Some of my clients who use GoDaddy self hosted WordPress are absolutely frustrated with Thrive Architect. Every time they try to update Thrive Architect plugin in most of the cases they end up breaking their WordPress website. They end with an error called “HTTP 500”. Nothing is accessible, you cannot even get to the WordPress backend.
There are two ways to fix this issue. Firstly you can use FTP to delete Thrive Architect and then again reinstall it via Thrive Product Manager. Another way is to restore the previous backup of your whole website (if you lucky enough and your web host keeps a regular backup of the site)
Some of my clients reached out to Thrive Themes support and they plainly said that the memory limit of GoDaddy is not enough. They cannot do anything about it. So in the end they just end up coming to me, pay me, just so that I can help them update Thrive Architect.
As you can see that this is a massive pain in the ass! Nobody wants to click on the update button with the fear that it might break their entire website. Also nobody wants to depend on someone else to fix it every time their website breaks.
The bottom line is that people who faces this issue needs a parmanent solution. The closest alternative to Thrive Architect is the Elementor Pro page builder plugin.
Furthermore, if you update Elementor in GoDaddy self hosted WordPress site, it will NOT break your website. I have updated Elementor several times on GoDaddy self hosted WordPress sites without any issues at all!
Thrive Architect and Elementor similarities
Both Thrive Architect and Elementor Pro are front end page builders. Both are extremely light weight, fast and extremely easy to use. When Thrive Architect was first released in 2017, most people said that it is a copy of Elementor. But Thrive Architect improved their user interface quite a bit, it is a bit easier to use than Elementor, in my opinion. Please have a look at both of their user interface, I have embed the screenshots of each one. Please click on the image to enlarge.
Elementor Pro user interface
Thrive Architect user interface
Brief Thrive Architect and Elementor Pro comparison
| Thrive Architect | Elementor Pro |
| No sliders, carousels of any type. Not even for logo carousels, gallery, testimonials etc. | Different types of sliders, carousel elements are available. Even a gallery element. |
| No Theme Builder included, you will have to buy it separately | Advanced Theme Builder included |
| No flip-boxes. | Flip boxes and other advanced animated elements included. |
| Contact form with limited number of fields | Advanced contact form with the ability to add any custom field you want |
What will you miss out if you use Elementor Pro instead of Thrive Architect
I will be honest here. If you do not use Thrive Architect you will definitely miss out in their conversion focused landing page templates. Their text editor is a bit superior to Elementor, you can highlight text and easily copy and paste text directly from word documents. So if you are a copywriter or marketer looking forward to sell products and do affiliate marketing, then I would suggest you keep Thrive Architect.
The Elementor text editor is a bit clunky and sometimes very frustrating to use. You cannot highlight text easily, you have to go around a bit, you can have a look at this blog if you want to highlight text in Elementor. But if you get used to using Elementor and you can build templates from scratch, then you can go for it.
Final Words
Before you decide to switch to Elementor from Thrive Architect, carefully assess your needs and requirements. For example, consider these things: is your website an ecommerce site? Do you need a custom blog page? Are you a marketer or a copywriter?
If you are confused, then please feel free to contact me.