To say that there are a plethora of gallery plugins on WordPress is an understatement. A simple search for “gallery” on the plugin sections of WordPress brings out a list of more than 2000 options.
Out of that number of gallery plugins on WordPress, NextGen Gallery remains one of the most popular WordPress Gallery plugin. It currently being used in close to a million active sites.
Choosing A Gallery Plugin
Gallery plugins are essential because, without them, you are automatically forced to use the inbuilt gallery option on WordPress. Although this works, it is elementary and very limiting, and that means you can’t achieve so much with it on your website.
This is where a photo gallery plugin like NextGen Gallery comes into play. A responsive photo gallery helps you to include high-quality images on your website. You would agree that adding the appropriate visual properties to your website will not only leave your visitors impressed; it will also provide a user-friendly experience for them.
NextGen Gallery provides a comprehensive features list that makes life easy for people who have a photo-focused website such as photographers, graphic artist, and more. In its basic form, NextGen allows you to create a simple but yet effective gallery with lots of attractive features. What’s more, it also offers advanced image management features among other things.
It is safe to say that it is in the advanced features that NextGen Gallery truly comes to life. It offers eCommerce integrations, print lab integration, client proofing and more.
The Brief – NextGen Gallery
NextGen Gallery comes as a free and premium WordPress Gallery plugin. It allows you to create photo galleries and albums n WordPress. NextGen Gallery comes with several effective and efficient ways to help you arrange and organize images. You can upload your images in bulk, import images, and so on.
NextGen Gallery Pricing
NextGen Gallery comes as a free version as well as premium packages. Although the free version is limited in some ways, it comes with some rather interesting features. It is an excellent option to make simple galleries using five of the open display options.
The premium version is divided into three packages;
- NextGen Plus
- NextGen Pro
- NextGen Pro Lifetime
NextGen Plus allows you to use more than 12 new display features. In addition, you can use interesting features like social sharing, pro support, gallery extensions, advanced lightbox tools, among other things.
NextGen Pro includes the features found in NextGen Plus including features such as client proofing, eCommerce integration, and more.
NextGen Pro Lifetime includes all the features found in NextGen Pro, including one year access to support and updates.
Here is a breakdown of the price
- NextGen Plus: Cost $79, and can be used for a one website
- NextGen Pro: Cost $139, and can be used for three websites
- NextGen Pro Lifetime: Cost $399, and can be used for unlimited sites
NextGen Gallery Selected Features
# Feature 1 – More Than 15 Gallery display Options
NextGen Gallery provides more than 15 gallery options that help to provide a different feel to your images. 5 of the gallery templates are free while the other 12 or so are available for premium packages.
The gallery display options include simple layouts like sideshow gallery, or more advanced layouts like filmstrip, and more.
# Feature 2 – Responsive image management
If you have a small sample of galleries, then the in-built WordPress gallery option might suit you. However, as your gallery gradually grows, using the in-built gallery to organize your galleries might become difficult. The WordPress gallery doesn’t give you so much flexibility, and uploading lots of images is almost impossible. This is where NextGen Gallery comes into play.
The plugin comes with its own image management system. The management system allows you to manage your images from the gallery’s settings.
To upload images, you can use the following methods;
- Use the NextGen Gallery uploader
- Import directly from the WordPress Library
- Use the bulk upload function by importing from a sever.
Who Can Use NextGen Gallery?
The plugin is built for people who are continually working with images such as bloggers; photographers need a highly functional tool that does a great job of showing images in a visually appealing gallery.
The NextGen Gallery is a superb option for people who;
- Work with several photos as the gallery allows you to upload several images in bulk. The bulk management features are quite responsive and do a great job of making your work schedule very easy. What’s more, you can also upload photos to your server using FTP, and then import them to NextGen Gallery.
- Sell images online. The plugin comes with eCommerce features that allow you to sell images both in physical and digital forms.
- Work directly with customers. With the plugin, you get Lightroom integration and client proofing feature.
Final Words On NextGen Gallery
There is no doubt that NextGen Gallery is the most popular and most used WordPress image gallery plugin. Photographers, graphic artists, eCommerce stores, and more employ the gallery for its simple and advanced features.
It doesn’t matter if you are an upcoming blogger seeking an effective way to make a visually appealing gallery or you are a photographer who is looking for more advanced options, NextGen Gallery is a perfect fit. You can try out the free version of NextGen Gallery to get a feel of it. Then if what you see appeals to you, you can upgrade to one of the three available premium packages so you can access more advanced features.