Tag: WordPress Themes

In a separate post, we provide new WordPress users with a comprehensive overview of WordPress Themes.

If you haven’t yet discovered themes and what makes WP themes so revolutionary in terms of website design, then go here to read the article: About WP Themes – A Useful Guide For Website Owners

In this article, we will show you where to browse hundreds of free and paid themes for your WordPress website. You will also learn about the different types of WordPress theme resources and get tips on how to ensure that you get the right themes for your needs and how to avoid dealing with problems like lack of support and poor theme coding.

As we’ve explained in another post, a theme is a special type of web template used on WordPress-driven sites and designed specifically with WordPress in mind.

Many individual website designers and web development firms create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WordPress community have access to thousands of excellent WordPress themes covering a wide-range of uses.

Finding Themes: So Many Choices … Where To Begin?

If you were to launch Google and type the following:

• best responsive WP themes
• best premium WordPress themes
• best paid WordPress themes for churches (type in whatever your business, area of interest or blog is about)

You are probably going to get an overwhelming amount of disorganized information to sort through in your 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 should know that WordPress offers users both a hosted and a self-hosted version. We’ll explain these differences in a different post. In this post, we’ll only be covering themes for the self-hosted version of WordPress (WordPress.org) in this article, as these give you more freedom, more options and more control over your web design.

Free vs Paid Themes

Next, it’s useful to know that you will easily find many Free and Paid themes made available. Free WordPress themes are generally distributed as Open Source Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or they are sold as Premium (i.e. paid) themes.

Theme Marketplaces vs WP Theme Agencies

There are 2 places where you can find WP themes. The first place is in WordPress theme marketplaces and WP theme directories. The second type of place are the commercial and independent WP theme houses.

Theme marketplaces and theme directories are big theme stores. WordPress theme developers (both commercial and independent) list their themes (both free and paid) in the marketplace or directory and buyers find these just like they would if they were shopping for apps on an app store or software marketplace.

Some of the bigger theme stores don’t just sell WordPress themes. They can also sell WordPress plugins and templates for other web applications (e.g. Joomla, Drupal, etc.)

Commercial and independent WordPress theme design houses can also create both free and premium themes, and can vary in size, from an individual theme developer or a small team of theme developer, to large web and theme design and development companies.

Many commercial or independent theme companies 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 directories .

Let’s now show you where to search for the best themes for your website.

Where To Find Great Themes For Your Website Or Blog

WordPress.org

(WordPress.org – Themes Directory)

The official WordPress theme directory is the biggest and best place to download free WordPress themes. In fact, it’s probably the only free theme directory you should use when looking for free WP themes. The reason why, 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 … even your entire business at risk.

The WordPress theme directory is not only a trustworthy and reputable place to download themes for your site, but it also relies on a team of theme reviewers to review and make sure that each theme listed in the directory complies with certain standards of quality and security.

To browse thousands of great-looking FREE WordPress themes from the official WP Themes Directory, go here:

http://www.wordpress.org/extend/themes

Search For Free Themes Without Leaving Your Own WordPress Dashboard

Useful Tip: You can easily browse through every WP theme in the WordPress directory and not only find what you are looking for, but also easily install and start using it directly from within your WordPress admin panel with a couple of mouse clicks.

Use The WordPress Theme Filtering

WordPress provides a filtering function inside the dashboard area that lets you narrow down your search for themes based on criteria like Colours, Layout and Features …

This makes it easy to find themes with specific features. For example, you could search for themes with predominantly orange color design, with a 3-column layout and a full-width template, or themes that support custom menus, etc.

Note: in the article where we discuss the importance of using “responsive” themes, we explained how responsive themes ensure that your theme will display without problems across all devices (e.g. the laptops, tablets and smartphones used by visitors to view your site) …

It’s a good idea to use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filtering option lets you do just that …

… and bring back only themes that are “responsive” …

Pros & Cons Of Using Free WP Themes

The obvious “pro” to using free WP themes is that it’s free to download and use the theme on your site. Additionally, many free themes are professionally designed and come with a number of built-in customizable settings, giving you great flexibility and choice in how you configure all of its various layout elements.

The ”cons” of 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 theme developer to provide immediate support, especially if they are not getting paid. Most free themes ask for donations to help cover support costs.

When downloading free themes, therefore, check to see when the theme was last updated. If it’s been more than 1 year since any updates were made, then think twice about downloading it, as WordPress changes quite often and this can result in conflicts or errors with older code.

If you’re just getting started and your site is still quite 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 money on paid themes. Who knows, the theme you downloaded for free could be exactly what works for your site and for your business.

Now that we’ve seen how to find free WordPress themes in the WordPress theme directory and ways to narrow down your search for themes that meet your specific requirements, it’s time to turn our attention to finding paid themes.

Paid 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 ongoing support, then search through the WordPress theme galleries of the “Premium” theme design agencies listed below:

WP Theme Marketplaces And Directories

ThemeForest

ThemeForest is one of the biggest and well known theme directories online.

