In another article, we provide new WordPress users with a comprehensive overview of WordPress Themes.
If you haven’t yet discovered themes and what makes themes unique, then make sure to check out the post here: Understanding WordPress Themes – A Guide For Business Owners
In this blog post, you will learn where to search for free and paid themes for your WordPress website or blog. 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 dealing with problems like lack of product support and poor theme coding.
As we’ve explained in our previous article, a WordPress theme is a unique type of web template that is used on WordPress-powered blogs and designed specifically with WordPress in mind.
Many skilled web designers and website design houses create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WP community can access thousands of professional-quality themes covering an extensive range of uses and applications.
Finding Themes: Your Time-Saving Guide
If you were to launch Google and search for a key phrase like the following:
- best free themes for WordPress
- WordPress themes free
- best paid WordPress themes for musicians (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 results.
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 start, you need to know that WordPress offers users both a hosted and a self-hosted version. We’ll cover these differences in another post. For now, let’s just cover themes for the self-hosted version of WordPress (WordPress.org) in this post, which gives you more freedom, more options and more control over the design aspects of your website.
Free vs Paid WordPress Themes
Next, it’s important to know that you will easily find many Free and Paid themes made available. Free WP themes are generally distributed as Open Source Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or they can be listed as Premium (paid) themes.
WP Theme Directories vs WP Theme Development Firms
There are two different types of places where WP themes can be found. The first type of place is in theme marketplaces and WP theme directories. The second type of place are the commercial and independent WP theme developers.
Theme marketplaces and WordPress 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 visitors search 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 WP plugins and templates for other web applications (e.g. Joomla, Drupal, etc.)
Commercial and independent theme developers can also create both free and commercial themes, and can vary in size, from an individual theme developer or a small team of designer, to large theme development companies.
Most commercial 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 WP theme directories .
Let’s now show you where to find the best WP themes for your blog.
Finding WP Themes For Your Website Or Blog
WordPress.org
(WordPress.org – WP Theme Directory)
The official WordPress.org theme directory is the biggest and best place to find free WP themes. In fact, it’s probably the only free WordPress 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 place your computer, digital presence and even your entire business at risk.
The WordPress.org directory is not only a trustworthy and reputable place to download themes for your website, but it also uses a review team to review and make sure that each theme listed in the directory meets high quality and security standards.
To browse thousands of great-looking FREE WordPress themes from the official Themes Repository, go here:
http://www.wordpress.org/extend/themes
Find Themes Inside Your WordPress Dashboard
Useful Tip: You can easily browse through every WP theme in the WordPress.org theme directory and not only find a great theme for your website or blog, but also easily install and activate it directly from inside your WP admin panel with only a couple of mouse clicks.
Use The WP Theme Feature Filters
WordPress provides a filtering function inside the admin area that lets you narrow down your search for themes based on criteria like Colours, Layout and Features …
This makes it easier to find themes with specific features. For example, you could search for themes with predominantly pink colour design, with a 3-column layout and a full-width template, or themes that support custom menus, etc.
Note: in another article where we discuss the importance of using “responsive” WP themes, we explained how responsive themes ensure that your theme will display without problems across all devices (e.g. the computers, tablets and smartphones used by visitors to view your web content) …
It’s a good idea to use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filter lets you do just that …
… and display only WP themes that are “responsive” …
Pros & Cons Of Using Free Themes
The obvious “pro” to using free themes is that it costs you 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 ”cons” to 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 developer to provide immediate support, especially if they are not getting paid. Many freely distributed 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 over one year since any changes were last made, then it’s best to think twice about downloading it, as the theme may have been abandoned by its developer.
If you’re just getting started and your website is still relatively new, there is nothing wrong with using a free theme until you have a better idea of the kind of site design that would work best for your site before spending any money on a premium theme. Who knows, the free theme you’ve downloaded could be exactly what works for you and helps to convert your site visitors into customers.
Now that we’ve seen how to find free WP themes in the WordPress.org theme directory and ways to narrow down your search for themes that meet specific criteria, let’s turn our attention to finding premium themes.
Premium WP 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 great support, you can 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 well known WP theme directories online.
