How to choose and install the best WordPress theme for your needsExpress version: The most import thing to know about installing WordPress themes is that you need a little patience! Not because it’s hard, but because all themes differ, and some may have many settings to work on before your chosen theme displays as it should. But if you’re short on time, you could always try Fiverr, where you can find an experienced WordPress user to install it and set it up for as little as $5USD (usually within 24 hours!). In the next lesson, I’ll show you how to customise it.

The lesson: As I’ve mentioned previously, themes are like your blog or website’s outfit – they’re what changes the look and feel of WordPress. You could describe a theme as the “design”, but there’s more to it than just colours and fonts. Depending on which theme you choose, the theme may control some functionality too.

Finding the perfect theme for you

I could write a post a mile long on your options for creating the perfect look for your WordPress site, but since this is a beginner e-course, here are the essentials!

What to look for when choosing a theme

  • A layout that’s close to what you want. This is more important than finding a theme with the perfect colours, fonts or demo pictures (which can easily be changed).
  • Readily available support from the developer if you need it. Check the developer’s social media accounts to see if they’re active, and what other people are saying.
  • Responsiveness. Google now favours responsive sites in their search engines (this means that their appearance changes to suit the size of the device they’re being viewed on). Most modern themes are responsive, and are usually labelled as such, but if you’re not sure, simply shoot the designer an e-mail or preview it on a website such as deviceponsive.

Where to find quality themes

Basically, you have a two choices of ready-made themes: free and premium.

Free themes
Free themes are great… because they’re free! If you browse the wordpress.org website, you’ll see that they literally have thousands of free themes available. And if you choose to use a free theme, this is the only place I recommend you get it from. For security reasons, don’t simply download a pretty free theme you found via Google – regardless of how nice it looks – as it may contain malicious code. That’s not to say a theme you pay for is guaranteed safe, but it’s probably much less likely that someone selling premium themes is going to risk damaging their reputation by creating shonky products!

Premium themes
I’d say the biggest advantages of premium themes (or paid themes) is that they tend to look nicer, come with support if you need it, and more frequent security and performance updates. Sure, a free theme might offer those things too, but without payment, there may be less incentive for the developer to respond to your questions for help should you need them. There are many places you can find premium themes – I suggest starting with my gallery right here! I have included themes from designers such as BluChic, Station Seven, 17th Avenue, Angie Makes, Pretty Darn Cute Design, and Restored 316. They’re all really beautiful and popular themes for blogs, websites, and stores.

There are also other options you may come across, such as frameworks, things called child themes, skins and templates. To install these, there are additional steps (it’s usually a two-part process), so just be aware that if you choose something other than a standard theme (such as those from the wordpress.org library), the instructions below won’t quite cover what you need to know (they cover the first part, but not the second). However, installing a child theme is pretty simple and the designers who make and sell them will always include instructions for this easy and additional step. Make sure you read them!

Side note: If you’ve chosen a theme that’s particularly complex to set up, there’s a cheap ‘n’ cheerful option if you’re having any problems… and it’s called Fiverr. It’s an outsourcing website and has many users available who will set up your WordPress theme exactly as the demo appears for as low as $5USD! Setting up a new theme is probably the most time-consuming step of the whole WordPress process. Not because it’s hard, per se, but because it can involve numerous adjustments and settings which can sometimes be tricky to find. Seriously, don’t stress if you can’t work it out straightaway, but just know there is the option for budget-friendly help if you need it!

The themes page

Head to the WordPress dashboard and clicking on Appearance > Themes. This is the area where you not only add new themes, but activate or preview them.

How to install a WordPress theme

You’ve probably noticed a pattern by now… there are usually two ways to do many things when it comes to WordPress! Installing a theme is no different… you can install a free theme by searching for it directly in the dashboard, or you can download and install a .zip file. Let’s cover both ways!

(Side note: There’s actually a third way, but this is getting a little beyond beginner stuff! You can also download a theme, unzip it, and upload it via FTP – which you now know all about! – to the wp-content/themes folder. Then you head back to your WordPress dashboard and head to Appearance > Themes. Find the theme you’ve just uploaded and click activate. You probably won’t ever need to do this, but it’s good to be aware of, just in case!)

