Tag: WP Themes

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

If you would like to learn more about WP themes and what makes WordPress themes unique, then go here to read our post: An Introduction to WP Themes

In this blog post, you will learn where you can look for free and paid themes for your 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 avoid experiencing problems like lack of product support and poorly-coded themes.

As explained in another post, a theme is a unique type of web template that is used on WordPress-powered sites and designed to work specifically with the WordPress platform in mind.

Many professional website designers and website design houses create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WordPress community can access thousands of professional-quality WordPress themes designed for many website uses.

Where To Find WordPress Themes: Let’s Simplify Things!

Let’s say you were to go to Google and search for the following:

• best free themes for WordPress
• best free themes for WordPress
• best paid WordPress themes for writers (type in whatever your business, search topic or blog is about)

You are probably going to get an overwhelming amount of junk to sort through in the search results.

So, to help you save time and make things easier, let’s just cut through the clutter and make the process of finding great WordPress themes really simple.

WordPress.com vs WordPress.org Themes

Before we start, you need to know that WordPress offers users both a hosted and a self-hosted version. We’ll cover these differences in a different article. For now, we’ll only be covering the topic of finding 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 the design aspects of your blog.

Free vs Paid Themes

Next, it’s important to know that there are both Free and Paid WP themes made available. Free WordPress themes are normally distributed as Free Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or they will be listed as Premium (paid) themes.

Theme Marketplaces & WordPress Theme Shops

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

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

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 theme stores can create both free and commercial WordPress themes, and can vary in size, from an individual theme designer or a small team of theme developer, to large web and theme design and development companies.

Many commercial theme design firms 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 WP theme directories .

Let’s now show you where to find the best themes for your website or blog.

Finding The Best Responsive Themes For Your WordPress Website

WordPress.org

(WordPress.org – Themes Directory)

The official WordPress theme directory is the largest and best place to download WP themes for free. In fact, it’s probably the only free directory you should use when looking for free WP themes. The reason why, is because –as some free software users have learned– 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 directory is not only a trustworthy and reputable place to download themes for your website, but it also relies on a theme review team to review and make sure that each theme uploaded to the directory complies with specific standards of quality and security.

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

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

Find WP Themes Inside Your Dashboard

Useful Tip: You can easily browse through every WP theme in the WordPress.org 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 just a couple of clicks.

Use The WordPress Theme Feature Filter

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

Note: in the post where we discuss the importance of choosing “responsive” themes, we explained how responsive themes ensure that your theme will display without problems on all devices (e.g. your visitors’ laptops, tablets and smartphones) …

You should use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filtering option lets you search across its entire database of free themes …

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

Pros & Cons Of Using Free Themes

The obvious “pro” to using free themes is that it costs nothing to download and use the theme on your site. An added plus, is that many free themes are professionally designed and provide a number of customizable features, giving you great flexibility and choice in how you configure all of its various layout elements.

The ”cons” to using free WordPress 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 urgent support, especially if they are not getting paid. Many freely distributed themes will ask you for a donation to help cover their support costs.

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 made, then think carefully about using it, as WordPress changes quite frequently and these changes 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 any money on a theme. Who knows, the free theme you’ve downloaded may just be the thing that works for you and helps to convert your site visitors into customers.

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

Premium WordPress 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 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 largest and most popular WordPress theme marketplaces online.

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

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

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

• Blog/Magazine – themes for bloggers and parenting blogs, etc.
• Corporate – themes suitable for medical sites and advertising purposes.
• Creative – themes suitable for creative work, crafts, etc.
• Directory Listings – themes ideal for sites related to directory listings, holiday rentals, social directories, etc.
• eCommerce – themes for ecommerce, membership sites, etc.
• Education – themes that suit sites related to training, etc.
• Entertainment – themes for photo gallery blogs, restaurants, etc.
• Mobile – e.g. mobile-switching 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 health products, trades or professionals (plumbers, legal practitioners, etc.)
• Technology – themes related to apps, affiliate marketing, seo, product reviews, direct sales, etc.
• Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and romance tips and advice blogs
• Miscellaneous – themes suitable for writing or discussing political issues, green living 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 thousands of great WP themes in the ThemeForest directory here:

• ThemeForest

Creative Market

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

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 WordPress themes in its marketplace, but you can easily find WP themes and search through their theme categories using the site’s dropdown “Themes” menu …

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

• Creative Market

Mojo Themes

(click on the above images to see 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 WordPress themes and narrow your search with theme categories by selecting the dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …

Visit the site to find quality premium WordPress themes in the Mojo marketplace here:

• Mojo

Now that we have looked at WP theme directories, let’s take a look at commercial and independent theme shops.

Commercial Theme Stores

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 images above to view all themes from SoloStream)

Woo Themes

Woo Themes creates eye-catching themes that are very popular and highly sought after by web users and offer a membership option that allows you to access all themes in their theme collection.

(click on the above images to see all WooThemes themes)

StoreFront

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

(click on the images above to see all StoreFront themes)

StudioPress

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

Many web 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 up-to-date to reflect best practices for coding and to make sure that themes are always compatible with the latest version of WordPress, but because you can update your themes without losing any customizations you may 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 design.

If this sounds too technical, don’t worry 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 allows 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 see more StudioPress themes)

WP Theme-Checking Tools

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

What WP Theme Is That? – WordPress Theme Checker

What WordPress Theme Is That.com is a free web tool that lets you easily detect what WP theme a website or blog uses.

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

Tip: If you can’t tell whether a site was built using WordPress or not, go here for a great tutorial that shows you how to tell if a web site was built using WordPress: Is Your Website 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 is powered by the WP CMS platform, but it will also list the WordPress theme being used on the site and list any plugins it detects.

• To use this online tool visit the website here: What WordPress Theme Is That
• To learn more about this tool go here: Tell-Tale Signs It’s A WordPress Blog And WordPress-Checking Tools

Theme Authenticity Checker - WordPress Plugin

We said this earlier and it’s worth repeating again: When choosing FREE themes for your WordPress site, we strongly recommend sticking with the WordPress themes listed in the official WordPress theme repository.

A tactic that is commonly used by many hackers and syndicates that engage in cyber-crime is to put up sites and directories offering “Free” themes for WordPress all over the web and then distribute themes with malicious code embedded in their files. In fact, some of these sites even come up on Google for phrases like “free WordPress themes“, “best free WordPress themes”” etc. It’s safer, therefore, to stick with the official WordPress theme directory, or use established and reputable sites.

If you are concerned about whether a WordPress theme installed on your site may be infected with malware or unwanted code, you can use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to scan your theme files. This 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 as shown in the screenshot below …

(TAC Report Page – Source: Plugin Site, WordPress.org)

We hope that you have found this information useful.

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