Disclosure: we make Gutenslider, one of the alternatives. Facts about the other plugins come from their own pages and plugin files, checked in October 2026.

Why people look for an alternative

• Price. Slider Revolution licences start at €45 a year for one site (€89 for three, €209 for up to 250). There is no free version.
• Bundled copies. A copy that came with a theme only updates through that theme. When the theme stops updating it, so does the slider.
• Weight. Older versions loaded jQuery and a lot of script. Slider Revolution 7 replaced jQuery with its own engine, which helps; independent tests still show it heavier than simple sliders: in WP Rocket’s test (first published 2024, updated August 2026) it scored 86 on PageSpeed mobile with a 748 KB page.
• Working outside the page. You build in Slider Revolution’s own editor and embed the result, so the slides don’t share your theme’s blocks and styles.

Free alternatives

If you used Slider Revolution for layer animations

Choreographed layers (a heading flies in, then a button, then a shape) are what Slider Revolution is best at. Among free plugins, Smart Slider 3 comes closest: it has a layer editor with free positioning, and its Pro version adds a layer animation builder. Depicter works similarly. Expect to rebuild your sliders; there is no importer between them.

If you used it for a hero or a content slider

Most Slider Revolution sliders on real sites are simpler than the demos: a big photo or video, a heading, a line of text and a button, changing every few seconds. That is exactly what a slider block does, without a separate editor:

1. Add the Gutenslider block where the hero should be.
2. Add a slide per Slider Revolution slide and set the image or video as its background.
3. Type the heading, text and button as normal blocks. They take your theme’s fonts and colors.
4. Set the height (for example full screen on desktop, shorter on phones), the effect and autoplay.
5. For a video hero, paste a YouTube link: the video becomes the slide, with its thumbnail as poster.

Gutenslider’s free version has slide, fade and flip; Pro adds 26 new effects, among them WebGL transitions such as Ripple, Liquid and Glitch, which give the “wow” of a Slider Revolution intro without a layer timeline. See them on the examples page.

Speed after the switch

Gutenslider loads about 33 KB of gzipped JavaScript for a basic slider, no jQuery, and only when the slider comes near the screen; the layout is rendered on the server, so nothing jumps. On our test pages it scores 95–99 on mobile Lighthouse. Measure your own page before and after the switch with PageSpeed Insights: the hero is usually the Largest Contentful Paint, so a lighter slider shows up directly in that number.

Removing Slider Revolution cleanly

• Search your pages for the Slider Revolution shortcode or block and replace each with the new slider before you deactivate it.
• Check the theme options: some themes place a Slider Revolution slider in the header outside the page content.
• After deactivating, clear your cache and check that no Slider Revolution scripts are still loaded (in the browser’s developer tools, Network tab, filter for “revslider”).

More on the differences between block sliders: the best slider blocks for the block editor.

Disclosure: we make Gutenslider. Facts about MetaSlider come from its wordpress.org page, its pricing page and its current plugin files (version 3.113.1), checked in October 2026.

How they work

MetaSlider has its own admin screen: you create a slideshow, add images, choose a slider type and options, and place it with a block, shortcode or widget. Its default engine is FlexSlider; Nivo Slider, Responsive Slides and Coin Slider are included as alternatives.

Gutenslider is a block you add where the slider should be. Each slide has an image, video, color or gradient background and holds blocks on top, with your theme’s styles. The editor shows the real slides.

Side by side

Speed

For a plain image slider MetaSlider is very light. In WP Rocket’s published test of six slider plugins (first published in 2024, updated in August 2026), MetaSlider was the fastest: a PageSpeed mobile score of 99, a page of 201 KB and a Largest Contentful Paint of 2.0 seconds. AcceleraWP’s comparison (2024 versions, updated 2026) also rated it the leanest for a simple slider. Credit where it’s due.

Two things to keep in mind. FlexSlider needs jQuery, so on a block theme that doesn’t load jQuery otherwise, MetaSlider brings it along (roughly 30 KB gzipped on top of the slider script). And those tests used three images and nothing else; once you add text layers, video or a lightbox, the picture changes. Gutenslider loads about 33 KB of gzipped JavaScript for a basic slider, no jQuery, and only when the slider comes near the screen. On our own test pages it scores 95–99 on mobile Lighthouse with no layout shift. Neither benchmark included a block slider, so test both on your own page if the last few kilobytes matter.

