If you are new to WordPress, make sure you read our introduction to WordPress themes. This in-depth article explains what themes are and how using themes can save business website owners significant time and money.
This step-by-step tutorial will show you how to update your themes with just a few clicks inside the dashboard.
Upgrading Themes – Best Practices Checklist
Before updating your themes, we recommend going through the handy checklist below to ensure that no settings or customizations are lost and your update goes smoothly.
1. Make A Full Site Backup
Backing up your files and data before making any changes to your site is vital. Whenever something doesn’t go as planned, you can always restore.
If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are many plugins you can use. Learn about a WordPress backup plugin that can automate your backup process 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 a changelog file included with an update listing new features, improvements, security fixes or any other information pertaining to the new version.
If the changes seem irrelevant or unimportant, you can skip the update. Otherwise, you should upgrade.
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 an installed theme, track any bugs and check to see if all plugins are working fine with the new theme before applying it to 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 live site.
4. Search Online
Before updating your theme, it’s a good idea to do a quick search online and see if anyone has reported any serious problems 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 provide forums for paid themes, and even for some free plugins).
5. Use Child Themes For Heavily Customized WordPress Themes
If you have made extensive changes to your existing WordPress 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 customizations get preserved through the “child theme.”
If you plan to customize your theme files, then we recommend becoming familiar with child themes, especially if you plan to use a theme that gets regularly updated. You can learn more about child themes by searching online, or just visit the WordPress Codex 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! The bit that takes the most time and effort to complete is the preparation involved prior to upgrading.
Some people don’t upgrade their themes regularly, while many upgrade without going through all of the steps listed in the section above. As mentioned earlier, the above are “best practice” methods for ensuring problem-free upgrades. Ultimately, as a website owner, it is solely your responsibility to protect your digital assets.
Updating Your Theme – Step-By-Step Tutorial
Upgrading your theme in your dashboard is simple.
Log into your WordPress administration area …
Depending on the theme(s) installed on your website, you may receive an occasional notification in your dashboard that new theme versions are available and require updating …
Updating a theme from the WP dashboard is simple and easy. You can update your site’s theme via the “Themes” area, or the “Updates” screen.
Updating WordPress Themes Via The “Themes” Area
You can see which themes need to be updated by going to your Themes area.
Choose Appearance > Themes from your WP dashboard menu …
This brings you to the “Themes” page …
WordPress Themes with new versions display an “Update Available” message over the theme’s thumbnail image …
Locate the theme you want to update and click on the “Update Available” alert.
When the theme details window opens up, click on update now …
WordPress automatically updates your theme …
Your WordPress theme is now up-to-date …
Repeat the process described above to update all of your remaining themes, or use the method below to bulk upgrade multiple themes.
Updating Your Theme Using The “Updates” Area
Update your WordPress themes from the “Updates” screen as follows:
To view all themes installed in your site that need updating, click on Dashboard > Updates …
This opens 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 update process …
WordPress will automatically update all of the selected themes …
Congratulations! Now you know how to upgrade your WP themes in your dashboard.
***
"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)