In an earlier article, we provide new WordPress users with a comprehensive overview of WordPress Themes.
If you haven’t yet discovered WP themes and what makes themes so attractive to website owners, then make sure to check out our article: An Overview of WordPress Themes
In this article, you will learn where to explore many fantastic 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 having to deal with problems like lack of customer support and poorly-coded themes.
As we’ve explained in another article, a theme is a unique type of web design template used on WordPress-driven websites and blogs and designed specifically on WordPress.
Many web designers and website development firms create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WP community can access thousands of great themes designed for many purposes.
Finding Great Themes For WordPress: Let’s Simplify Things!
If you were to go to Google and search for a key phrase like this:
- best free themes for WordPress
- WordPress themes free
- best free WordPress themes for business (enter whatever your business, search topic or blog is about)
You are probably going to get an overwhelming amount of junk to sort through in your search listings.
So, to help you save time and make things easier, we’ll just cut through the clutter and make the process of finding great WordPress themes simple.
WordPress.com vs WordPress.org Themes
Before we get started, you should know that WordPress offers both a hosted and a self-hosted version. We’ll explain these differences in a different article. To keep things simple, we’ll only cover themes for the self-hosted version of WordPress (WordPress.org) in this post, as these give you more freedom, more options and more control over your web design.
Free vs Paid Themes
Next, it’s important to know that typically, you’ll find both Free and Paid WP themes made available. Free themes are normally distributed as Free Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or they are licensed for use as Premium (i.e. paid) themes.
Theme Marketplaces And Directories vs Theme Development Firms
There are two different types of places where WordPress themes can be found. The first type of place is in theme marketplaces and theme directories. The second place are the commercial and independent theme development firms.
WP theme marketplaces and WordPress theme directories are large theme aggregators. 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 directory.
Some of the bigger directories don’t just sell WordPress themes. They can also sell WP plugins and templates for other web applications (e.g. Joomla, Drupal, etc.)
Commercial and independent WordPress theme design companies can design both free and paid themes, and can vary in size, from an individual developer or a small team of theme developer, to large theme design companies.
Many commercial or independent theme developers sell their 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 find great WordPress themes for your website or blog.
Finding The Best Themes For Your WP Website
WordPress.org
(WordPress.org – Theme Directory)
The official WordPress theme directory is the largest and best place to search for WP themes for free. In fact, it’s probably the only free theme directory you should use when looking for free WP themes. The reason for this, is because –as some 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 uses a review team comprised of dedicated and hard working volunteers to review and make sure that each theme listed in the directory complies with high standards of quality and security.
To browse thousands of professionally-designed FREE WordPress themes from the official WordPress Themes Directory, go here:
http://www.wordpress.org/extend/themes
Look For Free WordPress Themes Inside Your Own WP Dashboard
Useful Tip: You can easily browse through every WP theme in the WordPress directory and not only find a great theme for your website or blog, but also easily install and start using it directly from inside your WP dashboard with only a few clicks.
Use Theme Feature Filters
WordPress has a built-in filtering function inside the admin area that lets you narrow down your search for themes based on criteria like Colours, Layout and Features …
This makes it easy to find what you are looking for. For example, you could search for themes with predominantly orange color design, with a four-column layout and a full-width template, or themes that support custom menus, etc.
Note: in an earlier article where we present an overview of WordPress themes and discuss the importance of using “responsive” WordPress themes, we explained how these allow your site to be viewed correctly on all devices (e.g. laptops, tablets and smartphones) …
You should use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filter lets you do just that …
… and display only WP themes that are “responsive” …
Pros & Cons Of Using Free WP Themes
The obvious “pro” to using free WordPress themes is that it costs you nothing to download and use the theme on your site. An added plus, is that many free themes are professionally designed and offer a number of customizable features, giving you great flexibility and choice in how you configure all of its various layout elements.
The downside of using free themes are that your themes may not get updated as often with new features and bug fixes, and it’s unrealistic to expect the theme developer to provide urgent support, especially if they are not getting paid. Most freely distributed themes ask users 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 well over 1 year since any changes were last made, then it’s best to think twice about using it, as the theme may have been abandoned by its developer.
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 any money on a theme. Who knows, the free theme you’ve downloaded may just be the thing that works for your site and helps to convert your site visitors into customers.
Now that we’ve seen how to find free themes in the WordPress.org theme directory and how to narrow down your search for themes that meet your specific criteria, it’s time to turn our attention to finding premium themes.
Premium WP Themes
If you are looking for themes with stunning design, or professional quality yet highly affordable WordPress web design themes with a distinctive look, unique customizable options and great support, you can search through the WordPress theme galleries of the “Premium” theme design agencies listed below:
WordPress Theme Directories
ThemeForest
ThemeForest is one of the biggest and most popular WordPress theme directories online.
