Welcome back to the channel, my name is Fabrizio Van Marciano and in this video, I will share five of the best Bricks Builder Add-ons you should check! Let’s dive right into it.
Welcome back guys it’s been a while since I created any video content for this channel. I’ve been super busy building websites, and creating content for my online courses, and usually during the summer I tend to take a lot of time off to travel and spend time with the family. But hopefully, you should see more content coming to this channel in the very near future.
OK, so as far as add-ons go for any type of website builder, whether it’s Bricks or Oxygen, some of you may know my thoughts on this.
I don’t like to use add-ons. In most cases, I view them as an unnecessary opportunity to bloat your WordPress site. And also, more often than not, add-ons do exactly what the website builder does, just slightly differently.
And there’s also the small matter of that I can’t be bothered to start from scratch learning how an add-on works and yaddee, yaddee, yadda.
But, that said, there are exceptions. I’ve found a few add-ons that have proven to be quite useful in some of my projects when I’m working with Bricks and Oxygen. So, in this short video, I want to share with you five of the ones that I’m currently using. I’ve tested most of these in real-world scenarios and used them on my client and personal website projects, in my online courses, so let’s dive right into it.
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Best Bricks Builder add-ons to improve your workflow as a designer!
1. AutomaticCSS
Alright, I’ll start with AutomaticCSS which probably doesn’t need any introductions from me, really.
If you’ve been in the WordPress community, and website builder universe for some time, then chances are you may already know about this one.
Now, I was quite late in showing a genuine interest in ACSS, to be honest, and as I said, I don’t really use a great deal of add-ons with Bricks, but when I eventually got around to using it, I was blown away by some of the features that have definitely helped to improve my workflow and quality of life when working with Bricks.
I believe ACSS works with other page builders, it’s not exclusively for Bricks, so I put this add-on to my list for a few reasons –
- ACSS, for the most part, works right out of the box. So if you’re a complete none-techy, you don’t need to feel intimidated by the seemingly endless options that this plugin has. I mean, you can make as many changes as you like, and dive deep into customizing how you want ACSS to work, depending on the goal of your website design project, but it will work fine right out of the box. So that’s that.
- Layout options, you can get as basic or as complex as you like with your layouts. ACSS supports both Flexbox and Grid layouts.
- Color palette management, for me, is one of the features that I love most with ACSS. I can define a set of brand colors at the start of a project using the utility classes and color variables. I can also go back at any time during the design process, and make changes very quickly via ACSS. So there’s no need for me to start messing around with the colors in Bricks, ACSS takes care of all that. The color palette also lets me refine color shades, which is pretty awesome.
So, yeah those are just a few of the reasons I’m enjoying using ACSS, I know there is a lot more to discover about this add-on. But I think if you’re looking for a way to add consistency in your design, as in ensuring each page you build in Bricks is consistent with regards to the right amount of space, the font styling, and colors, buttons, and links, then the best and easiest way to do that is to use ACSS.
Oh, and one thing I didn’t mention is using ACSS removes the headache of some of the challenges of doing responsive design. Yes, Bricks has some great features such as customizable viewports and the ability to add additional breakpoints and whatnot, but when you are creating your layouts using AutomaticCSS’s layout options, it makes much lighter work when it comes to responsive tweaks. You can also add a larger or smaller viewport size, again this is probably something you would want to do early on in your project, and depending on your goals for the website as well.
OK, so I recommend checking out ACSS, if you haven’t already done so, I’ll have a link in the description of this video for you. So you can go over there and check it out. Moreover, Kevin Geary who is the creator of ACSS has some of the best tutorial videos so you’re in good hands.
2. PiotnetForms
As a long-time user of WPForms Pro and Gravity Forms, Contact Forms 7, after using PiotnetForms, I realized one thing. Up until about a year ago, I don’t even know if I should say this, but I now feel as if I’ve been robbed by paying an extortionate annual fee for a premium contact form plugin.
So yes, I guess I said it.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the features of WPForms, but the annual subscription fee isn’t cheap. And I’m being as kind as possible.
