In a separate article, we have written a comprehensive overview of WordPress Themes.
If you haven’t yet discovered WP themes and what makes WordPress themes so attractive to website owners, then make sure to check out our article: An Overview of WordPress Themes
In this blog post, we will show you where you can explore many excellent 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 avoid experiencing problems like lack of customer support and poor theme coding.
As we’ve explained in our previously-mentioned article, a theme is a special type of web design template that is used on WordPress-driven websites and blogs and designed specifically for the WP content management system.
Many talented web designers and website development firms create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WordPress community have access to thousands of high quality themes covering an extensive range of applications.
Finding Themes: Let’s Keep Things Simple!
If you were to go to Google and search for the following:
- best WordPress themes
- WordPress themes free
- best responsive WordPress themes for churches (type in whatever your business, search topic or website is about)
You are probably going to get an overwhelming amount of information 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 simple.
WordPress.com vs WordPress.org Themes
Before we get started, you need to know that WordPress offers both a hosted and a self-hosted version. We’ll cover these differences in a separate article. In this post, please note that we will only focus on 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 Themes
Next, it’s important to know that there are thousands of Free and Paid themes being made available. Free themes are generally distributed as Free Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or they can be sold as Premium (i.e. paid) themes.
Theme Directories & WP Theme Design Companies
There are mostly two places where WP themes can be found. The first place is in WP theme marketplaces and theme directories. The second are the commercial and independent theme development firms.
Theme marketplaces and WP theme directories are large theme aggregators. theme developers (both commercial and independent) list their themes (both free and paid) in the marketplace or directory and buyers search for these just like they would if they were shopping for apps on an app store or software marketplace.
Some of the larger marketplaces 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 development firms can also design both free and paid WordPress themes, and can vary in size, from an individual theme designer or a small team of theme designer, to large web and theme development companies.
Many commercial theme design firms 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 WP theme directories .
Let’s now show you where to search for the best themes for your website.
Choosing Responsive Themes For Your Website Or Blog
WordPress.org
(WordPress.org – Free Theme Directory)
The official WordPress.org theme directory is the largest and best place to find free WP themes. In fact, it’s probably the only free directory you should use when looking for free WP themes. The reason for this, is because –as some free software users have discovered– downloading free software, add-ons, apps, templates or themes from untrustworthy places can put your computer, digital presence and 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 meets their standards of quality and security.
To browse thousands of professionally-designed FREE WordPress themes from the official WordPress Themes Repository, go here:
http://www.wordpress.org/extend/themes
Look For Free Themes Inside Your Own WordPress Dashboard
Useful Tip: You can easily browse through every theme in the WordPress.org 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 admin panel with only a few clicks.
Use WordPress Theme Filtering
WordPress has a built-in filtering function inside the dashboard area that lets you narrow down your search for themes based on criteria like Colours, Layout and Features …
This makes it easy to find what you are looking for. For example, you could search for themes with predominantly orange colour design, with a 3-column layout and a full-width template, or themes that support custom menus, etc.
Note: in the article where we discuss the importance of using “responsive” themes, we explained how these ensure that your theme will display without problems across all devices (e.g. your visitors’ PCs, smartphones and tablets) …
You should use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filtering function lets you do just that …
… and bring back only themes that use “responsive” design standards …
Pros & Cons Of Using Free 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 provide a number of built-in customizable features, giving you great flexibility and choice in how you configure all of its various layout elements.
The ”cons” of using free WP themes are that your themes may not get updated as often with new features and bug fixes, and you shouldn’t expect the developer to provide dedicated support, especially if they are not getting paid. Many free themes ask users for donations to help cover their 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 over 1 year since any changes were last made, then we advise you to think twice about using it, as WordPress changes quite often and new features can result in conflicts and errors with older code.
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 paid themes or even on custom theme design. Who knows, the free theme you’ve downloaded may just be the thing that works for you and for your business.
Now that we’ve seen how to find free WP themes in the WordPress.org theme directory and how to filter your search for themes that meet specific criteria, let’s turn our attention to premium WordPress themes.
