In a previous 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 special, then make sure to check out this article: An Introduction to WordPress Themes
In this blog post, you will learn where you can search for 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 make sure that you get the right themes for your needs and avoid dealing with problems like lack of product support and poorly-coded themes.
As explained in our previous post, a theme is a special kind of web design template that is used on WordPress-powered blogs and designed to work specifically for WordPress.
Many professional website designers and website design houses create themes for WordPress. Consequently, WordPress users have access to thousands of quality WordPress themes covering a wide-range of uses and applications.
Finding Great Themes For WordPress: So Many Choices … Where To Begin?
If you were to fire up Google and type a key phrase like the following:
- best WP themes
- best premium WordPress themes
- best free WordPress themes for churches (or whatever your business, area of interest or website is about)
Chances are that you are going to get an overwhelming amount of information to sort through in the search listings.
So, to help you save time and make things 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 cover these differences in another post. For now, please note that we will only 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 your site’s web design.
Free vs Paid WordPress Themes
Next, it’s important to know that you can find thousands of Free and Paid themes being made available. Free WordPress themes are generally distributed as Open Source Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or they can be licensed for use as Premium (i.e. paid) themes.
Theme Directories vs Commercial WP Theme Vendors
There are two different types of places where you can find WordPress themes. The first is in theme marketplaces and theme directories. The second are the commercial and independent WP theme development firms.
Theme marketplaces and theme directories are large theme stores. WordPress theme developers (both commercial and independent) list their themes (both free and paid) in the marketplace or directory and customers shop for these just like they would if they were shopping for apps on an app store or software marketplace.
Some of the bigger marketplaces 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 design houses typically develop both free and premium WP themes, and can vary in size, from an individual theme developer or a small team of designer, to large web and theme design and development companies.
Many commercial 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 WP theme directories .
Let’s now show you where to search for great themes for your website.
Choosing Great Themes For Your WordPress Website Or Blog
WordPress.org
(WordPress.org – Theme Directory)
The official WordPress theme directory is the biggest 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 for this, is because –as some free software users have discovered– downloading free software, add-ons, apps, templates or themes from untrustworthy places can contain malicious code and put your computer, digital presence … even your entire business at risk.
The WordPress.org directory is not only a trustworthy and reputable place to download themes for your website or blog, but it also relies on a review team to review and ensure that each theme uploaded to the directory complies with high standards of quality and security.
To browse thousands of excellent FREE WordPress themes from the official WP Themes Repository, go here:
http://www.wordpress.org/extend/themes
Find Themes Inside Your Dashboard
Useful Tip: You can easily browse through every 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 within your WordPress dashboard with a few clicks.
Use Theme Filters
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 easier to find what you are looking for. For example, you could search for themes with predominantly gray color design, with a two-column layout and a full-width template, or themes that support custom menus, etc.
Note: in another post where we present an overview of WordPress themes and discuss the importance of using “responsive” WP themes, we explained how these allow your site to be viewed correctly across all devices (e.g. computers, tablets and smartphones) …
You should use responsive themes, and the WordPress theme filter lets you search across its entire database of free themes …
… and display only themes that are “responsive” …
Pros & Cons Of Using Free WP Themes
The obvious “pro” to using free WordPress themes is that it’s free to download and use the theme. An added plus, is that many free themes are professionally designed and come with a number of built-in customizable options, giving you great flexibility and choice in how you configure all of its various layout elements.
The downside to 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 developer to provide personal support, especially if they are not getting paid. Most freely distributed themes will ask you for a donation 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 change was made, then you should think carefully about downloading it, as WordPress changes quite frequently 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 paid themes or even on custom theme design. Who knows, the theme you downloaded for free could be exactly what works for your site and your business.
Now that we’ve seen how to find free themes in the WordPress.org theme directory and how to filter your search for themes that meet specific criteria, it’s time to turn our attention to paid themes.
Paid WordPress 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 And Directories
ThemeForest
ThemeForest is one of the largest and best-known WordPress theme marketplaces online.
