Where To Find The Best WordPress Themes

In a separate article, we provide new WordPress users with a comprehensive overview of WordPress Themes.

If you would like to know more about themes and what makes themes so revolutionary in terms of website design, then make sure to check out our article: About WordPress Themes – A Useful Guide For Business Owners

In this article, you will learn where you can search for free and paid themes for your website. You will also learn about the different types of WP theme resources and get tips on how to ensure that you get the right themes for your needs and avoid having to deal with problems like lack of product support and poorly-coded themes.

As explained in our previously-mentioned post, a theme is a unique type of web design template that is used on WordPress-driven sites and designed specifically for WordPress.

Many professional web designers and web development houses create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WordPress community can access thousands of professional-quality WP themes covering an extensive range of uses and applications.

Where To Find Themes: Too Much Information … Where To Begin?

Let’s say you were to go to Google and type something like this:

• best free WordPress themes
• WordPress themes free
• best free WordPress themes for musicians (or whatever your business, search topic or website is about)

You are probably going to get an overwhelming amount of disorganized information to sort through in the search listings.

So, to help you save time and make things easier, we’ll just cut through the clutter and make the process of finding great WP themes simple.

WordPress.com vs WordPress.org Themes

Before we get started, you need to know that WordPress offers users both a hosted and a self-hosted version. We’ll explain these differences in a later post. In this article, let’s just be covering the topic of finding themes for the self-hosted version of WordPress (WordPress.org) in this article, as these give you more freedom, more options and more control over the design of your blog.

Free vs Paid WP Themes

Next, it’s important to know that there are both Free and Paid WordPress themes made available. Free WordPress themes are normally distributed as Open Source Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or they are sold as Premium (i.e. paid) themes.

WP Theme Directories & Theme Developers

There are mostly 2 kinds of places where WordPress themes can be found. The first place is in WordPress theme marketplaces and WordPress theme directories. The second are the commercial and independent WP theme development firms.

Theme marketplaces and WP theme directories are big aggregators of themes. theme developers (both commercial and independent) list their themes (both free and paid) in the marketplace or directory and visitors shop for these just like they would if they were shopping for apps on an app store or software marketplace.

Some of the bigger directories don’t just sell WordPress themes. They can also sell WordPress plugins and templates for other web applications (e.g. Joomla, Drupal, etc.)

Commercial and independent WP theme design companies can also create both free and commercial themes, and can vary in size, from an individual designer or a small team of theme developer, to large theme design and development companies.

As you will see, many commercial or independent theme developers sell themes exclusively on their own web sites, but some will also list their themes in marketplaces and directories, or even create a free or “lite” version of their themes for free WordPress theme directories .

Let’s now show you where to find the best WP themes for your website.

Where To Find The Best Themes For Your Website Or Blog

WordPress.org

(WordPress.org – Themes Directory)

The official WordPress.org theme directory is the largest and best place to search for WP themes for free. In fact, it’s probably the only free theme directory you should use when looking for free WordPress themes. The reason for this, is because –as many free software users have discovered– downloading free software, add-ons, apps, templates or themes from untrustworthy places can contain malicious code and place your computer, digital presence … even your entire business at risk.

The WP directory is not only a trustworthy and reputable place to download themes for your website or blog, but it also relies on a team of theme reviewers to review and ensure that each theme listed in the directory complies with certain quality and security standards.

To browse thousands of great-looking FREE WordPress themes from the official WordPress Themes Directory, go here:

http://www.wordpress.org/extend/themes

You Don’t Even Have To Leave Your WP Dashboard

Useful Tip: You can easily browse through every theme in the WordPress theme directory and not only find what you are looking for, but also easily install and activate it directly from inside your WordPress dashboard with a few clicks.

Use Theme Filters

WordPress provides a filtering function inside the admin area that lets you narrow down your search for themes based on criteria like Colors, Layout and Features …

This makes it easy to find themes with specific features. For example, you could search for themes with a light colour design, with a three-column layout and a full-width template, or themes that support custom menus, etc.

