Where To Find The Best WordPress Themes

This tutorial shows you where to find many great free or premium WordPress themes for your online business, e-commerce store, website, or blog.

WordPress

In an earlier article, we provide new WordPress users with a comprehensive overview of WordPress Themes.

If you would like to learn more about WP themes and what makes WordPress themes so special, then make sure to check out this article: An Introduction to WordPress Themes

In this blog post, you will learn where you can discover loads of excellent free and paid themes for your website. You will also learn about the different types of WP theme resources and get tips on how to ensure that you get the right themes for your needs and avoid experiencing problems like lack of product support and poor theme coding.

As explained in our previous article, a theme is a unique kind of web design template that is used on WordPress-driven blogs and designed to work specifically in the WP platform.

Many individual website designers and website development houses create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WordPress community enjoy access to thousands of professional themes designed for a wide range of purposes and needs.

Themes cover an extensive range of uses and applications.

Finding Great Great Themes For WordPress: So Many Choices … Where To Begin?

Let’s say you were to open up Google and type the following:

  • best themes for WordPress
  • WordPress themes free
  • best free WordPress themes for blogs (type in whatever your business, area of interest or website is about)

Chances are that you are going to get an overwhelming amount of disorganized information to sort through in your search listings.

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 really simple.

WordPress.com vs WordPress.org Themes

Before we get started, you need to know that WordPress offers both a hosted and a self-hosted version. We’ll cover these differences in a separate post. In this article, let’s just be covering 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 the design of your website.

Free vs Paid Themes

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

WP Theme Directories vs Commercial WP Theme Developers

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

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

Some of the bigger marketplaces 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 theme stores typically develop both free and commercial themes, and can vary in size, from an individual designer or a small team of theme designer, to large web and theme development companies.

Many commercial or independent theme shops 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 find the best themes for your blog.

Finding The Best Themes For Your Website Or Blog

WordPress.org

WordPress.org - WordPress Themes Repository

(WordPress.org – WP Themes Directory)

The official WordPress theme directory is the largest and best place to find WordPress themes for free. In fact, it’s probably the only free WordPress theme directory you should use when looking for free WordPress 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 contain malicious code and place your computer, digital presence and even your entire business at risk.

The WP theme directory is not only a trustworthy and reputable place to download themes for your website, but it also uses a team of theme reviewers to review and ensure that each theme in the directory meets high standards of quality and security.

To browse thousands of professionally-designed FREE WordPress themes from the official Themes Repository, go here:

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

Useful Tip

You Don’t Even Have To Leave Your WordPress Dashboard

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

Search For Free Themes Inside Your Own WordPress Dashboard!

Use WordPress Theme Feature Filter

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

Use The Theme Filtering

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

Note: in the article mentioned earlier where we present an overview of WordPress themes and discuss the importance of using “responsive” themes, we explained how responsive themes allow your site to be viewed correctly on all devices (e.g. the computers, tablets and smartphones used by visitors to browse your site) …

Use Theme Filters

It’s a good idea to use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filtering function lets you search across its entire database of free themes …

Use Theme Filtering

… and find only WP themes that are “responsive” …

Use The WordPress Theme Filtering

Pros & Cons Of Using Free Themes

The obvious “pro” to using free themes is that it’s free to download and use the theme. An added plus, is that many free themes are professionally designed and offer a number of customizable options, giving you great flexibility and choice in how you configure all of its various layout elements.

The ”cons” of using free WP themes are that your themes may not get updated as often with new features and bug fixes, and it’s unrealistic to expect the developer to provide personal support, especially if they are not getting paid. Most free themes ask for donations to help cover their costs of providing support.

When downloading free themes, therefore, check to see when the theme was last updated. If it’s been more than a year since any changes were last made, then it’s best to think twice about downloading it, as WordPress changes quite often and these changes can create conflicts and 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 any money on premium themes or even on custom web design. Who knows, the free theme you’ve downloaded may just be the thing that works for you and for converting 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 requirements, it’s time to turn our attention to finding premium WP 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 responsive support, you can search through the WordPress theme galleries of the “Premium” theme design agencies listed below:

Theme Marketplaces

ThemeForest

ThemeForest - themes for WordPress

ThemeForest is one of the largest and well known WordPress theme marketplaces online.

