Tag: Free Themes

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

If you would like to know more about the benefits of using themes and what makes WordPress themes so attractive to website owners, then make sure to check out the article here: Understanding WordPress Themes – A Useful Guide For Website Owners

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

As we’ve explained in another post, a theme is a unique type of web design template used on WordPress-driven websites and blogs and designed to work specifically with the WP CMS platform in mind.

Many individual web designers and website development houses create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WordPress community enjoy access to thousands of great WP themes designed for many purposes and needs.

Finding WordPress Themes: Too Much Information … Where To Begin?

If you were to open up Google and search for a key phrase like the following:

• best free themes for WordPress
• WordPress themes free
• best responsive WordPress themes for artists (type in whatever your business, area of interest or website is about)

Chances are that you are going to get an overwhelming amount of junk to sort through in the search listings.

So, to help you save time and make your life easier, let’s just cut through the clutter and make the process of finding great WP themes really simple.

WordPress.com vs WordPress.org Themes

Before we start, you need to know that WordPress offers users both a hosted and a self-hosted version. We’ll cover these differences in a different post. For now, we’ll only cover themes for the self-hosted version of WordPress (WordPress.org) in this post, as these give you more freedom, more options and more control over your web design.

Free vs Paid Themes

Next, it’s important to know that you will easily find many Free and Paid WordPress themes being made available. Free themes for WordPress are generally distributed as Open Source Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or they are made available to users as Premium (paid) themes.

WordPress Theme Marketplaces Commercial And Independent WP Theme Design Houses

There are mostly 2 places where you can find themes. The first place is in WP theme marketplaces and theme directories. The second type of place are the commercial and independent theme houses.

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

Some of the larger theme stores 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 developers typically create both free and commercial themes, and can vary in size, from an individual designer or a small team of designer, to large theme design and development companies.

As you will see, many commercial theme developers sell their 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 directories .

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

Choosing A Responsive Theme Themes For Your WordPress Website Or Blog

WordPress.org

(WordPress.org – WordPress Themes Directory)

The official WordPress 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 why, 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, but it also relies on a theme review team comprised of dedicated and code-savvy volunteers to review and make sure that each theme in the directory complies with their quality and security standards.

To browse thousands of professionally-designed FREE WordPress themes from the official WP Themes Directory, go here:

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

You Don’t Even Have To Leave Your WordPress Dashboard

Useful Tip: You can easily browse through every theme in the WordPress theme directory and not only find a great theme for your website or blog, but also easily install and activate it directly from within your WP dashboard with just a couple of mouse clicks.

Use The Theme Filtering

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

This makes it easier to find themes with specific features. For example, you could search for themes with predominantly orange color design, with a four-column layout and a full-width template, or themes that support custom menus, etc.

Note: in another article where we present an overview of WordPress themes and discuss the importance of choosing “responsive” WP themes, we explained how these ensure that your theme will work across all devices (e.g. your computer, smartphone and tablet) …

It’s a good idea to use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filtering function lets you do just that …

… and display only themes that have been built using “responsive” design standards …

Pros & Cons Of Using Free Themes

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

The ”cons” of using free themes are that your themes may not get updated as often with new features and bug fixes, and you shouldn’t 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 costs of providing support and updates, bug fixes, etc..

When downloading free themes, therefore, check to see when the theme was last updated. If it’s been more than a year since any change was last made, then you should think carefully about using it, as the theme may have been abandoned by its developer.

If you’re just getting started and your website is still relatively 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 a theme. Who knows, the free theme you’ve downloaded could be exactly what works for you and your business.

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

Paid 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 responsive support, you can search through the WordPress theme galleries of the “Premium” theme design agencies listed below:

WordPress Theme Directories

ThemeForest

ThemeForest is one of the largest and best-known theme marketplaces online.