When MetaSlider is the better pick

• A simple image slideshow, maybe with captions, is all you need.
• Your theme loads jQuery anyway.
• You want the same slideshow in several places, including widgets, managed in one list.

When Gutenslider is the better pick

• Slides carry headings, buttons or columns, styled like the rest of your site.
• You want video slides from YouTube links or playlists, or a lightbox, in the free version.
• Your site is a block theme without jQuery, and you want to keep it that way.
• You want effects beyond slide, fade and flip (Pro has WebGL transitions, 3D and shaped effects), or a lifetime licence.

Switching from MetaSlider

Select the images of a MetaSlider slideshow in the Media Library and add them to a Gutenslider block: every image becomes a slide. If your MetaSlider slides have captions, turn on automatic captions to show the Media Library text on each slide without typing it again. Then replace the MetaSlider shortcode or block.

See what a slide with content looks like on the examples page.

Disclosure: we make Gutenslider. Facts about Smart Slider 3 come from its wordpress.org page, its pricing page and its current plugin files (version 3.5.1.39), checked in October 2026.

The main difference: where you build the slider

Smart Slider 3 has its own editor on a separate admin screen. You place layers (text, buttons, images, video) anywhere on the slide, animate them one by one, and then put the finished slider on a page with a block or shortcode. In the block editor you see a placeholder for it.

Gutenslider is a block in the page itself. Each slide has a background and holds ordinary blocks: headings, paragraphs, buttons, columns. They use your theme’s fonts, colors and spacing, and the editor shows the slider as the page will.

Neither way is better in general. Free positioning and layer animations need a dedicated editor; content that should look like the rest of your site is easier as blocks.

Side by side

Speed

Both plugins dropped jQuery; our size comparison of 12 sliders has the numbers for the others. Gutenslider loads about 33 KB of gzipped JavaScript for a basic slider (Swiper core, controls, view script) plus a 7.3 KB stylesheet, and only when a slider comes near the screen. Smart Slider 3’s two core scripts are about 39 KB gzipped in its current files, plus a small one for the slider type, with an optional large script for background animations.

The bigger difference is usually the markup and the images. WP Rocket’s published test of six slider plugins (first published in 2024, updated in August 2026, on a mobile test page with three images) measured Smart Slider 3 at a PageSpeed mobile score of 76 and a Largest Contentful Paint of 6.4 seconds. That test did not include any block slider, so we can’t put Gutenslider in the same table. On our own test pages, Gutenslider 7 scores 95–99 on mobile Lighthouse with a layout shift of 0. If speed matters to you, build the same slider with both on a staging site and run PageSpeed Insights on each; it takes ten minutes and beats any table.

When Smart Slider 3 is the better pick

• You want layers placed freely and animated one after another, like a banner ad or a hero with a choreographed entrance.
• You like starting from templates.
• You use a page builder other than the block editor, or the same slider on many pages, edited in one place.
• You prefer paying once: Smart Slider Pro is a one-time purchase per site.

When Gutenslider is the better pick

• You build pages with blocks and want the slides to look like the rest of the site without restyling.
• You want to edit the slides where they are, and see them as they will look.
• You need video slides from YouTube links or playlists, or a lightbox, without paying.
• Text in a full-width hero should line up with your page content: Gutenslider’s content width setting does that.

Switching from Smart Slider 3

There is no importer, because the models are different: a Smart Slider slide is a set of positioned layers, a Gutenslider slide is a background with blocks. In practice you rebuild each slide in a few minutes: add the Gutenslider block, add one slide per Smart Slider slide, set the background image, and type the heading and button as blocks. Keep Smart Slider active until the new slider is live, then replace the shortcode or block.

Try it on the examples page, or start with the first-slider tutorial.

Disclosure: we make Gutenslider, one of the blocks below. The facts about the other plugins come from their wordpress.org pages, their pricing pages and their current plugin files, checked in October 2026. Prices change often; follow the links before you buy.