Note: in another post where we discuss the importance of using “responsive” WordPress themes, we explained how responsive themes ensure that your theme will display correctly on all devices (e.g. your PC, smartphone and tablet) …

It’s a good idea to use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filtering function lets you search across its entire database of free themes …

… and display only themes that are “responsive” …

Pros & Cons Of Using Free WP Themes

The obvious “pro” to using free themes is that it costs nothing to download and use the theme on your site. Additionally, many free themes are professionally designed and offer a number of built-in customizable options, giving you great flexibility and choice in how you configure all of its various layout elements.

The ”cons” of using free WordPress themes are that your themes may not get updated as often with new features and bug fixes, and it’s unrealistic to expect the theme developer to provide personal support, especially if they are not getting paid. Most freely distributed themes ask for donations to help cover support costs.

When downloading free themes, therefore, check to see when the theme was last updated. If it’s been well over one year since any changes were made, then you should think twice about using it, as the theme may have been abandoned by its developer.

If you’re just getting started and your website is still quite new, it’s a good idea to start with a free theme until you have a better idea of the kind of site design that would work best for your site before spending money on paid themes or even on custom web design. Who knows, the theme you downloaded for free could be exactly what works for your site and for converting your site visitors into customers.

Now that we’ve seen how to find free themes in the WordPress theme directory and ways to narrow down your search for themes that meet your specific criteria, it’s time to turn our attention to finding paid WP themes.

Premium WordPress Themes

If you are looking for themes with stunning web design, or professional quality yet highly affordable WordPress web design themes with a distinctive look, unique customizable options and ongoing support, then search through the WordPress theme galleries of the “Premium” theme design agencies listed below:

WordPress Theme Marketplaces

ThemeForest

ThemeForest is one of the biggest and most popular theme directories online.

ThemeForest lets many professional WordPress theme creators showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are currently over 17,000 premium WordPress themes listed (some starting from as little as $3) …

(click on the above images to view more ThemeForest themes)

If you visit the ThemeForest theme marketplace, you will be able to browse for specific themes in a range of categories, such as:

• Blog/Magazine – themes for bloggers and parenting blogs, etc.
• Corporate – themes suitable for medical sites and advertising purposes.
• Creative – themes suitable for visual galleries, galleries, etc.
• Directory Listings – themes that suit sites about directory listings, holiday rentals, community resources, etc.
• eCommerce – themes for selling products online, event bookings and registrations, etc.
• Education – themes that suit sites related to teaching, etc.
• Entertainment – themes for celebrity blogs, restaurants, etc.
• Mobile – e.g. mobile-switching themes.
• NonProfit – themes for nonprofit organizations, churches, etc.
• Real Estate – themes for real estate and real estate listings (e.g. commercial property, etc.)
• Retail – themes for catalogs, trades or professionals (electricians, legal firms, etc.)
• Technology – themes related to apps, newsletters, etc.
• Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and romance tips and advice blogs
• Miscellaneous – themes suitable for topics related to activism, parenting sites or blogs … even themes you can use if your site is still under-construction!

When you purchase WordPress themes from ThemeForest, you will receive email notifications when a new update is available for your theme …

(ThemeForest sends you theme update notifications)

Browse thousands of great premium WP themes in the ThemeForest marketplace here:

• ThemeForest

Creative Market

(click on the images above to browse all Creative Market themes)

Creative Market is another leading WP theme marketplace where you can search through thousands of quality premium themes from independent theme creators.

As stated on their website …

“Creative Market is a platform for handcrafted, mousemade design content from independent creatives around the world.”

Creative Market doesn’t just sell WP themes in its directory, but you can easily go through all of their WP themes and narrow your search using theme categories from their dropdown “Themes” menu …

Browse through hundreds of great WordPress themes crafted by independent WP theme designers in the Creative Market themes directory here:

• Creative Market

Mojo Themes

(click on the above images to see all WP themes at Mojo)

Mojo is a marketplace for premium-quality WordPress themes where theme vendors are strongly encouraged to provide customers with lifetime support and upgrades.

