Content Aware Sidebars – Fastest Widget Area Plugin vs Easy Widget Columns

Content Aware Sidebars is the #1 WordPress Sidebar Plugin You can optimize conversion rates, boost on-site SEO, upsell products, and much more by displaying different widget areas on different conditions. Create tailored widget areas in seconds. No widget logic coding required. Show or Hide Widgets on Any Page (Yes, any) Replace your theme sidebars on different conditions, or insert widget areas with shortcodes. The following Display Conditions are available out of the box: Posts, Pages & Custom Post Types Content with Tags, Categories, or Custom Taxonomies Content written by select Authors Page Templates Blog Page & Post Type Archives Author Archives Taxonomy Archives Front Page, Search Results, 404 Not Found Page bbPress Profiles, Forums & Topics BuddyPress Profile Sections Languages (Polylang, qTranslate X, TranslatePress, Transposh, Weglot, WPML) Pods Pages You can even combine conditions in any way you like! E.g. target all posts in a select category and written by a specific author. Add Unlimited Sidebars & Widget Areas Create a post sidebar, a page sidebar, a category sidebar, or any custom sidebar you need – no coding required. CAS will never slow down your site, even if you create a lot of custom sidebars and conditions. Sidebars – Quick Select© lets you add or select widget areas directly when editing a post or page. Schedule & Disable Custom Sidebars In the All-in-one Sidebar Manager you just pick a start and end date for when widget areas should be displayed, and CAS will take care of the rest. 1-Click Sidebar Activation© lets you activate or deactivate widget areas instantly. The Most User-friendly Widget Manager When adding new widgets to sidebars, Live Search will find widgets instantly, and the smart split-screen makes it a joy to manage a lot of widgets and sidebars. The Enhanced Widget Manager adds the signature turquoise line to easily identify custom sidebars. Sidebar Plugin Integrations & Support CAS autodetects Custom Post Types and Taxonomies created by any plugin or theme. Built-in support for some of the most popular WordPress plugins means that you e.g. can create WooCommerce sidebars for select products or BuddyPress sidebars for your members. bbPress BuddyPress / BuddyBoss Easy Digital Downloads qTranslate X Pods Polylang TranslatePress Transposh Translation Filter WooCommerce Weglot WPML Customize Your Widget Areas Your Way Without writing any code, you can modify the HTML and CSS classes of widget areas, widgets, and widget titles. You get full control over the look and feel of your sidebars and widget areas, no matter what theme you use. Sidebar Visibility lets you elegantly hide any widget area for logged-out users. Complete control over your WordPress widget areas Upgrade to Content Aware Sidebars Pro and get these additional powerful features: Totem – Smart Floating Button Like the button you may have seen by Intercom or Helpscout, only this is for all your widgets Sticky Sidebars & Widget Areas Make any sidebar or widget area sticky without hurting site performance. No jQuery and no bloat Widget Areas after Paragraphs Display a widget area after a specific number or percentage of paragraphs in your content Even More Display Conditions Advanced Custom Fields data Meta Box data URLs + wildcards Referrer URLs Date Archives & Content by publish date BuddyPress Groups Random Widget Area Designer Add responsive widget columns and edit colors, backgrounds, paddings, etc. Widget Areas in Theme Hooks Intelligently infuse new widget areas into your theme without coding Automatic Widgets Backup Easily restore any changed or deleted widgets Widget Cleaner Save memory and remove clutter by disabling and removing unused widgets Extended User Visibility Show or hide widget areas for User Roles, BuddyPress Groups, and more Time & Weekday Schedule Display widget areas only in select time ranges on given days Container Widget Turn widget areas into reusable blocks and show the same widgets in different places Duplicate Widget Areas A real time-saver when adding new similar widget areas and so much more… Upgrade at anytime instantly and securely from your website’s Admin Dashboard. More Information Documentation GitHub Twitter