ThemeForest allows many professional WordPress theme designers to showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are currently over 17,000 premium WP themes listed (some starting from as little as $3) …

(click on the images above to view more ThemeForest themes)

If you visit the ThemeForest theme marketplace, you will be able to browse for specific themes in various categories, such as:

• Blog/Magazine – themes for general blogs and administration sites, etc.
• Corporate – themes suitable for medical sites and advertising purposes.
• Creative – themes suitable for video galleries, ebook authors, etc.
• Directory Listings – themes suitable for sites related to travel, classifieds, tourism directories, etc.
• eCommerce – themes for ecommerce, event bookings and registrations, etc.
• Education – themes that suit sites related to training, etc.
• Entertainment – themes for gossip blogs, nightlife, etc.
• Mobile – e.g. retina-ready themes.
• NonProfit – themes for nonprofit organizations, charities, etc.
• Real Estate – themes for real estate and real estate listings (e.g. commercial property, etc.)
• Retail – themes for health products, trades or professionals (repairers, medical centers, etc.)
• Technology – themes related to technology, newsletters, etc.
• Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and romance tips and advice blogs
• Miscellaneous – themes suitable for topics related to activism, parenting 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 emails you theme update notifications)

Browse lots of quality premium WP themes in the ThemeForest marketplace here:

• ThemeForest

Creative Market

(click on the images above to view more Creative Market themes)

Creative Market is another leading WP theme marketplace where you can search through thousands of quality premium WP 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 WordPress themes in its directory, but you can easily go through all of their WP themes and search through their theme categories (e.g. Blog or Photography themes, etc.) from the site’s dropdown “Themes” menu …

Browse through hundreds of quality premium WP themes crafted by independent WP theme developers in the Creative Market theme directory here:

• Creative Market

Mojo Themes

(click on the images above to view more Mojo themes)

Mojo is a marketplace 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 WordPress themes, but you can easily go through all of their WP themes and search through their theme categories (e.g. Responsive or eCommerce themes and theme frameworks, etc.) by using the dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …

Visit the site to find great themes in the Mojo theme marketplace here:

• Mojo

Now that we have looked at WP theme marketplaces, let’s take a look at commercial WordPress theme developers.

Commercial WordPress Theme Development Firms

SoloStream

SoloStream provides WordPress users with a selection of professional quality premium themes and the option of accessing all themes through a WordPress theme membership.

(click on above images to see more themes from SoloStream)

Woo Themes

Woo Themes designs great WP themes that are very popular and highly sought after by website users and also offer a membership option that allows members access to all themes in their WP theme collection.

(click on the images above to view all themes from WooThemes)

StoreFront

StoreFront specializes in creating WordPress themes for e-commerce. StoreFront themes also integrate well with some of the most powerful e-commerce platforms and plugins available.

(click on the images above to see more themes from StoreFront)

StudioPress

StudioPress develops WordPress themes based on a framework (called the “Genesis” framework) that enables users to quickly and easily build a professional and search optimized WordPress site, and provides a self-updating design architecture, turn-key designs with beautiful frames for your content and unprecedented control of the framework.

Many website developers prefer using this framework not only because it’s well-coded and well-supported (the development team at StudioPress keeps this framework regularly up-to-date to reflect best practices for coding and to ensure that themes are always compatible with the latest version of WordPress, but because you can update themes built using the Genesis framework without losing any customizations you have made to your theme.

This is because StudioPress themes use something called “child themes,” which are like a paint job that sits on top of the theme framework and gives your site its unique look and feel.

If this all sounds too technical, there’s no need to feel concerned about it. StudioPress themes are very easy to work with, just like all other WordPress themes. The great thing about choosing themes from StudioPress is that you pay just one low price 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 more StudioPress themes)

Theme-Checking Tools

Let’s finish this post with a couple of useful WordPress theme-related tools worth keeping in mind:

What WordPress Theme Is That

What WordPress Theme Is That is a free online tool that lets you easily detect what WP theme a site is using (including parent and child WordPress themes).

This is a great resource if you have come across a WordPress site that you like and would like to know what WP theme is being used on the website.

Tip: If you don’t know whether a site uses WordPress or not, we have published a a great tutorial that helps you tell if a website uses the WP CMS platform: Tell-Tale Signs It’s A WordPress Web Site And WordPress-Checking Tools

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 is powered by WordPress, but it will also list the WordPress theme being used on the site and list any WordPress plugins it detects.

• To use this tool visit the website here: What WordPress Theme Is That
• To learn how to use this tool go here: How Can I Tell If My Website Was Built Using WordPress?

Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) – WP 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 reviewed and approved WordPress themes listed in the official WordPress theme directory.

A strategy that is commonly used by many hacking groups and cyber criminals is to put up sites and directories offering “Free” themes for WordPress all over the web and then distribute modified themes with malicious code embedded in their files. In fact, some of these sites even come up on search engine results for search phrases like “free WordPress themes“, “best free WordPress themes”” etc. It’s best, therefore, to only download free WordPress themes from the official WordPress theme directory, or use well-known and reputable sites.

If you have any doubts about whether a WordPress theme that you have installed on your blog may contain malware or unwanted code, you can use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to scan your WordPress theme files. The plugin searches the source files of every installed theme on your site for signs of suspicious code and outputs a report with the results …

(Theme Authenticity Checker Report Page – Screenshot Source: Plugin)

We hope that you have found the information on how to find great free and premium themes for WordPress useful.

***

***