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FotoGrids vs NextGEN Gallery

NextGEN has been the default WordPress gallery since 2007, and it earned that. But nineteen years of add-on pricing left a plugin where masonry, hover effects and lazy loading all sit behind a licence. FotoGrids puts them in the free plugin.
FotoGrids
8 vs 4
Gallery layouts in FotoGrids Free vs NextGEN Free
12 vs 0
Hover effects in FotoGrids Free vs NextGEN Free
0
Analytics dashboards NextGEN offers at any tier
$199
What NextGEN Plus renews at, after the $99.50 first year
18
18

18 features NextGEN sells separately — or doesn't offer at all — are free in FotoGrids.

Why FotoGrids

Four reasons to pick FotoGrids over NextGEN Gallery

FotoGrids
NextGEN Gallery
Layouts without a licence
FotoGrids
Eight in Free, masonry and justified among them
NextGEN Gallery
Four. Masonry is Plus, justified is Starter
Making it look like yours
FotoGrids
Hover effects, colour, borders and fonts, all in Free
NextGEN Gallery
Hover, colour and borders begin at Plus
Letting visitors filter
FotoGrids
Filtering in Free, advanced filtering in Pro Starter
NextGEN Gallery
Filtering begins at Plus — $99.50 first year, $199 after
Putting a video in a gallery
FotoGrids
Video items in the free plugin
NextGEN Gallery
Video begins at Pro — $139.50 first year, $279 after
FotoGrids gallery styling panel for setting thumbnail border radius and border colour in WordPress
No-code design

Styling a gallery shouldn't be a premium feature

Changing a hover effect, picking a colour, rounding a corner — these are the first things anyone does after uploading photos.

NextGEN — Plus, at $99.50 then $199

Hover effects, colour controls and borders are all Plus features in NextGEN. The first year is half price. The renewal is not.

FotoGrids — In the free plugin

Twelve hover effects, full colour controls, borders, corner radius and custom fonts. Pro adds thirty-six advanced effects and a global palette.

Display & layout

Four layouts free — the rest need a licence

NextGEN’s free plugin ships slideshow, thumbnails, image browser and tag cloud.

NextGEN — Four of fifteen, then upgrade

Masonry, tiles, filmstrip, side-scroll and blog style are paid. The plugin's own code sorts them into lite, starter, plus and pro before the page loads.

FotoGrids — Eight layouts, no licence

Grid, masonry, justified, slider, image viewer and single item among them. Pick the one that suits the photographs rather than the one that suits the licence.

fg-synced-media-slide
FotoGrids gallery analytics dashboard with total views, a views-over-time chart, and a top performing content table
Engagement analytics

A gallery you can't measure is a guess

Which album do people open? Which photo do they stop on? Do they share it?

NextGEN — No dashboard at any tier

Views tracking starts at Starter. The closest thing to analytics is a Google Analytics add-on that hands the question to another tool.

FotoGrids — In the free plugin

Views, top-performing content and what's being shared, in the same screen you built the gallery in. Pro Plus adds traffic sources, devices and behaviour.

Pricing

Read the second year, not the first

Every price on Imagely’s pricing page is a 50% first-year offer. From year two, every tier costs exactly double.

NextGEN — $139 to $399 on renewal

The plugin costs $69.50, $99.50, $139.50 or $199.50 to start, and $139, $199, $279 or $399 to keep. The CDN is listed at $100 against a normal price of $120.

FotoGrids — One set of numbers

Free, $39, $79, $129. They are the joining price and the renewal price, because they are the same price.

Feature by feature

What NextGEN puts behind a licence

NextGEN’s prices are first-year promotional rates. The renewal is shown too, because that is what you will actually pay.
Feature
FotoGrids
NextGEN Gallery
Masonry Layout
Free
Plus — $99.50 first year, $199 after
Justified Layout
Free
Starter — $69.50 first year, $139 after
Hover Effects
Free
Plus — $99.50 first year, $199 after
Color Controls
Free
Plus — $99.50 first year, $199 after
Borders & Corner Radius
Free
Plus — $99.50 first year, $199 after
Lazy Loading
Free
Starter — $69.50 first year, $139 after
Filtering
Free
Plus — $99.50 first year, $199 after
Social Sharing
Free
Plus — $99.50 first year, $199 after
Open Graph Tags
Free
Plus — $99.50 first year, $199 after
Video
Free
Pro — $139.50 first year, $279 after
Views Tracking
Free
Starter — $69.50 first year, $139 after
Analytics Dashboard
Free
Not offered at any tier
Migration

Move from NextGEN Gallery in an afternoon

Step 1
Bring the galleries across
FotoGrids imports from NextGEN and other gallery plugins, so the albums you built since 2007 don’t need rebuilding.
Step 2
Keep the URLs
Galleries get their own addresses, and the permalink settings let you match the URLs you already have on NextGEN.
Step 3
Try it alongside
Free is a full plugin, not a trial. Build one gallery in FotoGrids beside your NextGEN one and compare on your own site.
Step 4
Make it yours
Set the layout, colours and borders NextGEN keeps at Plus, then save them as defaults for the next gallery.

Frequently asked questions

Yes. The free plugin ships eight layouts, 30+ templates, watermarking, password-protected galleries, lazy loading and an analytics dashboard — everything most sites need to publish, protect and measure a gallery, without a licence key.
Yes. Migration from other gallery plugins is built into the free version, so you can move your albums across and see the result on your own site before spending anything.
Eight layouts, 30+ templates, twelve hover effects, textual watermarking, password-protected galleries, EXIF viewing, Open Graph tags and the analytics dashboard. The full breakdown is on the Free vs Pro page.
The same as this year. Pro Starter, Pro Plus and Pro Agency are $39, $79 and $129, and those are the renewal prices as well as the joining ones. The tiers are set out on the pricing page.
We read each plugin’s actual source rather than its marketing pages, then run a second pass whose job is to disprove every claim. The method is in the methodology section, and every line in the table has a source behind it.
Eight layouts, watermarking and analytics. Free, on unlimited sites

Install the free plugin, apply a template, and change the parts that are not yours yet. Customize every detail from your very first gallery.

Download Free
Compare Free and Pro