If you are new to WordPress, make sure you read our introduction to WordPress themes. We’ve written an in-depth article that explains what themes are and how using themes can be cost-effective and time-saving for small business website owners.
This step-by-step tutorial will show you how to upgrade a WP theme in your admin area.
Updating A WordPress Theme – Best Practices
Before updating your themes, we recommend going through the “best practices” checklist below.
1. Back Up Your Site Files And Data
Backing up your website before making any updates to your site is vital. If something goes wrong, you can always restore your web site or blog to its previous settings.
If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are a number of free and paid plugins you can use. You can read about a WordPress backup plugin that can automate your site backups here:
2. Check The Theme Update Notes
When WordPress upgrades its software to a new version, this can affect the functionality of certain themes. Depending on the theme you have installed, there may be some release notes included with an update listing any new features, improvements, security fixes or important changes in the new version.
If the changes seem irrelevant or unimportant, you can skip the update. Otherwise, you should update.
3. Test Your Theme
If you can, it’s a good idea to check the theme before installing it on your site.
Typically, web service providers will set up a test site where they can test the latest version of a theme, track bugs and check to see if all plugins are working fine with the new theme before installing it on a live site.
If you’re managing your own website, you can set up a test WordPress site on a subdomain or a separate domain name with the same configuration settings (e.g. plugins) and play with the new theme versions on your test site before applying it to your main site.
4. Search Online
Before updating your theme, it’s a good idea to search online and see if anyone has reported any issues with the new theme version.
You can type the theme name and version into Google, and search the theme developer’s support forum (many developers offer this for premium WordPress themes, and even for some free plugins).
5. Use Child Themes For Heavily Customized WordPress Themes
If you have made extensive customizations to your existing theme files, upgrading your theme may result in your custom modifications being overwritten. To prevent losing your theme modifications, therefore, we recommend you learn how to create “child themes”.
A WordPress child theme is a theme that inherits the functionality of another theme, called the parent theme, and allows you to modify, or add to, the functionality of that parent theme. When you update the “parent theme”, your modifications are preserved through the “child theme.”
If you plan to customize your theme files, then we recommend becoming familiar with the use of child themes, especially if you plan on using a theme that gets regularly updated. You can learn more about child themes by searching online, or visit the official WordPress child theme page here:
As you will see below, the actual process of updating a WordPress theme is not complicated at all … a few simple clicks and you’re done! What can feel slightly bothersome is the precautionary work involved prior to upgrading.
Many people don’t upgrade their themes regularly, while many upgrade without going through some or all of the steps listed in the section above. As mentioned earlier, the above are “best practice” methods to help you avoid problems. Ultimately, it is solely the website owner’s responsibility to protect their online assets.
How To Update Your Theme – Step-By-Step Tutorial
Upgrading your WordPress theme from your dashboard is simple.
Log into your WordPress administration area …
Depending on the theme(s) installed on your site, you may receive occasional alerts in your WP Dashboard that new theme versions are available and require updating …
Updating a WordPress theme from the dashboard is simple and easy. You can update your WordPress theme via the “Themes” section, or the “Updates” screen.
Updating Your Site Themes From The “Themes” Section
You can see which themes need updating by going to your Themes page.
Select Appearance > Themes in your WordPress dashboard menu …
This brings you to the “Themes” page …
Themes that need updating display an “Update Available” message over the theme’s thumbnail image …
Locate the theme that needs to be updated and click on the “Update Available” alert.
When the theme details window opens up, click on update now …
WordPress automatically updates the theme …
Your WordPress theme is now updated …
Repeat the above process to update all of your remaining themes, or use the method below to bulk update multiple themes.
Updating WordPress Themes Via The “Updates” Page
Update your theme from the “Updates” page as shown below:
To view all themes installed in your site that require updating, click on Dashboard > Updates …
This brings up the Updates screen. Scroll down to the Themes section …
Select all the themes you want to update and click on Update Themes to complete the upgrade process …
WordPress automatically updates all of your selected themes …
Congratulations! Now you know how to update your WordPress theme in the WP dashboard.
***
"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group