In another article, we provide new WordPress users with a comprehensive overview of WordPress Themes.
If you haven’t yet discovered WordPress themes and what makes WordPress themes unique, then go here to read our post: An Overview of WP Themes
In this article, you will learn where to search for free and paid themes for your WP 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 support and poor coding.
As explained in another post, a theme is a special kind of web design template used on WordPress-driven blogs and designed to work specifically with the WordPress platform in mind.
Many talented web designers and web design houses create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WordPress community have access to thousands of professional-quality WP themes designed to cover many website uses.
Finding WordPress Themes: How To Avoid Getting Overwhelmed
If you were to open up Google and type key phrases like this:
- best WordPress themes
- best free themes for WordPress
- best free WordPress themes for writers (enter whatever your business, search topic or blog 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 should know that WordPress offers users both a hosted and a self-hosted version. We’ll cover these differences in another article. To keep things simple, let’s just cover the topic of finding themes for the self-hosted version of WordPress (WordPress.org) in this article, which gives you more freedom, more options and more control over the design areas of your site.
Free vs Paid Themes
Next, it’s important to know that typically, you’ll find both Free and Paid WP themes being made available. Free themes are generally distributed as Free Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or they are licensed for use as Premium (i.e. paid) themes.
Theme Directories vs WordPress Theme Shops
There are mostly two different types of places where WordPress themes can be found. The first is in theme marketplaces and theme directories. The second place are the commercial and independent theme development firms.
Theme marketplaces and WP theme directories are large aggregators of themes. theme developers (both commercial and independent) list their themes (both free and paid) in the marketplace or directory and buyers shop for these just like they would if they were shopping for apps on an app store or software marketplace.
Some of the larger directories don’t just sell WordPress themes. They can also sell WP plugins and templates for other web applications (e.g. Joomla, Drupal, etc.)
Commercial and independent WordPress theme shops can also develop both free and commercial WP themes, and can vary in size, from an individual theme developer or a small team of theme developer, to large web and theme design companies.
Many commercial theme shops 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 WordPress theme directories .
Let’s now show you where to find great WordPress themes for your website or blog.
Finding The Best Responsive Themes For Your Website Or Blog
WordPress.org
(WordPress.org – Theme Directory)
The official WordPress.org theme directory is the largest and best place to download free WordPress themes. In fact, it’s probably the only free WP theme directory you should use when looking for free WordPress themes. The reason for this, is because –as some free software users have learned– 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 WordPress.org directory is not only a trustworthy and reputable place to download themes for your site, but it also relies on a review team to review and ensure that each theme in the directory meets their quality and security standards.
To browse thousands of great-looking 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.org directory and not only find what you are looking for, but also easily install and start using it directly from inside your WP dashboard with only a couple of clicks.
Use Theme Filtering
WordPress has a built-in 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 predominantly blue colour design, with a 4-column layout and a full-width template, or themes that support custom menus, etc.
Note: in another post where we present an overview of WordPress themes and discuss the importance of choosing “responsive” WP themes, we explained how responsive themes allow your site to be viewed without problems on all devices (e.g. your visitors’ computers, smartphones and tablets) …
It’s a good idea to use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filtering function lets you do just that …
… and find only themes that are “responsive” …
Pros & Cons Of Using Free WordPress Themes
The obvious “pro” to using free themes is that it costs nothing to download and use the theme. Additionally, many free themes are professionally designed and come with a number of built-in customizable options, giving you great flexibility and choice in how you configure all of its various layout elements.
The downside 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 urgent support, especially if they are not getting paid. Most free themes will ask you for a donation to help cover support costs.
When downloading free themes, therefore, check to see when the theme was last updated. If it’s been more than 1 year since any changes were last made, then think carefully about downloading 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 a paid theme. Who knows, the theme you downloaded for free could be exactly what works for you and your business.
Now that we’ve seen how to find free themes in the WordPress theme directory and how to filter your search for themes that meet specific requirements, it’s time to turn our attention to finding paid WordPress themes.
Paid Themes
If you are looking for themes with stunning design, or professional quality yet highly affordable WordPress web design themes with a distinctive look, unique customizable options and responsive support, then search through the WordPress theme galleries of the “Premium” theme design agencies listed below:
WP Theme Marketplaces
ThemeForest
ThemeForest is one of the largest and well known WP theme marketplaces online.
ThemeForest lets many professional WordPress theme developers showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are over 17,500 premium themes listed (some starting from as little as $3) …
(click on the above images to see more themes on ThemeForest)
If you visit the ThemeForest theme marketplace, you will be able to browse for specific WP themes in various categories, such as:
- Blog/Magazine – themes for general blogs and news editorials, etc.