ThemeForest lets many professional WP theme creators showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are over 17,500 premium themes to choose from (you can find great themes from as little as $3) …
(click on the above images to browse all themes on ThemeForest)
If you visit the ThemeForest theme marketplace, you will be able to browse for specific WordPress themes in various categories, such as:
- Blog/Magazine – themes for personal blogs and activism blogs, etc.
- Corporate – themes suitable for corporate sites or marketing purposes.
- Creative – themes for photography, arts, etc.
- Directory Listings – themes that suit sites related to employment opportunities, classifieds, business directories, etc.
- eCommerce – themes for e-commerce, membership sites, etc.
- Education – themes that suit sites related to training, etc.
- Entertainment – themes for celebrity blogs, music venues, etc.
- Mobile – e.g. responsive themes.
- NonProfit – themes for nonprofit organizations, charities, etc.
- Real Estate – themes for real estate and real estate listings (e.g. rentals, etc.)
- Retail – themes for catalogs, trades or professionals (electricians, legal firms, etc.)
- Technology – themes related to hosting, landing pages, etc.
- Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and wedding 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 sends you theme update notifications)
Go here to browse many great premium themes in the ThemeForest site:
Creative Market
(click on the above images to see all Creative Market themes)
Creative Market is another leading WP theme marketplace where you can browse many quality premium 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 WP themes in its directory, but you can easily browse hundreds of themes for WordPress and search through their theme categories (e.g. Minimal or Commerce themes, etc.) from the site’s dropdown “Themes” menu …
Browse through hundreds of great premium themes crafted by independent WordPress theme designers in the Creative Market marketplace here:
Mojo Themes
(click on the above images to browse all Mojo themes)
Mojo is a marketplace for premium 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 narrow your search with theme categories by choosing the site’s dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …
Visit the site to find quality premium themes in the Mojo marketplace here:
Now that we have looked at WordPress theme marketplaces, let’s look at commercial and independent theme vendors.
Commercial And Independent Theme Design Houses
SoloStream
SoloStream provides WordPress users with a selection of professional quality premium WP themes and the option of accessing all themes through a WordPress theme membership.
(click on images above to browse more SoloStream themes)
Woo Themes
Woo Themes designs eye-catching WordPress themes that are very popular and highly sought after by web users and also offers a membership option that gives you access to all themes in their theme portfolio.
(click on the images above to see all themes from WooThemes)
StoreFront
StoreFront Themes creates stunning 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 view more themes from StoreFront)
StudioPress
StudioPress builds WordPress themes based on a framework that lets you 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 the content and unprecedented control of the framework.
Many web developers like the Genesis framework not only because it’s well-coded and well-supported (the development team at StudioPress keeps the framework frequently updated to reflect best coding practices and to ensure that themes remain always compatible with the latest version of WordPress, but because you can update themes built using the Genesis framework without losing any customizations you may have made to your theme.
This is because themes built with the Genesis framework use something called “child themes,” which are like “skins” that sit on top of the framework and gives your site its unique design.
If this sounds way 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 StudioPress themes is that one low price entitles you to receive unlimited support and updates, and you can install your themes on unlimited domains.
For more details, click here: StudioPress.
(click on the above images to view all themes from StudioPress)
Theme-Checking Tools
Here are a couple of useful WP theme-related tools worth keeping in mind:
What WordPress Theme Is That – WordPress Theme Checker
What WordPress Theme Is That is a free web tool that lets you easily detect what WordPress theme a site is using (including parent and child 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 site.
Tip: If you can’t tell if a site uses WordPress or not, we have published a a great tutorial that shows you how to tell if a web site uses WordPress: How Can I Check If My Web Site Was Built With WordPress?
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 whether or not the site was built on WordPress, but it will also list the 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.com
- To learn more about using this tool go here: Is My Site WordPress?
Theme Authenticity Checker - WordPress Plugin
A word of warning: When choosing FREE themes for your WordPress site, we highly recommend sticking with the approved themes listed in the official WordPress theme repository.
A well-known strategy used by a number of hacking groups and cyber criminals is to put up sites offering “Free” WordPress themes all over the web and then distribute modified themes and plugins with malicious code embedded in their files. In fact, some of these sites even come up on Google’s search results for key phrases like “free WordPress themes“, “best free themes for WordPress”” etc. It’s best, therefore, to stick with the official WordPress.org theme directory, or use well-known and reputable theme download sites.
If you have any doubts about whether a WordPress theme installed on your blog could contain malicious or unwanted code, you can use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to run a scan of your theme files. The TAC plugin searches the source files of every them you have installed on your site for signs of malicious code and then presents you with a report …
(TAC Report Page – Screenshot: Plugin, WordPress.org)
We hope that you have found this information useful.
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