Better Block Editor (BBE) vs Smush – Image Optimization, Compression, Lazy Load, WebP & CDN

Better Block Editor (BBE) adds responsive layout controls, hover effects, on-scroll animations, and ready-to-use site templates to Block Editor. It’s not another page builder. It doesn’t replace core blocks or add bloat — BBE just adds the missing settings where needed. It works with your current block theme and plugins, so your existing content stays intact. Highlights Responsive Settings for Row, Stack, Grid, Columns, Button, Navigation, and text (Heading, Paragraph) blocks — choose a breakpoint, then adjust orientation, spacing, and alignment at that breakpoint. Responsive Visibility for any block — set the default visibility state and change it at a chosen breakpoint. Prevent Shrinking for elements set to Fixed or Fit-content sizes — keeps complex layouts intact on small screens. Animation on Scroll — configurable animation effect, easing, duration, and delay. Hover colors for Button and Navigation. Pre-made Sites and Partial Import — bring over a full site or a single page/section; assets import automatically. One-click customization for imported content — set primary, secondary, and neutral colors; BBE creates a balanced palette in one click. Native Block Editor integration — no lock-in, lightweight, GPL, and free. Free pre-made site templates Business — https://templates.wpbbe.io/business/ Brewery — https://templates.wpbbe.io/brewery/ Life Coach — https://templates.wpbbe.io/life-coach/ Bakery — https://templates.wpbbe.io/bakery/ More templates coming soon. How it works Import a template and make it yours in minutes with the one-click customization tool. Mix pages and sections from different templates with Partial Import. Create a professional website in hours — not weeks! Features Responsive Settings for Row and Stack — change orientation (convert Row ↔ Stack), justification, vertical alignment, and spacing at a chosen breakpoint. This panel is key to controllable responsive behavior in Block Editor sites. Prevent Shrinking — available when a block’s width/height is set to Fit content or Fixed; prevents fixed-size elements from collapsing on small screens. Responsive Visibility for any block — set the default visibility state (visible/hidden) and change it at a chosen breakpoint. Responsive Settings for Grid — replaces the core Stack on mobile with a dedicated panel to choose the stacking breakpoint and adjust spacing at that breakpoint. Improved Stack on mobile for Columns — choose the breakpoint and optionally reverse the column order at that breakpoint. Navigation overlay menu — replaces the fixed Mobile option with Responsive; pick the exact breakpoint when navigation collapses to a menu icon (useful for headers). Hover color for Navigation — add hover color controls for menu and submenu items. Responsive Settings for Button — control the orientation of inner buttons (stack or reverse), plus justification and vertical alignment at a chosen breakpoint. Hover colors for Button — set text, background, and border colors on hover. Responsive Settings for Post Template (Grid view) — stack posts and adjust spacing at a chosen breakpoint. Animation on Scroll for any block — subtle reveal on scroll with configurable effect, easing, duration, and delay. Responsive text alignment — add alignment controls at a chosen breakpoint for Heading, Paragraph, and select text-based blocks. SVG Icon block + sanitized SVG upload — place SVG icons anywhere; control size, color, hover color, and linking. Breakpoints — edit built-in breakpoints and add or remove custom breakpoints. Requirements & Compatibility WordPress 6.8 or later Uses the native Block Editor (Gutenberg) Works with block themes; does not target third-party page builders Privacy This plugin does not collect personal data from site visitors. It uses standard Block Editor controls and optional template imports. Site owners should review their own analytics/embeds for compliance. License Better Block Editor is distributed under the GPLv2 or later. You are free to use it on personal and commercial sites. Resources Official website — https://wpbbe.io/ User Guide — https://docs.wpbbe.io/

