If you are new to WordPress, make sure you read our overview of WordPress themes. This detailed article explains what WordPress themes are and how using a theme can be cost-effective and time-saving for business website owners.
In this tutorial, you will learn how to update WP themes in your admin area.
Upgrading WordPress Themes – Best Practices
We recommend going through the handy checklist below before going through the upgrade process.
1. Back Up Your Website Fully
Backing up your website before making any updates to your site is vital. Whenever something doesn’t go as planned, you can always restore your web site or blog to its former state.
If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are many free and paid WordPress plugins you can use. Learn 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 are using, there may be a changelog file included with an update listing new features, improvements, security fixes or important information pertaining to the new version.
If the theme changes seem irrelevant or unimportant, you can skip the update. Otherwise, it’s best to 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 a theme, track bugs and verify that all plugins are working fine with the new theme before applying and activating 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 plugins and configuration settings 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 to 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 customizations to your existing theme files, upgrading your theme could 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 the parent theme. When you update the “parent theme”, your customizations 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 use 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 simple. The bit that takes the most time and effort to complete is the preparation involved prior to upgrading.
Some people don’t upgrade their WordPress themes regularly, while others upgrade without going through some or all of the steps listed in the section above. As mentioned earlier, the above are recommended “best practice” methods for ensuring problem-free upgrades. Ultimately, it is solely your responsibility as a website owner to protect your digital properties.
Updating Your Theme – Step-By-Step Tutorial
Upgrading your themes in the WP dashboard is easy.
Log into your WordPress admin area …
Depending on what theme(s) are installed on your site, you may receive occasional alerts in your WP Dashboard that your theme(s) need updating …
Updating a theme in the WP dashboard is a very simple process. You can update your themes using the “Themes” feature, or the “Updates” area.
Updating WordPress Themes From The “Themes” Page
You can see which themes need to be updated by going to your Themes page.
Choose Appearance > Themes in your WordPress dashboard menu …
This opens up the “Themes” page …
Themes with new versions display an “Update Available” message over their 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 will automatically update the theme in seconds …
Your theme is now updated …
Repeat the above to update all of your remaining themes, or use the method described below to upgrade multiple themes.
Updating Your Site’s Theme Using The “Updates” Page
Update your theme via the “Updates” area as shown below:
To view all themes on your website 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 bulk upgrade process …
WordPress automatically updates all of the selected themes …
Congratulations! Now you know how to upgrade your WordPress themes in your admin dashboard.
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