Genesis framework is well-known for its SEO-optimized code and strong security features. Due to the performance first approach, most Genesis child themes do not include any control panel.
Additionally, the framework uses hooks and filters which are not particularly beginner-friendly.
Earlier I have shared some of the best premium & free Child themes for Genesis, if you haven’t gone through it, you can browse all the Genesis skins below:
For these reasons, you need to install third-party plugins to get more features. While there are lots of Genesis plugins out there, you don’t need all of them. Rather, you only need to use the most reliable and useful plugins for your Genesis-powered website.
In today’s post, I will introduce you to the top 20 most wanted Genesis plugins. All of these plugins are available in the WordPress plugin repository.
Feel free to download and try them on your website.
17 Genesis WordPress Plugins to Help in Customization & Extension
1. Genesis Simple Edits
This highly popular Genesis plugin provides an easy solution to edit the three most common areas of your website – the byline, post meta and the footer section. You can edit all these sections without messing around with any filters, hooks or PHP code. It is possible to put normal text, HTML code or shortcodes into the sections.
2. Genesis Simple Hooks
This brilliant free plugin lets you attach HTML, PHP code or shortcodes to more than 50 Genesis hooks. The plugin will create a new settings page under the Genesis menu in your website dashboard. By using that page, you can define the content and the relevant hook. When using the plugin, you won’t have to create custom functions to insert content into the hooks.
3. Genesis eNews Extended
Genesis eNews was a very popular genesis widget which was removed in Genesis 2.0. By using the Genesis eNews Extended plugin, you can bring back the plugin along with some enhanced features. The plugin supports most mailing list service providers including MailChimp, AWeber, FeedBurner and FeedBlitz.
4. Genesis Responsive Slider
If you are looking for a plugin which lets you display a slideshow of featured posts, Genesis Responsive Slider is the answer for you. This fully responsive plugin allows you to choose the maximum dimension, specify a category or specify the post IDs to display in the slideshow. The slideshow could be placed in a widget area too.
5. Genesis Simple Sidebars
Genesis Simple Sidebars allows you to create custom widget areas and place the areas into the sidebars. The plugin supports two sidebars – Primary and Secondary. It is also possible to assign the sidebars to specific posts, pages, tag and/or category archives.
6. Genesis Title Toggle
This very useful plugin lets you hide the page title from any page you want. The plugin will add a new metabox in the WordPress post editor. By checking the hide checkbox, you can easily hide the title for any page. The plugin also allows you to set site-wide defaults. You will find the option in the ‘Title Toggle’ section at the Genesis > Theme Settings page.
7. WP Responsive Menu
WP Responsive Menu lets you create fully responsive, mobile-supported navigation menus for your Genesis-powered website. Besides customizing the color, the plugin lets you choose the menu animation too. You can also choose to add your logo to the menu, hide specific things, enable swipe gestures, pinch zooming etc.
8. Genesis Layout Extras
While Genesis is not provided with any additional page payout, you can use the excellent Genesis Layout Extras plugin for getting extra layouts. The plugin comes with customizable layouts for the home page, search results, 404, posts, pages, attachments, author, date archive, category, tag etc. The plugin also has layouts for the custom post types created by other Genesis plugins.
9. Genesis Visual Hook Guide
If you want to customize your Genesis child theme on your own, this is a must-have tool for you. This is actually the plugin version of Genesis Tutorial’s extremely popular Visual Genesis Hooks and Filters guide. By enabling the plugin, you can view the hooks, filters or the markup of your currently active theme.
10. Genesis Translations
If you want to translate the Genesis framework into other supported languages, you can do that by using the Genesis Translations plugin. The plugin frees you from fiddling with the functions.php file or uploading the po and mo files for the translation process. You can check the available languages in the StudioPress translations page.
11. Genesis Connect for WooCommerce
Planning to create an e-commerce site with Genesis and WooCommerce? Make a note to install this plugin in your site. This handy plugin will replace the default WooCommerce styles for various pages with Genesis-ready styles. By using the plugin, you can enjoy customized designs for the product, product category, tag archive and the main shop pages.
12. Genesis Simple Menus
Genesis Simple Menus provides an easy way to manage the secondary navigation menu of your Genesis-powered website. The plugin allows you to set customized navigation menus for specific posts, pages or taxonomy pages. These settings will override the values provided in the Appearance > Menus page.
13. Genesis Simple Share
Social shares have become an important element of modern website. By using the Genesis Simple Share plugins, you can provide easy sharing options for your visitors. By default, the plugin enables the sharing icons for each post. However, you can customize the plugin settings by going to the Genesis > Simple Share page from your website dashboard.
