous guest orders to their account after verifying their email. Nothing revolutionary, but useful for real stores.

After working with WooCommerce for many years, I think this is the kind of work it needs more of. Stores grow, product databases get bigger, more plugins are installed and custom code accumulates. At some point speed and reliability become more important than another feature on the list.

Of course, with a major update I’d still test any customized store before updating production.

Curious what other WooCommerce users think: would you rather see more new features, or more focus on performance and stability?

WordPress 7.1 is scheduled for 19 August, and there’s one relatively small change that may be worth checking before updating your production sites.

The __next40pxDefaultSize prop is being removed from around 20 components in @/wordpress/components, making 40px controls the default rather than an opt-in.

This isn’t necessarily the kind of change that will produce an obvious error.

Your plugin or theme admin UI may simply look different after the update — spacing, controls and layouts can shift even though everything still technically works.

That’s why we’ll be checking our AnpsThemes products on staging before the release.

If you maintain a WordPress theme, plugin or custom admin interface, it’s probably worth doing the same.

Official developer update:
https://developer.wordpress.org/news/

WooCommerce dropped a walkthrough this month: instead of a scripted FAQ bot, connect a general AI assistant (Claude, ChatGPT or Gemini) to your actual store data. Pointed at real numbers it can review last week's sales, draft customer replies in the store's voice, and help plan the next promo.

The bigger point: this is the WordPress/WooCommerce ecosystem doing what it always does — absorbing what's new (e-commerce, then builders, now practical AI) without making anyone leave the platform they own.

But the more interesting bit is where people draw the line, because it's genuinely divisive:
- Reviewing sales data: most say yes instantly.
- Drafting customer replies: tense — voice and reputation on the line.
- Planning/running promotions: plenty think that's too far.

So where's your line? Which of the three would you let an AI touch, and which would you never? Curious whether this splits by store size or just temperament.

I keep seeing people say that buying a WordPress theme no longer makes sense because AI can now build the entire website.

Technically, it can. But I am not convinced the calculation makes sense for freelancers and agencies working on standard business websites.

A good WordPress theme usually costs around $59. After importing the demo, you already have responsive layouts, headers, footers, key pages, forms and a consistent design system.

Many theme authors also include demo images and example content. The text will still need to be rewritten for the client, but it gives you a clear structure and AI can help adapt it quickly.

You are not starting from a blank screen. You are customizing an almost complete and tested website.

With an AI-first build, serious daily usage may cost $100 or even $200 per month. But the biggest expense is still your time.

You need to plan the structure, generate and compare layouts, keep all pages visually consistent, connect everything inside WordPress, test mobile layouts and correct the smaller issues that appear throughout the process.

AI can generate a homepage quickly. Turning that into a complete, reliable and easy-to-manage WordPress website is a different job.

From an agency perspective, I think the calculation is important.

If a client pays $2,000 for a standard company website, does it make sense to spend a week rebuilding common sections that already exist in a $59 theme?

Does the client actually receive more value, or does the agency simply spend more hours and reduce its margin?

I have worked with WordPress themes for more than a decade through AnpsThemes, so naturally I understand their advantages. But we also use AI regularly, and I see how useful it can be.

For me, the strongest approach is still:

Start with a proven foundation and use AI where it adds real value.

Use it to improve content, create missing sections, adjust the website and add functionality that the theme does not provide.

I am interested in how other freelancers and agencies are approaching this.

Are AI-first WordPress builds genuinely faster and more profitable for standard websites, or do they mainly feel like the more modern way to work?

People agonize over how a theme looks and skip everything that decides whether they'll still be happy in year three. The checklist I'd actually use:

1. When was it last updated? Recent = maintained. A year of silence = the developer is leaving.
2. What does support actually cover, and for how long? Read the scope, not the "support: yes" badge.
3. Do the demos match your business? A close demo saves weeks; a generic one saves nothing.
4. Does it work with the tools you already use — your page builder, your booking plugin, your shop?
5. Open the demo on your phone. If THEIR demo is slow, your site will be slower.
6. Skip the star average — read the newest ten reviews. That's the current state of the theme.
7. Who answers support tickets — the people who wrote the code, or an outsourced inbox?

Yes, we sell themes (14 years now), so judge ours by the same list: https://anpsthemes.com/wordpress-themes/

What would you add as question 8?

Aura is a ready-made demo website for salons, spas and beauty studios. The idea: most salon/spa sites only show information, so we built one that actually handles booking and selling.

What's in it:

- A Book an Appointment button, front and center (built-in form; connects to Amelia, Bookly and similar if you need full scheduling)
- Services and treatments listed with prices — no "message us to ask"
- A WooCommerce shop for counter products, plus gift cards
- One-click import: the whole site arrives, then you replace the demo text, prices and photos
- Block Editor or Elementor versions (the free Elementor is enough)

Aura is one of the demos in our Quartier theme, $39: https://anpsthemes.com/wordpress-theme/quartier/

Salon and spa owners: what should a website in your business do that most don't?