PiotnetForms is a breath of fresh air and it’s possible uses are endless. I mean, you can literally create any kind of form for any conversion goal that you have in mind and have complete control over the layout and design, the functionality, and more
Now, on the negative side, if you can call it that – because PiotnetForms is highly customizable, it takes a little while to get around all of the features and options, and there is a lot of it. It can be quite overwhelming at the best of times.
That said, I use PiotnetForms on all my personal and client sites because I love having all those options available. I also use this plugin in my web design courses.
So I highly recommend this add-on if you’re using Bricks Builder, although Bricks has a simple enough contact form element that you can use.
The other thing is this plugin isn’t really an add-on as such, it is a stand-alone plugin that you can use with any WordPress theme, but it does work seamlessly with Bricks.
I should also mention that you can now use PiotnetBricks, which is an add-on for PiotnetForms that will let you build complex functions for your forms without writing a single line of code. So that might be worth checking out as well.
Don’t forget to check out my PiotnetForms tutorials here.
3. WPCodeBox
Next on my list is WPCodeBox. Now, this is one plugin that I use persistently and one that I can’t recommend enough.
In fact, I don’t think I’ve started a single WordPress website design project without installing WPCodeBox in the past few years. It’s become the default plugin.
WPCodeBox2, which is the latest version available, is a powerful code snippets builder and code management plugin for WordPress.
Whether you just want to add some simple custom CSS or create fully-fledged stylesheets to add to your WordPress site, WPCodeBox is the plugin to use.
So what’s the benefit?
For one, you can use it with any WordPress theme, it’s not exclusively for website builders!
Not only can you use WPCodeBox to add custom code to your WordPress site, including PHP, JavaScript, and LESS, but you can also export and import your snippets, and upload your snippets to the cloud so that you have access to them on other websites using WPCodeBox, and more.
Sounds pretty cool, right?
One of the features I use and love the most is being able to create and manage multiple stylesheets for each project, and it will even compile SCSS for you, which is just awesome.
Anyhow, as I mentioned, WPCodeBox works with almost all WordPress themes but works even better with page builders like Bricks and Oxygen. Again, highly recommended.
4. Meta Box
When it comes to adding custom fields to your WordPress site, there are a few options available out there. Meta Box is one of those options, and having used several other custom field plugins in the past, yes including Advanced Custom Fields, for me, Meta Box is by far the simplest to use. That’s based on my personal experience, anyway.
As you’ve probably guessed, Meta Box is an infinitely flexible WordPress custom fields plugin. The core plugin is free to use with additional features available under premium options. As is always the case with plugins.
Even with the free version, you can create custom post types, and custom fields, for almost any goal you have for your site.
I recently added some basic tutorials using Meta Box that you can check out here. I also have some tutorials on how to use Meta Box with Bricks Builder in my Bricks Builder Web Design Course.
5. BricksForge
BricksForge shares some similarities with AutomaticCSS, however, there are a few additional things that you can do. The core features of this plugin are the builder customizer, global classes management, animations, and BricksForge terminal to name a few.
My favorite features are animations, the backend designer, which lets you create custom dashboards, login pages, and admin bar, and the ability to customize the builder which comes in useful if you’re using Bricks to build client websites that you want to make easy to use.
6. Bricksable*
Last but not least is Bricksable, which I’ll be honest with you, I haven’t yet gotten the opportunity to look at properly. However, I’ve recently worked on a client site that has this plugin enabled, and from what I could see with very little experience, that has some useful features.
Like the rest of the plugins mentioned above, Bricksable is designed to enhance Bricks Builder, speed up your workflow, and comes with a nice bundle of useable elements such as FlipBox, floating elements, tiltable images, and more.
The best part about Bricksable is that it’s free to use! So go and check it out, install it on a demo site, and take it for a test drive.
Summary
So there you have it. Not a massive collection but a few of the premium, and free, Bricks Builder add-ons that I like and believe would help enhance your experience, improve your workflow, and help you get the results you’re looking for when working with Bricks Builder.