The short answer

• You want slides with real content (headings, buttons, columns over a photo or video) and you build with blocks: Gutenslider, Spectra, Otter’s Content Slider or Stackable’s Carousel. All four let every slide hold any blocks.
• You only need images that rotate: the gallery-style blocks are enough, for example Kadence Blocks’ Advanced Gallery (carousel and slider modes) or Otter’s Slider block.
• You want layer animations and ready-made templates, positioned freely like in a design tool: a classic slider plugin such as Smart Slider 3 or Slider Revolution fits better. You build those in their own editor, not with blocks.

Slider blocks compared

“Via blocks on a slide” means you can put an embed or video block onto a slide; the slider itself doesn’t make the video the slide’s background or play it when the slide shows. “—” means we found no lightbox in the slider block’s own settings.

Gutenslider

Gutenslider is a slider block and nothing else. A slide has a background (image, video, color or gradient) and any blocks on top. The editor shows the slider as the page will, and a preview button plays the real slider, with its effect and autoplay, inside the editor.

• Free: slide, fade and flip, carousels with up to eight slides per view per device, video slides from the Media Library or from links (paste a YouTube video or playlist and every video becomes a slide), a lightbox that grows out of the clicked image, 11 arrow styles with positions, lightbox thumbnails, shape dividers, and a content width option that lines the text in a full-width slider up with the rest of your page.
• Pro: 26 more effects (20 WebGL transitions such as Ripple and Liquid, six shaped effects such as Fan and Morph) plus Coverflow, Cards and Cube, parallax, arrows that follow the pointer, numbers and a progress bar as pagination, lightbox zoom, and video from Vimeo, Dailymotion and TikTok. From $29/year for one site, or $199 once for unlimited sites.
• On the page: about 33 KB of JavaScript, gzipped, for a basic slider (Swiper core, controls and the view script; WordPress’ Interactivity API runtime comes from core on top) and one 7.3 KB CSS file. The script loads when a slider comes near the screen, and the layout is rendered on the server, so nothing shifts when it starts.

See it on the examples page or read what’s new in Gutenslider 7.

Spectra

Spectra (Brainstorm Force) is a large block collection with more than a million installs. Its Slider block is a parent block with slide blocks inside, and each slide takes any blocks, so it works much like Gutenslider. The slider is free and uses Swiper (about 40–44 KB gzipped in our measurement of the plugin files). Note that there are two plugins now: “Spectra Legacy” (the long-running one) and the newer “Spectra Blocks”, which is a separate install. If you already use Spectra for other blocks, its slider is the obvious first try.

Otter Blocks

Otter (Themeisle) has two sliders. The older Slider block is for images only and uses Glide.js. The Content Slider, added in July 2026, lets every slide hold any blocks and is very light: a 2 KB script on top of CSS scroll-snap. It is new and deliberately simple; there are no effects beyond the scroll.

Stackable

Stackable’s free Carousel block also takes inner blocks per slide and is built on CSS scroll-snap with its own small script (under 4 KB gzipped) and a fade mode; the plugin also has an image and video lightbox. A good pick if you want a light carousel and already like Stackable’s design controls.

Kadence Blocks

Kadence’s free Advanced Gallery block has carousel, fluid carousel, slider and thumbnail-slider modes, with a lightbox. It is images only. For slides with content, Kadence has an Advanced Slider block in the paid plan.

Getwid and Essential Blocks

Both have free slider blocks, and Getwid’s Content Slider takes any blocks per slide. Both use Slick, which needs jQuery on the front end. That is fine if your theme loads jQuery anyway; on a lean block theme it adds a library you otherwise wouldn’t load. More on that in which WordPress sliders are lightweight, and which still need jQuery.

When a classic slider plugin is the better choice

Smart Slider 3, Slider Revolution, MetaSlider, Soliloquy and Depicter work differently: you build the slider on its own admin screen and place it with a block or shortcode. That is worth it when you want:

• layers you position freely and animate one by one, like a mini After Effects (Smart Slider 3, Slider Revolution, Depicter);
• a big library of ready-made templates;
• the same slider on many pages, edited in one place.

The trade-off: the slides don’t use your theme’s blocks and styles, and the editor shows a placeholder instead of the slide. We compared two of them in detail: Gutenslider vs Smart Slider 3 and Gutenslider vs MetaSlider.

