In an earlier article, we have written a comprehensive overview of WordPress Themes.
If you would like to learn more about the benefits of using WP themes and what makes WP themes so special, then go here to read the post: Understanding WP Themes – A Non-Technical User’s Guide
In this blog post, we explain where to search for free and paid themes for your WP website or blog. You will also learn about the different types of WordPress theme resources and get tips on how to make sure that you get the right themes for your needs and how to avoid having to deal with problems like lack of product support and poorly-coded themes.
As we’ve explained in another article, a theme is a unique type of web template that is used on WordPress-driven sites and designed to work specifically with the WP CMS platform in mind.
Many professional web designers and website development agencies create themes for WordPress. Consequently, members of the WordPress community enjoy access to thousands of exciting WP themes designed for many purposes and needs.
Finding Responsive Themes For WordPress: How To Avoid Information Overload
If you were to fire up Google and type the following:
- best paid WP themes
- WordPress themes free
- best responsive WordPress themes for business (enter 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 the search listings.
So, to help you save time and make your life easier, we’ll 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 cover these differences in another article. For now, let’s just 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 WordPress Themes
Next, it’s important to know that you will find thousands of Free and Paid 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 listed as Premium (paid) themes.
Theme Marketplaces & WP Theme Shops
There are two types of places where you can find themes. The first type of place is in WordPress theme marketplaces and WordPress theme directories. The second type of place are the commercial and independent WP theme houses.
WP theme marketplaces and WP theme directories are large theme aggregators. WordPress 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 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 theme vendors can also design both free and premium WP themes, and can vary in size, from an individual developer or a small team of developer, to large web and theme design and development companies.
Most commercial or independent theme stores 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 great WordPress themes for your website or blog.
Finding WordPress Themes For Your Website Or Blog
WordPress.org
(WordPress.org – WordPress Themes Directory)
The official WordPress.org theme directory is the biggest and best place to search for free WordPress themes. In fact, it’s probably the only free WP theme directory you should use when looking for free WordPress 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 contain malicious code and place your computer, digital presence and even your entire business at risk.
The WordPress directory is not only a trustworthy and reputable place to download themes for your site, but it also uses a theme review team comprised of dedicated and code-savvy volunteers to review and ensure that each theme uploaded to the directory complies with specific quality and security standards.
To browse thousands of great-looking FREE WordPress themes from the official WP Themes Directory, go here:
http://www.wordpress.org/extend/themes
Find Free Themes Inside Your Own WP Dashboard
Useful Tip: You can easily browse through every theme in the WordPress theme directory and not only find what you are looking for, but also easily install and activate it directly from inside your WP admin panel with a few clicks.
Use Theme Feature Filter
WordPress has a built-in filtering function inside the dashboard area that lets you narrow down your search for themes based on criteria like Colors, Layout and Features …
This makes it easy to find what you are looking for. For example, you could search for themes with predominantly blue colour design, with a four-column layout and a full-width template, or themes that support custom menus, etc.
Note: in another post where we discuss the importance of using “responsive” WordPress themes, we explained how responsive themes allow your site to be viewed correctly across all devices (e.g. the laptops, tablets and smartphones used by visitors to browse your information) …
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 use “responsive” design standards …
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. Additionally, many free themes are professionally designed and come with 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 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 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 think twice about using it, as the WordPress software changes quite often and these changes can create conflicts or errors with older code.
If you’re just getting started and your website 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. Who knows, the theme you downloaded for free could be exactly what works for your site and helps to convert your site visitors into customers.
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 specific requirements, it’s time to turn our attention to paid WordPress 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 responsive support, you can search through the WordPress theme galleries of the “Premium” theme design agencies listed below:
Theme Marketplaces And Directories
ThemeForest
ThemeForest is one of the biggest and well known theme marketplaces online.
ThemeForest allows many professional WordPress theme designers to showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are over 15,000 premium WP themes listed (you can find great themes from as little as $3) …
(click on the above images to see all themes on ThemeForest)
If you visit the ThemeForest theme marketplace, you will be able to browse for specific WP themes in a range of categories, such as:
- Blog/Magazine – themes for bloggers and administration sites, etc.