- Corporate – themes suitable for medical sites or marketing purposes.
- Creative – themes for design, freelancers, etc.
- Directory Listings – themes that suit sites about employment opportunities, holiday rentals, business directories, etc.
- eCommerce – themes for e-commerce, membership sites, etc.
- Education – themes that suit sites related to tutoring, etc.
- Entertainment – themes for fashion blogs, dining out, 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 travel, trades or professionals (electricians, dentists, etc.)
- Technology – themes related to technology, landing pages, etc.
- Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and dating advice blogs
- Miscellaneous – themes suitable for writing or discussing political issues, 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 emails you theme update notifications)
Browse lots of great premium WordPress themes in the ThemeForest themes directory here:
Creative Market
(click on the above images to see more Creative Market themes)
Creative Market is another leading WP theme directory 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 marketplace, but you can easily find themes for WordPress and search through their theme categories (e.g. Landing Page or Photography themes, etc.) using the site’s dropdown “Themes” menu …
Browse through hundreds of quality premium themes crafted by independent WP theme designers in the Creative Market marketplace here:
Mojo Themes
(click on the images above to see all themes at Mojo)
Mojo is a marketplace for premium WP 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 go through all of their themes for WordPress and narrow your search with theme categories by selecting the dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …
Visit the site to find quality premium WP themes in the Mojo theme marketplace here:
Now that we have looked at WP theme marketplaces, let’s turn our attention to commercial WP theme developers.
Commercial Theme Developers
SoloStream
SoloStream provides WordPress users with a great selection of high quality themes and the option of accessing all themes through a WordPress theme membership.
(click on images above to view all themes from SoloStream)
Woo Themes
Woo Themes creates stunning premium themes for WordPress that are very popular and highly sought after by website users and offers a membership option that allows members access to all themes in their theme collection.
(click on the images above to see all WooThemes themes)
StoreFront
StoreFront specializes in e-commerce themes for WordPress. Their themes also integrate well with some of the most powerful e-commerce platforms and plugins available.
(click on the images above to view more themes from StoreFront)
StudioPress
StudioPress builds WordPress themes based on a framework that lets users quickly and easily build a professional and search optimized WordPress website, and provides a self-updating design architecture, turn-key designs with beautiful frames for your content and unprecedented control of the framework.
Many website developers like this framework not only because it’s well-coded and well-supported (the development team at StudioPress keeps this framework consistently up-to-date to reflect best coding practices and to ensure that it always remains compatible with the latest WordPress version, but because you can update themes built using the Genesis framework 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 “skins” that sit on top of the framework and gives your site its unique look and feel.
If this sounds too technical, don’t worry about it. StudioPress themes are very easy to work with, just like all other WordPress themes. The great thing about choosing StudioPress themes is that one low price allows 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 above images to browse more themes from StudioPress)
WordPress Theme-Checking Tools
To round things up, here are some useful WordPress theme-related tools worth knowing about:
What WordPress Theme Is That? WordPress Theme Checker
What WordPress Theme Is That? is a free online tool that allows you to easily detect what WP theme a site uses (including parent and child themes).
This is a great resource if you have come across a WordPress site that you like and would like to know what WordPress theme is being used on the website.
Tip: If you don’t know if a site runs on WordPress or not, we have posted a a great tutorial that shows you how to tell if a web site uses the WordPress CMS platform: Tell-Tale Signs It’s A WordPress Site And WordPress-Checking Tools
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 then not only confirm if the site was built on the WordPress CMS platform, but it will also list the theme being used and list any WP plugins detected.
- To use the online tool go here: What WordPress Theme Is That.com
- To learn how to use this tool go here: Is My Website Built With WordPress? Tell-Tale Signs & WordPress-Checking Tools
Theme Authenticity Checker - Plugin
A word of warning: When choosing FREE themes for your WordPress site, we highly recommend sticking with the reviewed and approved WordPress themes listed in the official WordPress theme directory.
A commonly-used strategy employed by many hacking groups and cyber criminals is to put up websites and directories offering “Free” WP themes all over the web and then distribute modified themes and plugins containing malicious code. 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 safer, therefore, to only download free WP themes from the official WordPress repository, or use well-known and trusted sites.
If you are in doubt about whether a WordPress theme installed on your site could be infected with malicious or unwanted code, use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to perform a scan of your theme files. This plugin searches the source files of every installed theme on your site for signs of malicious code and presents you with a report …
(Theme Authenticity Checker Report Page – Source: WordPress.org Plugin Site)
I hope that you have found this information useful.
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