ThemeForest lets many professional WP theme developers showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are over 15,000 premium WP themes listed (some starting from as little as $3) …

(click on the above images to browse all themes on ThemeForest)

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

• Blog/Magazine – themes for general blogs and news editorials, etc.
• Corporate – themes suitable for government sites or advertising purposes.
• Creative – themes suitable for creative work, kindle book authors, etc.
• Directory Listings – themes that suit sites related to directory listings, holiday rentals, business directories, etc.
• eCommerce – themes for selling products online, membership sites, etc.
• Education – themes that suit sites related to tutoring, etc.
• Entertainment – themes for celebrity blogs, nightlife, etc.
• Mobile – e.g. responsive themes.
• NonProfit – themes for nonprofit organizations, churches, etc.
• Real Estate – themes for real estate and real estate listings (e.g. home sales, etc.)
• Retail – themes for catalogs, trades or professionals (plumbers, medical centers, etc.)
• Technology – themes related to apps, landing pages, etc.
• Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and marriage celebrant blogs
• Miscellaneous – themes suitable for writing or discussing political issues, green living 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 emails you theme update notifications)

Go here to find great premium WordPress themes in the ThemeForest themes site:

• ThemeForest

Creative Market

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

Creative Market is another leading WordPress theme marketplace where you can browse many quality premium WP 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 themes for WordPress and narrow your search using theme categories (e.g. Minimal or Commerce themes, etc.) using their dropdown “Themes” menu …

Browse through hundreds of quality premium WordPress themes crafted by independent WordPress theme designers in the Creative Market themes marketplace here:

• Creative Market

Mojo Themes

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

Mojo is a directory for premium 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 WordPress themes, but you can easily browse hundreds of WP themes and search through their theme categories (e.g. Magazine or eCommerce themes and theme frameworks, etc.) by using the dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …

Visit the site to find great WordPress themes in the Mojo themes directory here:

• Mojo Themes

Now that we have looked at WordPress theme marketplaces, let’s look at commercial and independent WP theme design houses.

Commercial And Independent Theme Developers

SoloStream

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

(click on images above to browse all SoloStream themes)

Woo Themes

Woo Themes creates stunning premium themes for WordPress that are very popular and highly sought after by website users and offer a membership option that gives you access to all themes in their growing theme collection.

(click on the above images to browse all themes from WooThemes)

StoreFront

StoreFront specializes in creating WordPress themes for e-commerce. Their themes also integrate well with some of the most powerful e-commerce platforms and plugins available.

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

StudioPress

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

Many web developers like the Genesis framework not only because it’s well-coded and well-supported (the development team at StudioPress keeps this framework regularly up-to-date to reflect best practices for coding and to make sure that themes remain always compatible with the latest WordPress version, but because you can update your themes without losing any customizations you 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 design.

If this sounds 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 you pay one low price 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 browse more StudioPress themes)

Theme-Checking Tools

Here are a couple of useful WP theme-related tools worth keeping in mind:

What WordPress Theme Is That?

What WordPress Theme Is That is a free WP theme and plugin-checking tool that allows you to easily detect what WP theme and plugins a website or blog uses (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 WordPress theme the website uses.

Tip: If you don’t know if a site runs on WordPress or not, we have posted a a great tutorial that helps you tell if a site is powered by WordPress: The Easy Way To Tell If Your Web Site Was Built Using WP Software

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 software, but it will also list the WP theme being used on the site and list any WP plugins it detects.

• To use this online tool go here: What WordPress Theme Is That.com
• To learn more about this tool go here: The Easy Way To Tell If Your Blog Was Built Using The WP CMS Platform

Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC)

We said this earlier and it’s worth repeating it again: If you decide to use FREE themes for your WordPress site, we highly recommend sticking with the WordPress themes listed in the official WordPress theme repository.

A method that is commonly used by many hackers and cyber criminals is to put up websites offering “Free” themes for WordPress all over the web and then distribute themes and plugins with malicious code embedded in their files. In fact, some of these sites even display on Google’s search results for phrases like “free WordPress themes“, “best free WordPress themes”” etc. It’s best, therefore, to only download free themes from the official WordPress repository, or use established and reputable sites.

If you are concerned about whether a WordPress theme that you have installed on your site may contain malware or unwanted code, you can use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to scan your WordPress theme files. The plugin scans the source files of every installed theme on your site for signs of malicious code and then outputs a report …

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

I hope that you have found this information useful.

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