Bricks Builder vs. Elementor in 2026: A Performance Benchmark

For years, the WordPress community has been fighting a “civil war.”

On one side, you have Elementor: the giant, the democratizer of design, the tool that powers 10+ million sites.1

On the other side, you have Bricks Builder: the challenger, the developer’s darling, and the tool that promised to fix the “bloat” problem.

At Inspired Monks, we don’t believe in choosing tools based on hype. We believe in data. So, in 2026, where “Interaction to Next Paint” (INP) and “Green Web Standards” determine your Google ranking, we put both builders to the test.

The results weren’t just close. They were a revelation.

The Setup: How We Tested

To ensure a fair fight, we set up two identical environments.

• Hosting: Standard Cloud VPS (2GB RAM, 1 vCPU).
• The Design: A complex “Landing Page” section containing a hero header, a feature grid (3 columns), a contact form, and an animated “Call to Action” button.
• Optimization: No caching plugins (WP Rocket/Autoptimize) were used. We wanted to see the raw code output.

Round 1: The “Div Soup” (DOM Structure)

The biggest killer of mobile performance is an excessive DOM size (too many HTML tags nested inside each other). This confuses screen readers and forces the browser to work harder.

• Elementor: To create our section, Elementor generated a deep hierarchy of “Wrappers,” “Columns,” and “Inner Sections.” Even with the “Flexbox Container” update, legacy bloat remains.²
• Bricks: Bricks outputs clean, semantic HTML.³ A section is just a <section>. A heading is just an <h2>.

The Result:

• Elementor: 84 DOM Nodes
• Bricks: 32 DOM Nodes
• Winner:Bricks (61% leaner structure)

Round 2: The Weight Test (Page Size)

We measured the total size of CSS and JavaScript files loaded on the frontend. This is the “luggage” your user’s phone has to download before the site works.

• Elementor: Even on an empty page, Elementor loads foundational scripts (Dialog.js, Swiper.js, etc.) and a global CSS file that covers every possible widget you might use.
• Bricks: Bricks uses a “Smart Loading” logic.⁴ If you don’t use a slider, the slider code never loads.

Metric	Elementor (Hello Theme)	Bricks Builder
JS Loaded	~245 KB	~15 KB
CSS Loaded	~180 KB	~25 KB
Total Requests	19	7

The Verdict: Bricks is nearly 10x lighter out of the box.

Round 3: The 2026 Metric (INP & Reactivity)

In 2026, Google cares about INP (Interaction to Next Paint). This measures how quickly a page responds when you click a button.

• Elementor: Relies heavily on jQuery (an older JavaScript library). It works, but it can be sluggish on low-end Android devices.
• Bricks: Built on Vue.js, a modern framework.⁵ The builder itself is incredibly snappy, and the frontend interactions (like mobile menus or popups) execute instantly without “blocking” the main thread.

Why this matters for you:

If you run an E-commerce store, a 100ms delay in a “Add to Cart” button can cost you a sale. Bricks virtually eliminates this delay.

Beyond Speed: The “Developer Experience”

Performance isn’t just about speed; it’s about maintainability.

• Elementor is “ID-Based”: If you want to change the color of 50 buttons, you often have to edit them one by one (unless you strictly use Global Colors).
• Bricks is “Class-Based”: It works like professional coding. You create a CSS class called .btn-primary. You apply it to 50 buttons. If you change the class once, everything updates.

This is why Inspired Monks builds complex sites on Bricks. It allows us to scale your website without the code turning into a messy tangled web.

The One Area Elementor Wins (For Now)

Elementor still has a larger ecosystem. If you need a very specific, niche widget (like a “3D Before/After Image Slider with Particle Effects”), you can probably find an Elementor plugin for it in 5 seconds.

However, for Bricks, we often build these custom elements ourselves. (In fact, we built our own Geo Targeting for Bricks Builder Plugin because the native options weren’t precise enough for our clients).

Conclusion: Which One Should You Choose?

• Choose Elementor If: You are a DIY beginner building a simple hobby site and you need 500+ pre-made templates to drag and drop.
• Choose Bricks If: You are a business that relies on SEO, mobile conversions, and professional scalability.

At Inspired Monks, we have officially shifted our primary development stack to Bricks Builder. The performance gains are simply too massive to ignore.

Want to migrate your slow Elementor site to a high-speed Bricks build? Contact Us.

We don’t just “copy-paste” designs; we refactor your entire codebase for speed.

Inspired Monks