According to their website …

“Mojo is a marketplace where anyone can find, rate and buy quality themes & templates in one trusted place.”

Like Envato and Creative Market, Mojo doesn’t focus exclusively on WP themes, but you can easily browse hundreds of WordPress themes and narrow your search with theme categories (e.g. BuddyPress or eCommerce themes and theme frameworks, etc.) using the site’s dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …

Visit the site to find quality premium WP themes in the Mojo marketplace here:

• Mojo Themes

Now that we have looked at WordPress theme aggregators, let’s look at commercial and independent WP theme development firms.

Commercial And Independent WP Theme Shops

SoloStream

SoloStream provides WordPress users with a great selection of high quality WordPress themes and the option of accessing all themes through a WordPress theme membership.

(click on above images to see all themes from SoloStream)

Woo Themes

Woo Themes creates eye-catching premium themes for WordPress and offers a membership option that allows members to access their entire theme collection.

(click on the images above to see all WooThemes themes)

StoreFront

StoreFront creates gorgeous e-commerce themes for WordPress. StoreFront themes also integrate well with some of the most powerful e-commerce platforms and plugins available.

(click on the above images to see all themes from StoreFront)

StudioPress

StudioPress designs WordPress themes based on a framework that allows users to quickly and easily build a professional and search optimized WordPress website, and provides a self-updating design architecture, turn-key site designs with beautiful frames for the content and unprecedented control of the framework.

Many website developers prefer using the Genesis framework not only because it’s well-coded and well-supported (the development team at StudioPress keeps this framework frequently up-to-date to reflect best practices for coding and to ensure that it always remains compatible with the latest version of WordPress, but because you can update your themes without losing any customizations you may have made to your theme.

This is because themes built with the Genesis framework use something called “child themes,” which are like a paint job that sits on top of the framework and gives your site its unique look and feel.

If this sounds way too technical, don’t worry about it. StudioPress themes are easy to work with, just like all other WordPress themes. The great thing about choosing themes from StudioPress is that one low price entitles you to receive unlimited support and updates, and you can install your themes on unlimited domains.

For more details, click here: StudioPress.

(click on the images above to see all themes from StudioPress)

Theme-Checking Tools

Here are some useful WordPress theme-related tools worth knowing about:

What WordPress Theme Is That.com

What WordPress Theme Is That? is a free WordPress theme and plugin search tool that allows you to easily detect what WP theme and plugins a website or blog is using (including parent and child themes).

This is a great resource if you ever come across a WordPress site that you like and would like to know what theme the site uses.

Tip: If you can’t tell if a site runs on WordPress or not, go here for a great tutorial that shows you how to tell whether or not a website was built using WordPress: The Easy Way To Tell If Your Web Site Runs On WordPress

Using this tool is very simple. Just enter the site’s domain name into the field and click the search icon or hit “Enter.” The tool will not only confirm if a site is powered by WordPress, but it will also list the theme being used by the site and list any plugins it detects.

• To use the online tool go here: What WordPress Theme Is That.com
• To learn how to use this tool go here: How To Check If Your Website Was Built Using WordPress

Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC)

A word of warning: When choosing FREE themes for your WordPress site, we highly recommend sticking with the approved themes listed in the official WordPress theme directory.

A commonly-used method employed by many hackers and cyber criminals is to put up websites and directories offering “Free” WP themes all over the web and distribute modified themes and plugins containing malicious code. In fact, some of these sites even come up on Google’s search results for key phrases like “free WordPress themes“, “best free themes for WordPress”” etc. It’s safer, therefore, to stick with the official WordPress directory, or use established and reputable theme download sites.

If you have any concerns about whether a WordPress theme installed on your site may contain malicious or unwanted code, you can use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to perform a scan of your theme files. The plugin searches the source files of every installed theme on your site for signs of suspicious code and presents you with a report …

(TAC Report Page – Screenshot Source: Plugin, WordPress.org)

We hope that you have found this information useful.

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