Is a slider coming to WordPress itself?

Not yet. There is no slider in core today, but work on one is active: a “Slider” block with slide blocks inside is on the Gutenberg roadmap and has draft pull requests. When it ships, simple sliders will need no plugin at all. Plugins like Gutenslider will still be the place for video slides, effects, lightboxes and fine control, the same way the core Gallery block didn’t replace gallery plugins.

How to choose

1. Do the slides need text and buttons? If not, a gallery carousel is enough.
2. Do you already use a block collection? Try its slider first; one fewer plugin is a good thing.
3. Do you need video slides, a lightbox or effects? Then compare what is free: in Gutenslider all three are in the free plugin.
4. Check the page weight on a test page with PageSpeed Insights before you commit: the slider is often the largest element on the page, so it decides the Largest Contentful Paint.

Build it in four steps

1. Add the Gutenslider block and pick your photos from the Media Library; each one becomes a slide. Use images at least 1600 px wide.
2. Set the alignment to full width in the block toolbar.
3. In the slider’s Slides panel turn on Full screen height. The slider now fills the height of the screen on every device.
4. Set Content to Same on all and add a heading, a short paragraph and a button. They stay in place while the photos change underneath.

For the calm look of a hero, choose the Fade effect in the slider settings. Press Preview in the slider’s toolbar to see it move in the editor.

Almost full screen

A slider that fills the screen completely hides the rest of the page; visitors may not notice they can scroll. A minimum height such as 80vh leaves a hint of the next section. The height can differ per device: the example uses 70vh on desktop, 60vh on tablets and 480px on phones.

Keep the text readable

• Give each slide an overlay: a dark color at 30–40 % opacity behind white text works on almost any photo.
• Set the focal point of each image so faces and horizons stay visible when phones crop the photo to a portrait shape.
• Turn the arrows off on phones; visitors swipe there, and the arrows would sit on the text.

With a video instead

Any slide can have a video background instead of a photo, muted and looping. See Full-screen video background slider.

Fast on the first screen

The first image of a hero slider is the largest element on the screen, so Gutenslider loads it with high priority and the others lazily, with a srcset that sends phones a small file. The layout is in the HTML before any script runs, so nothing jumps while the page loads.

Add a video background

1. Add the Gutenslider block and set it to full width; turn on Full screen height in the Slides panel for a full-screen video.
2. Select a slide and, in its Background settings, choose Video.
3. Pick a video from the Media Library. Loop and Muted are on, and the video pauses when its slide is not shown.
4. Add a Poster image: it shows until the video can play, and on connections that don’t load video.
5. Set Content to Same on all and add your headline and button.

Prepare the video file

• Keep it short: 10–20 seconds that loop without a visible jump.
• 1920 px wide is enough for a full-screen background; 1280 px is fine behind text with an overlay.
• Export as MP4 (H.264) without sound, at a moderate bitrate. 3–6 MB is a good target.
• Add an overlay (a dark color at 30–40 %) so white text stays readable on every frame.

Videos from YouTube or a link

Instead of uploading, a slide can play a video from a link: YouTube videos and playlists, or a direct link to an .mp4, .webm or .mov file, in the free plugin. Pro adds YouTube channels, Vimeo, Dailymotion and TikTok. Players load only when their slide shows; YouTube plays from youtube-nocookie.com. See the YouTube examples.

On phones

Muted, inline videos autoplay on iOS and Android. Use the slide’s Focal point to keep the subject in view when the video is cropped to a portrait screen. If the video is mostly decoration, consider a photo slider on phones instead: hide the video slider on phones with Show the slider on, and show a second, lighter slider there.

All slider animations compared

Choose an effect

1. Select the slider (the List View is the quickest way).
2. Pick an option in Effect, in the slider’s settings. The effects are grouped; each one shows a short description.
3. Press Preview in the slider’s toolbar: it runs the real slider with the effect in the editor.

Slide, fade and flip (free)

• Slide moves the slides sideways. It is the only effect that works with several slides in view, so carousels use it.
• Fade crossfades one slide into the next. It suits heroes with a fixed headline, quotes and photo series.
• Flip turns one slide over to show the next, one slide at a time.