Option 1: searching and installing

This is how you’d install a free theme directly from the wordpress.org website’s library. On the Themes page, start by either clicking the big plus sign or add new.

On the next page, you can use the filters or the search bar to find a theme that suits your needs.

Each theme you click on will give you the opportunity to preview how it looks, as well as read its description and user reviews. A tip: the preview may not look exactly as the thumbnail. This is simply because there may be some settings you need to adjust after installing it in order for it to look as pictured. In this picture below, I’m using The Newswire theme by WP Dev Shed.

To install your chosen theme, simply hover over it and click the install button.

Now you get to choose if you want to preview it or activate it. If you preview it this time, it will look different because it’s actually installed and will include the content that’s on your site (that is, you’re no longer looking at a demo site). This option is helpful if you already have a theme installed and would like to see how it looks before implementing it for your viewers to see. However, since this is a brand new site, we don’t have any content yet. You can still hit preview, but it’ll look pretty bland and empty. To activate it, simply click activate. You can now check it out on the front end of your site (but remember, without content you can’t expect it to look perfect at this stage!).

Option 2: downloading and installing

This is how you’d install a premium theme that you’ve purchased and downloaded as a .zip file. Start by heading to Appearance > Themes and clicking add new or the big plus sign – just like we covered above. The difference this time, is that when you move to the next screen, we’re going to select Upload Theme.

On the next screen, you’ll be prompted to upload your theme as a .zip file. For this demonstration, I’m using the premium BluChic theme called Dorothy. BluChic themes have been super popular for my readers! Once you’ve purchased and downloaded it to your computer, you can upload it to WordPress (as pictured below). But, before you do that, make sure that the .zip file you’ve downloaded doesn’t have another .zip file within it (along with other files, such as instructions or Photoshop templates). If you upload the wrong .zip file, things won’t work as they should. If there’s more than one .zip file, you want the one inside the one you downloaded.

Once it’s installed, you just need to click the activate link (as mentioned in a previous step). Again, remember that things on the front end might not look like they’re supposed to just yet – you’ll need to do some setting up of the theme in order for it to look as you want it to!

Now’s a very good time to READ THROUGH ANY INSTRUCTIONS PROVIDED BY THE DESIGNER. Seriously! Some themes will work straight out of the box, some themes will need some settings adjusted (such as social media profile links), and some themes may even need a plugin installed or certain templates applied to some pages. You’ll also need to set up menus and widgets, but we’ll be covering that soon!

The BluChic theme I’ve chosen does need some basic setting up (and they do a really good job at providing the instructions on their site). In the picture below, you’ll see that now that it’s installed there are some extra options in the Appearance area of the menu. These include theme settings and theme options. There is also slider (which controls the home page slider) positioned in the menu bar, just below posts.

Adjusting theme settings

What theme settings or theme options you need to adjust will vary based on the theme. In this BluChic example, you’re given the opportunity of how you’d like the slider on the home page to transition. Again, you’ll need to take the time to read over the instructions provided by the theme’s maker. You may actually want to leave the theme setting up for now, and continue on with the course so you know how to use menus, widgets and more – this knowledge will make the setting up of your theme even easier!

How to switch a WordPress theme

Sometimes, you might install and activate a theme and realise it’s not what you want. That’s OK! You can simply install and activate another theme, or you can activate a theme that’s already installed. It’s really easy to do this – head to the Themes page in the dashboard, hover over a theme that’s not installed and click Activate. Just keep in mind that you might need to go through some of the set-up process again, especially when it comes to menus and widgets.

How to delete a theme

While it’s OK to have numerous themes installed, I wouldn’t make a habit of leaving them installed “just because”. The more themes you have installed, the more you have to update and the bigger your backup files will be. So if there’s a theme that you’re sure you’re not going to be using, it’s best to delete it from your site. Do this by heading to Appearance > Themes to view all of the themes you have installed. Make sure the theme you want to delete is not activated (and activate the another one if it is) and hover your mouse over the theme and click Theme Details. You’ll see a confirmation message pop up. Click OK and that’s it!

Related video

This YouTube video by user Logan Walker shows all three ways of installing a WordPress theme. The third way mentions visiting your hosting account to upload the theme folder, but you can do this via FTP as well.

Do you have any questions about installing themes? Ask below!

Next lesson: How to customise your WordPress theme