14. Genesis 404 Page
Customizing the 404 page requires special expertise, which could be challenging for most newbies. Furthermore, Genesis uses a function to generate the default content for the page. If you want a simple solution for customizing the 404 page, this is the plugin for you. The plugin lets you choose the title and content of the page.
15. Genesis Printstyle Plus
This is an interesting plugin for creating print-ready version of your webpages. The lightweight plugin will add a printer-friendly CSS file in the currently active Genesis child theme. The print versions will be stripped off any unnecessary page elements like widgets, sidebar, forms etc. Besides English, the plugin is also available in German and Italian languages.
16. Genesis Featured Page Advanced
The default Featured Page widget of Genesis is an excellent way to display some of your best content. However, the default widget does not offer enough customization options. Genesis Featured Page Advanced offers an enhanced version of the widget. Along with customizing the title position, you can also upload images in custom sizes, display page excerpts, remove links from the title, insert read more links, etc.
17. Genesis Custom Headers
If you want to add custom headers in your posts, pages or any other custom post types, you should install Genesis Custom Headers on your website. This powerful plugin lets you display a custom image, the featured image, slideshow, custom content, iframe content or rah HTML code into the custom header.
Final Words: Genesis Framework Plugins
By using the above-mentioned plugins, you can easily customize your Genesis-powered website. Let me know which plugins are most useful for you.
Did I miss any of your favorite Genesis plugin(s) here?
If yes, please let me know the name(s) by leaving a comment below. I will be happy to take a look.
Here are a few hand-picked posts for you to read next:
So many plugin – will it not impact performance of website.
Great Plugin collections.
I love Genesis Framework and my site looks cool with it 😉
Thank you for showing us these wonderful plugins. But Please I have a question, I want to add a read more link to the genesis child theme. Is there a plugin that can help me do that?
I am using gensis and this article has been of great help for me. Thanks for providing the list of all the plugins. Really Helpful!
Excellent buddy i was just after Mobile Menu Plugin and here thy are (WP Responsive Menu and Genesis Simple Menus) but yet to test them out
just wanted to leave a quick thank you
Thanks Rauf.
This post made my day bro!! Just looking to customise the Child theme in genesis framework and this post is there…
Hey, Foysal!
Some very impressive collection of the great Genesis-related plugins that I am glad to find!
I gotta dig into them as I recently started using Genesis framework (which is surprisingly awesome)
Thanks again!
~ Adeel
Thanks Foysal very helpful Article, Their is so much to do with genesis plugins I never heard about them thanks once again.
Hi Foysal!
Just came across your list. What a great resource! Here is another one you might consider. WP Clips permits update-safe code customizing of Genesis child themes in addition to multisite support for customizing individual sites using the one Genesis theme – http://wpclips.net. I’ve only recently released the plugins (3 versions – all free) and I’m very open to feedback.
Best always,
Jon 🙂
“WP Responsive Menu plugin” how to hide theme navigation menu i use genesis theme for my blog,so what,s the code to include for hiding navigation menu in mobile…
Awesome Plugins!, I was thinking of customizing my Genesis Theme from the last few weeks. These plugins give me the power to do so. Now I can make my Genesis Theme more beautiful. Thank you very much. 🙂
Hi,
Can you please tell me how to change the featured Image size in Genesis 2.0.2.
In the Theme Settings panel it has only 3 or 4 options but I want to increase the Featured Image size to 300 by 200.
I also tried the Element Inspector of chrome and tried to increase the size but all it does it increases the size but the Image gets blurry as Genesis crops the Images to 150 by 150. Please tell me how to change that. I already searched on Google and didn’t find any good tutorial. I copied some php codes to the functions.php file too but that didn’t work as well.
As I am new to php so I need your help.
Waiting for your Response.
Thanks!
You have to add the below code snippet into your theme’s function.php file
// Add custom featured Image size
add_image_size(‘featured-image-custom’, 300, 200, TRUE);
And then you have to set the featured image from customize option, thats it
Hey useful list.
Can you also please tell me a plugin to add Email Subscribe form after every post.
I use to have this feature while i was using Genesis, currently im using Hueman theme, so its not having this feature n im looking how can i have email subscribe form after every blog post
I have been usinggenesis on my site for a long time. I was unaware of these extra plugins.. Thanks. Very helpul article
Don’t forget to view StudioPress to see the plugins the StudioPress team made and do support on.
http://www.studiopress.com/plugins
What a great list of genesis plugins, there are some new plugins that I know now and going to download them, Thanks for nice article.
I have noticed that most of the wordpress blogs are using genesis parent theme on their blogs. I always wondered what plugins do they use to make their sites look like the sites they have now. These plugins may help me out in this case .