ThemeForest lets many professional WordPress theme developers showcase their designs through their online marketplace. There are well over 17,500 premium themes listed (you can find great themes from as little as $3) …
(click on the images above 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 e-magazines, etc.
- Corporate – themes suitable for legal sites or marketing purposes.
- Creative – themes for portfolios, ebook authors, etc.
- Directory Listings – themes suitable for sites related to employment opportunities, dining out & restaurants, tourism directories, etc.
- eCommerce – themes for ecommerce, event bookings and registrations, etc.
- Education – themes that suit sites related to training, etc.
- Entertainment – themes for music and bands blogs, nightlife, etc.
- Mobile – e.g. responsive themes.
- NonProfit – themes for nonprofit organizations, churches, etc.
- Real Estate – themes for real estate and real estate listings (e.g. commercial property, etc.)
- Retail – themes for travel, trades or professionals (plumbers, medical centers, 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 political 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 WP themes in the ThemeForest themes directory here:
Creative Market
(click on the above images to view all themes on Creative Market)
Creative Market is another leading WordPress theme directory where you can search through 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 go through all of their themes for WordPress and search through their theme categories (e.g. Landing Page or Popular themes, etc.) from their dropdown “Themes” menu …
Browse through hundreds of quality premium WP themes crafted by independent WordPress theme designers in the Creative Market themes directory here:
Mojo Themes
(click on the above images to browse more 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 WP themes, but you can easily find WP themes and search through their theme categories using the dropdown “WordPress Themes” menu …
Visit the site to find great WordPress themes in the Mojo directory here:
Now that we have looked at WP theme aggregators, let’s turn our attention to commercial and independent theme shops.
Commercial WP Theme Shops
SoloStream
SoloStream provides WordPress users with a great selection of high quality WP themes and the option of accessing all themes through a WordPress theme membership.
(click on images above to view all SoloStream themes)
Woo Themes
Woo Themes creates eye-catching premium themes for WordPress and offer a membership option that lets you access their entire theme portfolio.
(click on the above images to browse 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 above images to see all StoreFront themes)
StudioPress
StudioPress develops WordPress themes based on a 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 the content and unprecedented control of the framework.
Many web developers like this 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 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 themes built using the Genesis framework 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 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.
(click on the above images to see all themes from StudioPress)
WordPress Theme-Checking Tools
To round things up, here are some useful WP theme-related tools worth knowing about:
What WordPress Theme Is That WordPress Theme Checker
What WordPress Theme Is That 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 have come across a WordPress site that you like and would like to know what WP theme the site uses.
Tip: If you don’t know whether a site uses WordPress or not, go here for a great tutorial that helps you tell whether or not a site was built using WordPress: How Can I Check If My 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 if the site has been built on WordPress, but it will also list the theme being used by the site and list any plugins detected.
- To use the online tool go here: What WordPress Theme Is That?
- To learn more about this tool go here: Is My Website Built With WordPress? How To Tell
Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) – WordPress Plugin
A word of warning: If you decide to use FREE themes for your WordPress site, we highly recommend sticking with the themes listed in the official WordPress theme directory.
A tactic that is commonly used by many hacking groups and networks that engage in cyber criminal activities is to put up websites and directories offering “Free” WP themes all over the web and then distribute themes and plugins with malicious code embedded in their files. In fact, some of these sites even display on Google’s search results for search phrases like “free WordPress themes“, “best free themes for WordPress”” etc. It’s safer, therefore, to only download free themes from the official WordPress theme repository, or use established and trusted sites.
If you have any doubts about whether a WordPress theme that you have installed on your blog may contain potentially malicious or unwanted code, you can use a free WordPress plugin like Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC) to scan your WordPress theme files. This plugin scans the source files of every installed theme on your site for signs of malicious code and then outputs a report with the results …
(Theme Authenticity Checker Report Page – Source: Plugin Page, WordPress.org)
We hope that you have found the information on how to find great WP useful.
***
"This is AMAZING! I had learnt about how to use WordPress previously, but this covers absolutely everything and more!! Incredible value! Thank you!" - Monique, Warrior Forum
***