Paid WordPress 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:
Theme Marketplaces
ThemeForest
ThemeForest is one of the largest and well known WP theme marketplaces online.
ThemeForest lets many professional WP theme creators showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are well over 15,000 premium 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 themes in various categories, such as:
- Blog/Magazine – themes for general blogs and blog magazines, etc.
- Corporate – themes suitable for business sites and marketing purposes.
- Creative – themes for video galleries, writers, etc.
- Directory Listings – themes suitable for sites related to directory listings, holiday rentals, social directories, etc.
- eCommerce – themes for online shopping, event bookings and registrations, etc.
- Education – themes that suit sites related to training, etc.
- Entertainment – themes for photo gallery blogs, cafes, 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. commercial property, etc.)
- Retail – themes for travel, trades or professionals (electricians, chiropractors, etc.)
- Technology – themes related to software, newsletters, etc.
- Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and wedding advice blogs
- Miscellaneous – themes suitable for topics related to activism, 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 discover quality premium themes in the ThemeForest themes site:
Creative Market
(click on the above images to browse more themes on Creative Market)
Creative Market is another leading WordPress theme directory where you can browse many 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 WordPress themes in its marketplace, but you can easily find themes for WordPress and search through their theme categories from the site’s dropdown “Themes” menu …
Browse through hundreds of quality premium themes crafted by independent WP theme developers in the Creative Market themes marketplace here:
Mojo Themes
(click on the images above to see more themes at Mojo)
Mojo is a directory 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 go through all of their themes for WordPress and narrow your search with theme categories (e.g. Portfolio or Business themes and theme frameworks, etc.) by choosing the dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …
Visit the site to find great premium WP themes in the Mojo marketplace here:
Now that we have looked at WP theme marketplaces, let’s look at commercial and independent theme vendors.
Commercial WP Theme Agencies
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 above images to see all themes from SoloStream)
Woo Themes
Woo Themes designs eye-catching premium themes for WordPress that are very popular and highly sought after by web users and also offer a membership option that allows you access to their entire WP theme collection.
(click on the above images 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 browse all themes from StoreFront)
StudioPress
StudioPress provides WordPress themes based on a framework that allows users to quickly and easily build a professional and search optimized WordPress site, and provides a self-updating design architecture, turn-key designs with beautiful frames for the content and unprecedented control of the framework.
Many website developers prefer using this framework not only because it’s well-coded and well-supported (the development team at StudioPress keeps the framework regularly updated to reflect best coding practices 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 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 theme framework and gives your site its unique design.
If this all 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 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 see more themes from StudioPress)
Theme-Checking Tools
Let’s finish this post with a couple of useful WordPress theme-related tools worth keeping in mind:
What WordPress Theme Is That – WP Theme And Plugin Checker
What WordPress Theme Is That is a free online tool that lets you easily detect what WordPress theme a website or blog uses (including parent and child WP themes).
This is a great resource if you have come across a WordPress site that you like and would like to know what theme the website or blog uses.
Tip: If you don’t know whether a site uses WordPress or not, we have posted a a great tutorial that helps you tell if a web site is WordPress-driven: The Easy Way To Tell If Your Blog 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 then not only confirm whether or not a site is powered by WordPress software, but it will also list the theme being used and list any plugins it detects.
- To use the tool visit the website here: What WordPress Theme Is That?
- To learn how to use this tool go here: Is My Website WordPress?
Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC)
We said this before and it’s worth repeating it again: If you decide to use FREE themes for your WordPress site, we strongly recommend sticking with the approved WP themes listed in the official WordPress theme repository.
A tactic 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 that contain 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 best, therefore, to only download free WP themes from the official WordPress.org theme repository, or use well-known and trusted theme merchants.
If you are in doubt about whether a WordPress theme installed on your site could be infected with potentially malicious or unwanted code, you can use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to scan your theme files. The plugin scans the source files of every them you have installed on your site for signs of injected code and then presents you with a report with the results …
(Theme Authenticity Checker Report Page – Screenshot Source: Plugin)
I hope that you have found this information useful.
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