Compress images, optimize images, and enable image lazy load automatically with the powerful Smush image optimizer to keep your WordPress site fast, without losing quality. Smush makes it easy to optimize images, compress images, and deliver images faster across your entire WordPress site. This all-in-one image optimizer automatically reduces image file sizes, enables image lazy load, and serves modern formats like WebP and AVIF, all without breaking image quality or adding extra work. Whether you’re running a blog, store, or portfolio, Smush helps you optimize images at scale and keep your site fast with a trusted WordPress image optimizer. Trusted by 1+ Million Sites | 4.8/5 Star Rating Get everything you need to optimize images and speed up your site. Smush works out of the box with no complicated setup – just install and let it handle the rest. Compress images without losing quality Reduce image file size automatically while keeping your images sharp and clear. Smush is an easy-to-use image optimizer which let’s you compress images using both lossless and lossy compression, giving you the best balance of quality and performance without extra work. You can also compress images outside the media library using Directory Smush, making it easy to optimize images stored in theme folders, plugins, or other directories on your server. Lazy load images for faster pages Enable image lazy load across your site so images load only when needed. This image optimizer improves initial page speed and creates a smoother experience for visitors without extra configuration. Serve WebP and AVIF images automatically (PRO) Convert images to WebP and AVIF and serve them automatically to supported browsers. Smush helps you optimize images using next-gen formats to reduce file size and improve load times across your WordPress site. Deliver images faster with an Image CDN (PRO) Serve images through a global image CDN to reduce latency and improve load times for visitors around the world. 119 global CDN servers Up to 500 GB of bandwidth Faster image delivery based on visitor location Improved performance for image-heavy and high-traffic sites Automatically resize and fix image dimensions (PRO) Eliminate common PageSpeed warnings and improve layout stability with automatic image sizing. Smush dynamically resizes images to perfectly fit their containers, regardless of original size, helping fix the “Properly size images” warning in Google PageSpeed Insights. It also automatically adds missing width and height attributes to your images, improving rendering speed and reducing layout shifts. This helps you meet the “Ensure images have explicit width and height” recommendation without any manual work. Optimize your entire site, automatically Smush works across your whole site as a powerful image optimizer to optimize images as you upload them and maintain performance over time without manual work. Optimize images automatically on upload Compress images in bulk or individually Works with your existing media library No need to re-upload images Enable image lazy load across your site Convert images to WebP and AVIF Deliver images with an integrated image CDN Automatically resize and serve correctly sized images Optimize images outside the media library with Directory Smush Built for performance Smush improves page speed and overall performance by reducing image weight and improving how images are delivered. Reduce page load times Improve user experience Better performance for image-heavy pages Supports image lazy load and preload images (PRO) for faster perceived performance Works with your existing setup Smush is built to work with your current WordPress setup, including popular themes, page builders, and plugins. Compatible with Gutenberg, Elementor, WPBakery, and more Works with WooCommerce stores No need to change your workflow Easy to enable and configure Designed to be simple You don’t need to be a performance expert to optimize images with Smush image optimizer. Works out of the box Simple settings when you need them No technical knowledge required Safe to use on any site Why choose Smush? There are plenty of image optimization plugins, but Smush focuses on making it easy to optimize images, compress images, and improve performance without complexity. As a leading WordPress image optimizer, Smush gives you powerful optimization tools without the technical hassle. Trusted by over 1 million WordPress users Built specifically for WordPress Regular updates and improvements Backed by the WPMU DEV team Get started in minutes Install Smush, activate it, and start to compress images, optimize images, and enable image lazy load right away. This easy-to-use image optimizer helps most sites see improvements immediately without changing how they upload or manage images. About Us WPMU DEV is a premium supplier of quality WordPress plugins, services and support. Learn more here: https://wpmudev.com/ Don’t forget to stay up to date on everything WordPress from the Internet’s number one resource: WPMU DEV Blog Hey, one more thing… we hope you enjoy our free offerings as much as we’ve loved making them for you! Contact and Credits Originally written by Alex Dunae at Dialect (dialect.ca, e-mail ‘alex’ at ‘dialect dot ca’), 2008-11.