WordPress Notification Bar

There are numerous benefits to using a notification bar. From growing your mailing list to sharing news and notifications, displaying an attractive and highly optimized WordPress notification bar can quickly help increase your site’s conversions.

📚 In this article, we look at some of the best free notification bar plugins and consider their features as well as their pros and cons. By the end of the post, you will have a good understanding of what each plugin is offering, and consequently, which WordPress notification bar plugin is the best fit for your website.

So let’s get started…

Best WordPress notification bar plugins in 2024

1. Easy Notification Bar

Easy Notification Bar is a free tool that is very straightforward in its purpose. It differs from the other notification bar plugins on this list because of its simplicity: it only offers a floating bar. This makes it a good option for users who want to run a basic alert on their websites. It’s also a good option for those on a tighter budget because it is completely free to use.

Let’s take a look at its pros and cons…

Pros 👍

  • Custom background, text alignment, color, and font size settings.
  • Responsive design that looks good on different devices.
  • Easy to install and set up.
  • Free to use with no upsells.

Cons 👎

  • It only allows you to display one message across your website.
  • Basic customization abilities, no advanced features.

Price 💸

Easy Notification Bar is free to use. It doesn’t have a premium version.

2. WPFront Notification Bar

WPFront Notification Bar is a free WordPress plugin that will enable you to display news, a call to action, or a promotion. Quick and easy to set up, simply write a message and then add an appropriate button.

So let’s take a look at its best (and worst) features…

Pros 👍

  • Display settings – You can display notification bars at the top or bottom of a page. Equally, you can select the Sticky Bar option, so the bar will continuously display as a user scrolls down the page.
  • Customization settings – Colors are fully customizable.
  • Advanced settings – Select a start and end date for notification bars, set the number of seconds before a bar appears, and provide a close and/or re-open button for users.

Cons 👎

  • Although you can customize the colors of the WordPress notification bar, other customization options are extremely limited.
  • No analytics.

Price 💸

WPFront Notification Bar is free.

3. Icegram

Icegram is another lead generation tool that provides a range of opt-in tools and features to help you grow your email list and ensure your website converts against its goals.

Select from a number of free and premium plans, then quickly get started with this user-friendly solution that allows you to display notification bars (named Floating Action Bars by Icegram) as well as pop-ups, slide-ins, and alert notification boxes, to name a few options.

So let’s check out the pros and cons of the free plan…

Pros 👍

  • Icegram template gallery – Browse and use numerous notification bar templates from the Icegram gallery.
  • Time-based targeting – Target your visitors with notification bars that appear at the right time and in the right place. Select appropriate pages and then set appropriate time delays for your notifications, ensuring optimal engagement with your visitors.
  • Visitor-based targeting – Display specific messages to specific groups of people. Opt to show a WordPress notification bar to new visitors, or to those regulars who are already logged into your site.

Cons 👎

  • The premium Max plan includes a useful geo-targeting feature, which allows you to target users based on their location. However, this feature is not included in the free plan.
  • No A/B testing or analytics provided.

Price 💸

Icegram has a free plan available. Premium plans start at $129 per year.

4. Notibar

Our next WordPress notification bar option is Notibar, a lightweight plugin designed to help you display simple and clean notifications on your website. The plugin allows you to use it as a sticky header, enabling your website visitors to scroll while still having the notification visible on top. In addition, the notification dismiss button can be permanently closed, disabled, or toggled as your visitors wish.

Here are the pros and cons of using Notibar…

Pros 👍

  • Instant Live Preview mode that allows you to see how every setting affects the notification bar, before publishing.
  • Different options for the dismiss button – toggle, disable, or close.
  • Different presets to help you create a notification bar that fits your needs.

Cons 👎

  • Limited customization abilities.
  • No analytics.

Price 💸

Notibar is free to install and use.

5. Poptin

Poptin is a feature-rich platform that will enable you to create a WordPress notification bar within minutes. Both the free and premium plans include an intuitive drag-and-drop builder, beautiful templates, and a range of lead generation options, including notification bars and pop-ups, as well as social media buttons, and much more.

