If you are new to WordPress, make sure you read our introduction to WordPress themes. The comprehensive article explains what WP themes are and how themes can save business website owners significant time and money.
In this step-by-step tutorial, you will learn how to upgrade your theme in your dashboard.
Updating WP Themes – Best Practices
We recommend going through the “best practices” checklist below before going through the upgrade process.
1. Make A Complete Backup
Backing up your website before making any changes to your site is essential. This way, if things don’t go as planned, you can always restore your website to its former configuration.
If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are many plugins you can use. Learn about a WordPress backup plugin that can fully automate your site backups here:
2. Check The Theme Update Notes
Changes made to the WordPress software can affect the functionality of certain themes. Depending on the theme you are using, there may be a changelog file accompanying an update listing any new features, improvements, security fixes or important changes in the new theme version.
If the changes seem irrelevant or unimportant, you can skip the update. Otherwise, it’s best to 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 any bugs and check if the new theme version doesn’t conflict with any existing plugins or settings before applying it to a live site.
If you’re managing your own website, you can install a test WordPress site on a subdomain or a separate domain using the same configuration settings (e.g. plugins) and test new theme versions on your test site before applying it to your live website.
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 issues with the new theme version.
You can enter the theme name and version into Google, and search the theme developer’s support forum (many developers offer this for paid 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 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 that parent theme. When you update the “parent theme”, all customizations are preserved through the “child theme.”
If you plan to customize your theme files, then we recommend becoming familiar with child themes, especially if you 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 part of the update process that takes the most time and effort to complete is the precautionary work involved prior to upgrading.
Many people don’t upgrade their themes regularly, while others upgrade without going through 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 digital assets.
Updating A Theme In WordPress – Step-By-Step Tutorial
Updating your themes in your dashboard is easy.
Log into your WordPress administration area …
Depending on which theme(s) are installed on your website, you may receive occasional alerts in your WP Dashboard that your theme(s) need updating …
Updating a WordPress theme in the dashboard is quite a simple process. You can update your site’s theme via the “Themes” screen, or the “Updates” area.
Updating WordPress Themes Using The “Themes” Screen
To see which themes need updating, go to your Themes page.
Choose Appearance > Themes in your WP admin menu …
This brings you to the “Themes” page …
WordPress Themes that need updating display an “Update Available” message over their thumbnail image …
Locate the theme you want to update and click on the “Update Available” message.
When the theme details window opens up, click on update now …
WordPress will automatically update the theme …
Your WordPress theme is now up-to-date …
Repeat the above to update all of your out-of-date themes, or use the method below to upgrade multiple themes at once.
Updating WordPress Themes Via The “Updates” Area
Update your WordPress themes using the “Updates” screen as follows:
To view all themes in 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 will automatically update all of the selected themes …
Congratulations! Now you know how to update your WordPress themes from the WP dashboard.
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"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