When Gutenberg launched in 2018 it was half-finished. Barely usable for anything beyond basic text posts. Elementor dominated the visual page building market, and rightfully so. Seven years later the situation looks different.
Gutenberg today
Full Site Editing has matured considerably. You can edit headers, footers, and templates without touching a single line of code. Not as smooth as Elementor in every situation, but sufficient for the vast majority of sites. And the big advantage: it's built in. No extra plugins, no extra JavaScript, no extra load time.
WordPress 6.4 and 6.5 added pattern management and improved responsive editing. It's not the same half-baked editor from three years ago.
Elementor today
Still smoother for complex layouts. The drag-and-drop interface is polished after years of development. Motion effects, popup builder, custom breakpoints, it's all there.
But it comes at a cost. Sites built with Elementor typically weigh 200 to 400 KB more in JavaScript and CSS. That affects Core Web Vitals, especially on mobile devices. And every extra plugin dependency is a potential security risk.
What we choose
Simple sites, landing pages, blogs: Gutenberg. You save a dependency and get better performance without sacrificing essential functionality.
Complex layouts with many sections, advanced animations, and specific responsive adjustments: Elementor still offers more control. But ask yourself whether you truly need all of that.
Our approach: we always start with Gutenberg. Elementor comes in only when it's actually needed. Not the other way around.