- Corporate – themes suitable for business sites and marketing purposes.
- Creative – themes suitable for design, writing professionals, etc.
- Directory Listings – themes that suit sites about employment opportunities, buy & sell, social directories, etc.
- eCommerce – themes for e-commerce, membership sites, etc.
- Education – themes that suit sites related to teaching, etc.
- Entertainment – themes for gossip blogs, cafes, 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. commercial property, etc.)
- Retail – themes for beauty products, trades or professionals (plumbers, medical centers, etc.)
- Technology – themes related to hosting, landing pages, etc.
- Wedding – e.g. themes for wedding sites and marriage counselling 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!
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)
Browse lots of great themes in the ThemeForest directory here:
Creative Market
(click on the images above to browse all themes on Creative Market)
Creative Market is another leading WordPress theme directory 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 browse hundreds of themes for WordPress and narrow your search using theme categories using their dropdown “Themes” menu …
Browse through hundreds of great premium themes crafted by independent WordPress theme developers in the Creative Market theme directory here:
Mojo Themes
(click on the above images to browse all WordPress themes at Mojo)
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 WP themes, but you can easily go through all of their themes for WordPress and narrow your search with theme categories (e.g. Blog or Photography themes and theme frameworks, etc.) from the dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …
Visit the site to find great themes in the Mojo theme directory here:
Now that we have looked at WP theme directories, let’s look at commercial and independent WP theme shops.
Commercial And Independent Theme Design Companies
SoloStream
SoloStream provides WordPress users with a great selection of professional quality premium WP themes and the option of accessing all themes through a WordPress theme membership.
(click on above images to view all themes from SoloStream)
Woo Themes
Woo Themes creates stunning premium themes for WordPress that are very popular and highly sought after by website users and offers a membership option that gives you access to their entire WP theme portfolio.
(click on the images above to view more WooThemes themes)
StoreFront
StoreFront specializes in creating WP themes for e-commerce. Their themes also integrate well with some of the most powerful e-commerce platforms and plugins available.
(click on the above images to view all StoreFront themes)
StudioPress
StudioPress builds WordPress themes based on a framework that allows users to 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 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 coding practices and to make sure that it is 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 using the Genesis framework use something called “child themes,” which are like a paint job that sits on top of the framework and gives your site its unique design.
If this sounds too technical, there’s no need to feel concerned about it. StudioPress themes are 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 StudioPress themes)
Theme-Checking Tools
Here are a couple of useful WP theme-related tools worth knowing about:
What WordPress Theme Is That? WordPress Theme Checker
What WordPress Theme Is That.com is a free WordPress theme and plugin search tool that allows you to easily detect what WP theme a website is using (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 the website or blog is using.
Tip: If you don’t know whether a site uses WordPress or not, we have published a a great tutorial that shows you how to tell if a site uses the WordPress CMS platform: How To Check If Your Website Was Built Using 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 not only confirm if a site has been built using the WordPress CMS platform, but it will also list the theme being used by the site and list any WP plugins it detects.
- To use this tool visit the website here: What WordPress Theme Is That.com
- To learn how to use this tool go here: Does My Website Run On WordPress?
Theme Authenticity Checker - WP Plugin
We suggested this earlier and it’s worth repeating again: If you decide to use FREE themes for your WordPress site, we highly recommend sticking with the approved WordPress themes listed in the official WordPress theme directory.
A commonly-used tactic employed 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 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 WordPress themes”” etc. It’s best, therefore, to stick with the official WordPress directory, or use established and trusted theme download sites.
If you are in doubt 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 theme files. The TAC plugin searches the source files of every them you have installed on your site for signs of injected code and presents you with a report …
(Theme Authenticity Checker Report Page – Screenshot: Plugin)
We hope that you have found the information on how to find the best free and commercial themes for WordPress useful.
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