So let’s have a look at the pros and cons of the free plan from Poptin…

Pros 👍

  • Advanced trigger settings – Trigger options include exit intent, geo-location, traffic source, new/returning visitors, and more.
  • Integrations – Poptin integrates with all major marketing platforms including Mailchimp, HubSpot, ConvertKit, and Zapier, to name a few.
  • SupportLive chat support is available even on the free plan.

Cons 👎

  • Your notification bars can only be viewed by up to 1,000 users a month.
  • Poptin branded notification bars.

Price 💸

Poptin has a free plan available. Premium plans start from $20 per month (billed annually; month-to-month available at a higher cost).

6. Top Bar

Top Bar is a free WordPress notification bar plugin that, although a little basic, will enable you to display attractive calls-to-action on your website and engage with your audience.

Here are its pros and cons…

Pros 👍

  • Choose from a selection of right, bold colors.
  • Write your own custom message.
  • Sticky Bar feature available – display a notification bar at all times, even once a user has scrolled down the page.

Cons 👎

  • There are no trigger settings, so the notification bar will just be on permanent display until you disable it.
  • Limited customization options.

If you are looking for more advanced features, then check out the Pro version of Top Bar.

Price 💸

Top Bar has a free plan available. The premium plan costs $16 per year.

7. Advanced Floating Content Lite

Advanced Floating Content Lite is a watered-down version of the feature-rich premium Advanced Floating Content plugin. The free Lite option is another basic but useful plugin, that allows to simply add announcements to your website via notification bars.

So, here are the pros and cons of Advanced Floating Content Lite…

Pros 👍

  • Create an unlimited number of notification bars.
  • Extremely quick and easy to set up.
  • Some very basic customization options for positioning, colors, margins, and borders.

Cons 👎

  • No option to add a call-to-action button – this plugin is only for announcements.
  • You can only display notification bars on the homepage.

Price 💸

Advanced Floating Content Lite has a free plan available. The premium version is priced at $25, as a one-time fee.

8. MailChimp Top Bar

The last plugin in this list of WordPress notification bars is MailChimp Top Bar. This plugin will enable you to add a stylish opt-in bar to your website to help you grow your mailing list. However, it is worth mentioning that this plugin has been created specifically for Mailchimp users, and is an add-on to the popular MailChimp for WordPress plugin.

MailChimp Top Bar WordPress notification bar example

So, let’s take a look at this plugin’s pros and cons…

Pros 👍

  • MailChimp Top Bar is extremely lightweight, consisting of just a single 4 kb JavaScript file. Therefore, the impact on your website’s speed will be minimal.
  • Display notification bars at the top or bottom of pages.
  • Customize the notification bar text as well as the color.

Cons 👎

  • Only integrates with Mailchimp (no other email marketing services).
  • Customization and notification bar setting options are limited.

Price 💸

Mailchimp Top Bar is a free notification bar plugin.

9. Sumo

A word of explanation about Sumo. So it’s an SaaS tool most of all, that integrates with WordPress in some capacity. However, its WordPress plugin keeps getting removed from the official directory every now and then. This doesn’t necessarily need to discourage you, though. Still worth checking out.

Sumo is an impressive lead generation tool which incorporates notification bars alongside pop-ups, social media buttons, and an email marketing service. Referred to as a smart bar by Sumo, this platform enables you to add a notification bar to the top or bottom of your site’s pages, as well as display a call to action button to drive email subscriptions or social media follows.

Sumo offers both free and premium plans. Here are some pros and cons of the free option…

Pros 👍

  • Easily integrate your WordPress website with the Sumo platform by using the Sumo WordPress plugin.
  • Send welcome emails, email campaigns, or integrate with other email marketing services.
  • Access analytics and find out which pages, forms, and notification bars are performing.

Cons 👎

  • All notification bars will display Sumo branding (on the free plan).
  • No split testing feature offered.
  • The WordPress plugin tends to get removed from the official directory every once in a while.

Price 💸

Sumo has a free plan available. Premium plans start at $39 per month (billed annually).

Final thoughts on choosing a WordPress notification bar

As you can see, the WordPress notification bar plugins mentioned in this article have different features, as well as numerous pros and cons. Think carefully about the needs of your project and then select a plugin based on this criteria.

Have any questions about choosing the best plugin for your needs? Ask away in the comments!

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