3D effects (Pro)

Coverflow tilts the neighbouring slides like album covers, Cards stacks the slides like a deck, and Cube turns them on the sides of a cube. Cards and Cube show one slide at a time.

Shaped and WebGL transitions (Pro)

The six shaped effects (Morph, Parallax, Tilt, Fan, Stack and Reveal) change the slides’ shape as they move, with CSS only. The twenty WebGL transitions, such as Liquid, Ripple, Swirl, Glitch and Burn, are drawn on the graphics card over a crossfade. See them on the examples page.

Speed and timing

Transition time sets how long the change takes (0.7 seconds by default) and Time per slide how long each slide stays. Longer transitions suit fades and photos, short ones suit carousels. More in Slide duration and autoplay.

Reduced motion

Visitors who turn on “reduce motion” in their operating system get a calm slider: no autoplay, and the WebGL transitions become a crossfade. You don’t need to set anything for this.

Set up a carousel

1. Add the Gutenslider block and choose your images; six or more work best for a carousel.
2. In the Slides panel, set Slides in view to 3 with the desktop switch on, then switch to tablet and set 2, and to phone and set 1. Up to eight slides per view are possible.
3. Set Space between slides per device, for example 16, 12 and 10 pixels.
4. Choose how far one arrow click moves with Slides per step: one slide at a time, or a whole page of slides.

Carousels need the Slide effect; fade and the 3D effects show one slide at a time (Coverflow is the exception, it shows the neighbours tilted).

Centered or aligned left

Center the active slide (in the Motion panel) keeps the active slide in the middle, with parts of its neighbours at the edges, a hint that there is more to swipe. Turn it off to start with the first slide at the left edge.

Slides with their own width

Pick Width from content in Slides in view and each slide keeps its own width, for example portrait and landscape photos at the same height, or a strip of logos. See the auto-width example.

Tips

• Turn on the lightbox so visitors can open a photo large; it grows out of the clicked image.
• Use images with the same aspect ratio, or set a fixed height so the row looks even.
• For a carousel of cards with text, put a Group block with an image, heading and button on each slide.

Let the slider grow with each slide

1. Select the slider and open the Slides panel.
2. Turn on Grow with the content. The slider now takes the height of the slide on show.
3. Use the device switch to set it per device. A common setup: a fixed height on desktop, where text sits next to the image, and grow with the content on phones, where everything stacks.

Or a fixed height

For photo sliders a steady height looks calmer. Set a Minimum height in the same panel, in any CSS unit:

The minimum height is a minimum: a slide with more content than fits still makes the slider taller, so text is never cut off. Full screen height fills the screen instead, see Fullscreen background slider.

Tips

• With adaptive height the dots at the bottom move with each slide’s height. Keep the arrows at the sides, or move the dots to the top (see the dot positions).
• Check the padding on phones: 40 px around the content on desktop is a lot on a small screen. Padding can be set per device.

Every height option is in the settings reference.

Link a whole slide

1. Select the slide (not the slider): click the slide’s background, or pick it in the List View.
2. Click Link the slide in the slide’s toolbar.
3. Search for a page or paste a URL, and choose whether it opens in a new tab.

The whole slide is now a link. A Linked label in the editor shows which slides have one. Use this for image sliders without text, for example a row of projects or products where each photo leads to its page.

Buttons and links on a slide

Each slide is a container for blocks, so a Buttons block or a link in a paragraph works as anywhere else on the page. This is the better choice when a slide has a headline and a call to action: visitors see what they click, and screen readers read a clear link text.

Don’t combine both on one slide: a slide link around a button makes two links in one place.

Link to one slide from elsewhere

Turn on Link to each slide in the slider’s Advanced settings and every slide gets an address such as #slide-3. A link to /tours/#slide-3 opens the page with that slide showing, and a button with the URL #slide-3 jumps there on the same page. Set a Link prefix for addresses like #tour-3, or give a slide its own name with Slide link name in the slide’s Advanced settings. More in Link to a single slide.

Or open the image

To let visitors see a photo larger instead of going to another page, turn on the lightbox: a click opens the image, and it grows out of its place on the slide.

All slide settings are in the settings reference.