ThemeForest lets many professional WordPress theme designers showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are currently over 17,000 premium themes listed (you can find great themes from as little as $3) …

ThemeForest - Premium WordPress Themes

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

If you visit the ThemeForest theme directory, you will be able to browse for specific WP themes in a range of categories, such as:

  • Blog/Magazine – themes for personal blogs and blog magazines, etc.
  • Corporate – themes suitable for government sites and marketing purposes.
  • Creative – themes for creative work, cv and resume writing, etc.
  • Directory Listings – themes that suit sites related to employment opportunities, holiday rentals, , etc.
  • eCommerce – themes for e-commerce, event bookings and registrations, etc.
  • Education – themes that suit sites related to training, etc.
  • Entertainment – themes for fashion 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. home sales, etc.)
  • Retail – themes for retail stores, trades or professionals (electricians, dentists, etc.)
  • Technology – themes related to technology, landing pages, etc.
  • Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and dating advice blogs
  • Miscellaneous – themes suitable for writing or discussing environmental issues, parenting sites or blogs … even themes you can use if your site is still under-construction!

Tip

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

(ThemeForest sends you theme update notifications)

Browse thousands of great themes in the ThemeForest theme directory here:

Creative Market

Creative Market - WP Theme Directory

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

Creative Market is another leading WordPress theme directory 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 WordPress themes in its directory, but you can easily browse hundreds of themes for WordPress and search through their theme categories using the site’s dropdown “Themes” menu …

Creative Market - directory of WordPress themes

Browse through hundreds of great themes crafted by independent WordPress theme developers in the Creative Market themes marketplace here:

Mojo Themes

Mojo Themes - WP Theme Marketplace

(click on the images above to browse all themes at Mojo)

Mojo is a directory for premium WP 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 find themes for WordPress and search through their theme categories from the dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …

Mojo - themes for WordPress

Visit the site to find great WP themes in the Mojo themes directory here:

Now that we have looked at WP theme aggregators, let’s take a look at commercial and independent WordPress theme design companies.

Commercial And Independent WordPress Theme Design Companies

SoloStream

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

Solostream Premium Themes

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

Woo Themes

Woo Themes designs great premium themes that are very popular and highly sought after by web users and offers a membership option that gives you access to all themes in their growing WordPress theme portfolio.

Woo Themes WordPress Themes

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

StoreFront

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

StoreFront Themes

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

StudioPress

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

Many website developers prefer using 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 practices for coding and to make sure that it always remains compatible with the latest version of WordPress, but because you can update your themes 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 framework and gives your site its unique look and feel.

If this 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 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.

StudioPress

(click on the images above to view all StudioPress themes)

Theme-Checking Tools

To round things up, here are a few more useful WP theme-related tools worth keeping in mind:

What WordPress Theme Is That.com

What WP Theme Is That? - WordPress Theme Search Tool

What WordPress Theme Is That? is a free WP theme and plugin search tool that lets you easily detect what WordPress theme a website uses (including parent and child themes).

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

Tip

Tip: If you can’t tell whether a site uses WordPress or not, go here for a great tutorial that helps you tell if a website is WordPress-driven: Is My Website Built Using WordPress? How To Tell

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 a site was built using WordPress, but it will also list the theme being used by the site and list any WordPress plugins detected.

Theme Authenticity Checker - WordPress Plugin

Important Info

A word of warning: When choosing FREE themes for your WordPress site, we recommend sticking with the themes listed in the official WordPress theme directory.

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

If you are concerned about whether a WordPress theme installed on your site could be infected with malicious or unwanted code, use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to scan your WP theme files. The TAC plugin scans the source files of every them you have installed on your site for signs of injected code and then outputs a report as shown in the screenshot below …

Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) - Plugin

(Theme Authenticity Checker Report Page – Screenshot: Plugin)

I hope that you have found the information on how to find the best WordPress useful.

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"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)

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