ThemeForest lets many professional WP theme creators showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are well over 17,000 premium themes listed (you can find great themes from as little as $3) …
(click on the images above to browse all 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 activism blogs, etc.
- Corporate – themes suitable for medical sites or marketing purposes.
- Creative – themes for visual galleries, writers, etc.
- Directory Listings – themes ideal for sites related to employment opportunities, dining out & restaurants, 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 music and bands blogs, music venues, etc.
- Mobile – e.g. mobile-switching themes.
- NonProfit – themes for nonprofit organizations, charities, etc.
- Real Estate – themes for real estate and real estate listings (e.g. rentals, etc.)
- Retail – themes for catalogs, trades or professionals (electricians, medical practitioners, etc.)
- Technology – themes related to hosting, affiliate marketing, seo, product reviews, direct sales, etc.
- Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and dating 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 sends you theme update notifications)
Go here to browse many quality premium WP themes in the ThemeForest marketplace:
Creative Market
(click on the images above to see all Creative Market themes)
Creative Market is another leading WP theme marketplace where you can browse many quality premium WordPress 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 browse hundreds of WordPress themes and search through their theme categories using the site’s dropdown “Themes” menu …
Browse through hundreds of quality premium themes crafted by independent WordPress theme designers in the Creative Market themes marketplace here:
Mojo Themes
(click on the above images to see more WordPress 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. Magazine or Business themes and theme frameworks, etc.) using the site’s dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …
Visit the site to find great themes in the Mojo theme directory here:
Now that we have looked at WordPress theme marketplaces, let’s take a look at commercial and independent theme stores.
Commercial WordPress Theme Developers
SoloStream
SoloStream provides WordPress users with a selection of high quality premium themes and the option of accessing all themes through a WordPress theme membership.
(click on above images to browse more SoloStream themes)
Woo Themes
Woo Themes creates eye-catching premium themes that are very popular and highly sought after by website users and offer a membership option that gives you access to their entire theme collection.
(click on the above images to see all WooThemes themes)
StoreFront
StoreFront Themes 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 see more StoreFront themes)
StudioPress
StudioPress develops 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 your content and unprecedented control of the framework.
Many web 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 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 “skins” that sit on top of the framework and gives your site its unique design.
If this all 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 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 images above to view all themes from StudioPress)
Theme-Checking Tools
Let’s finish this article with a couple of useful WordPress theme-related tools worth knowing about:
What WP Theme Is That? WordPress Theme Checker
What WordPress Theme Is That? is a free WordPress theme-checking tool that lets you easily detect what WordPress theme a website uses.
This is a great resource if you have come across a WordPress site that you like and would like to know what WordPress theme the website or blog uses.
Tip: If you don’t know if a site runs on WordPress or not, go here for a great tutorial that shows you how to tell if a site is powered by WordPress: How To Check If A Website Was Built Using 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 if the site has been built using WordPress, but it will also list the theme being used and list any plugins detected.
- To use this online tool go here: What WordPress Theme Is That.com
- To learn how to use this tool go here: Is Your Site Built With WordPress?
Theme Authenticity Checker - WordPress Plugin
We suggested this before and it’s worth repeating again: If you decide to use FREE themes for your WordPress site, we highly recommend sticking with the themes listed in the official WordPress theme repository.
A well-known tactic used by many hackers and cyber criminals is to put up sites and directories offering “Free” themes for WordPress all over the web and distribute themes and plugins with malicious code embedded in their files. In fact, some of these sites even display on search engine results for search phrases like “free WordPress themes“, “best free WordPress themes”” etc. It’s safer, therefore, to only download free themes from the official WordPress repository, or use established and trusted theme merchants.
If you are concerned about whether a WordPress theme installed on your blog may be infected with malware or unwanted code, you can use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to scan your WordPress theme files. This plugin scans the source files of every installed theme on your site for signs of malicious code and presents you with a report as shown in the screenshot below …
(Theme Authenticity Checker Report Page – Source: WordPress.org Plugin Site)
We hope that you have found this information useful.
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"If you're new to WordPress, this can stand on its own as a training course and will stay with you as you progress from beginner to advanced and even guru status." - Bruce (Columbus, Ohio)
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