Easy Widget Columns makes it really easy to arrange your widgets in rows of columns. It works by adding a new ‘Column width’ select option at the bottom of your widget’s form that allows you to set a width value for each widget. You can define new rows and sub-rows of widget columns with the ‘Widget Row’ widget and the ‘Sub-Row’ widget respectively, allowing you to create complex layouts directly from within your widget area or sidebar. Genesis Framework users, be sure to check out the Widgetized Page Template plugin, which helps you create full-page widget areas to use as a “blank canvas” with Easy Widget Columns. Works With Most Themes Easy Widget Columns is optimized for use with the Genesis Framework, but it is not required. It uses the Genesis Framework Column Classes to display your widgets in rows of columns. If your theme already incorporates the Genesis Framework Column Classes, or you want to manually add or edit the CSS, you can choose not to load the CSS under ‘Settings’ > ‘Widget Columns’ and rely on your theme’s stylesheet instead. This option is recommended for most Genesis users or those concerned with loading additional assets on their website. Translation and RTL Ready The plugin supports RTL layouts and is translation ready. Filters for Developers The following filters are available for you to take full control of the plugin on your themes. ewc_include_widgets – This whitelist filter is used to add the width control ONLY to the specified widgets. ewc_exclude_widgets – This blacklist filter is used to remove the width control from the specified widgets. ewc_color_palette – This filter allows you to add a custom color palette to the color picker control in the ‘Widget Row’ widget. ewc_preset_classes – This filter allows you assign preset CSS classes that display as a checkbox list in the ‘Widget Row’ widget. ewc_advanced_options – This filter allows you to remove specific or all advanced options from the ‘Widget Row’ widget. 1. ewc_include_widgets / ewc_exclude_widgets Both filters accept the widget’s ID base as parameters. Please note that you cannot use both filters at once. The ewc_include_widgets filter will always take precedence over the ewc_exclude_widgets filter and overwrite it. The examples below demonstrate how you can implement these filters on your theme. add_filter( 'ewc_include_widgets', 'myprefix_add_ewc_control' ); /** * Filter to add the EWC control to specified widgets. * * @param array An empty array. * @return array An array containing the widget's ID base. */ function myprefix_add_ewc_control( $ewc_widgets ) { $ewc_widgets = array( 'meta', // WP Meta widget 'archives', // WP Archives widget 'calendar', // WP Calendar widget 'categories', // WP Categories widget ); return $ewc_widgets; } add_filter( 'ewc_exclude_widgets', 'myprefix_remove_ewc_control' ); /** * Filter to remove the EWC control from specified widgets. * * @param array An empty array. * @return array An array containing the widget's ID base. */ function myprefix_remove_ewc_control( $ewc_widgets ) { $ewc_widgets = array( 'recent-comments', // WP Recent Comments widget 'recent-posts', // WP Recent Posts widget 'rss', // WP RSS widget 'tag_cloud', // WP Tag Cloud widget ); return $ewc_widgets; } 2. ewc_color_palette This filter allows you to add a custom color palette to the color picker control in the ‘Widget Row’ widget. It accepts an array of hex color values as parameters. The example below demonstrates how you can implement this filter on your theme. add_filter( 'ewc_color_palette', 'myprefix_ewc_color_palette' ); /** * Filter to edit the color palette in the color picker control. * * @param array An empty array. * @return array An array containing hex color values. */ function myprefix_ewc_color_palette( $color_palette ) { $color_palette = array( '#252724', '#ce6b36', '#31284b', '#a03327', '#3b3e3e', '#67b183', ); return $color_palette; } 3. ewc_preset_classes This filter allows you assign preset CSS classes that display as a checkbox list in the ‘Widget Row’ widget. The following example demonstrates how you can implement this filter on your theme. add_filter( 'ewc_preset_classes', 'myprefix_preset_classes' ); /** * Filter for predefining EWC Widget Row classes. * * @param array An empty array. * @return array An array containing new values. */ function myprefix_preset_classes( $classes ) { $classes = array( 'hero', 'parallax', 'slider', 'content', ); return $classes; } 4. ewc_advanced_options This filter allows you to remove specific or all advanced options from the ‘Widget Row’ widget. This can be useful for limiting design functionality on a client website (decisions, not options). The following example demonstrates how to completely remove all advanced options. // Remove all advanced options from the Widget Row widget. add_filter( 'ewc_advanced_options', '__return_false' ); The example below demonstrates how to disable or enable specific advanced options. The display parameter toggles the advanced option and the active parameter determines if the panel will display open (1) or closed (0) when the Widget Row widget is first added into a widget area. add_filter( 'ewc_advanced_options', 'myprefix_display_advanced_options' ); /** * Filter to remove specific advanced options from the Widget Row widget. * * @param array An array containing default values. * @return array An array containing new values. */ function myprefix_display_advanced_options( $display ) { $display = array( 'ewc_background' => array( 'display' => true, 'active' => 1, ), 'ewc_margin' => array( 'display' => false, 'active' => 0, ), 'ewc_padding' => array( 'display' => false, 'active' => 0, ), 'ewc_class' => array( 'display' => true, 'active' => 0, ), ); return $display; }