How to Choose a Wordpress Theme

Many beginners feel overwhelmed when it comes to selecting a theme for their WordPress site. There are thousands of free and paid options. Each theme looks better than the other. How do you choose the best WordPress theme? In this article, we will share the 9 things you should consider, so that you can choose the best WordPress theme for your site.

Select the perfect theme for your WordPress site

Why should you be careful when choosing a WordPress theme?

WordPress is used to create all kinds of websites. That's why each theme is aimed at a different market.

Your WordPress theme should best integrate the content of your website. For example, if you are starting a blog that covers political or social issues, then you should choose a theme that improves readability.

Many WordPress themes come with tons of customization options. If not properly developed, these options can make it difficult to customize or use other WordPress plugins. You may be stuck in that theme or you will have to pay a developer to help you change.

On the other hand, some WordPress themes that look really cool can actually make your website incredibly slow. Nobody likes slow websites, especially Google , which prefers to rank faster websites at the top.

Your theme is also the skeleton of your WordPress site and plays an important role in the way users and search engines perceive it.

You've probably heard the saying "Not all that glitters is gold."

With that said, let's take a look at the steps you can take to make sure you select the best theme for your WordPress site.

1. Look for simplicity

Simplicity is the best rule in design

Many WordPress themes have many colors, complex layouts, flashy animations, etc. Sometimes you may need these things, but in most cases you don't really need this.

Look for a theme with a layout design that helps you support your goal. It must look good but without compromising usability and simplicity.

Make sure the presentation style of the theme isn't overly complicated. The purpose of web design is to help users find the information they need and help the site owner achieve their goal at the same time.

If a theme looks good but doesn't help you get new business or subscribers, it's not a good theme. Besides, it's not a good theme, even when your users can't find their way around the website.

2. Being Responsive is not an option

Choose a responsive WordPress theme

Responsive themes change the layout based on screen size and different devices.

A significant amount of web traffic is generated by mobile devices and other portable devices. Depending on the topics of your website, this number may exceed 90% of your traffic.

Google shows websites optimized for mobile devices in mobile search results. Regardless of your site's topics and demographics, all websites must be ready, fully mobile.

Most WordPress themes are already responsive by default. But there are still consultants who make fixed-width layouts that are not optimized for mobile devices at all. Make sure the theme chosen for your website is optimized for mobile devices.

Testing a theme for mobile readiness

The easiest way to check if a theme is responsive or not is to resize the browser screen. As you resize the browser screen, you will notice that the theme layout will adapt to the width of the screen.

For more in-depth testing, you can copy the URL of the theme demo page and paste it into the Google Mobile Optimization Test page.

Note that this test will show some warnings, regardless of how good a theme is.

Look for any red flags, such as too small text, wider screen content, etc.

3. Browser compatibility

Your users will use different browsers. Your theme may look perfect on the browser you use, but there may be something broken in other browsers.

This is where browser compatibility comes in. Most WordPress theme developers rigorously test their themes using sophisticated browser compatibility testing tools.

Some manufacturers may mention it clearly on their website. But if they don't, you can always run some basic tests to check the theme on different browsers like Google Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari, etc.

Don't forget to test on different browsers even on mobile devices.

4. Plugins supported

The true power of WordPress comes with WordPress plugins. These plugins allow you to do anything with your WordPress site.

There are many WordPress plugins, but some are indispensable WordPress plugins for all websites. Like Gravity Forms, Yoast SEO, W3 Total Cache, etc.

Make sure your WordPress theme supports all popular plugins. If you are not sure, ask the developer of the theme.

5. Translation + multilingual

Multilingual WordPress themes ready for translation

A large number of WordPress sites are not in the English language. You may want to create a website in a language other than English. Maybe you plan to build a multilingual WordPress site in the future.

Make sure your WordPress theme is ready for translation and supports multilingual WordPress plugins.

6. Page Builder

Drag and drop page generators, for WordPress themes

Page builders are WordPress plugins that allow you to create page layouts using the drag and drop user interface.

Many premium WordPress themes come with preinstalled page builders. Some of these page builders are used only by the theme developer.

Using a Page builder to create landing pages can produce a lot of unwanted code. If you change the theme, those pages will require a lot of cleaning.

You should choose the themes that are shipped with one of the most used plugins for creating pages.

You can also purchase these page builders separately for use with other themes as well.

7. Support options for when you need help

Support for your WordPress theme

A negative aspect of using a free WordPress theme is that there is no guaranteed support. While some developers provide excellent support for their free themes, many free themes do not have support options.

If you mess up your WordPress theme, you will have to understand it for yourself. You can also pay a third-party developer to solve smaller problems.

Make sure you select a WordPress theme with good documentation and support options. Most premium WordPress themes offer detailed documentation with 1 year of email support.

8. SEO Friendly

Check your theme for SEO friendliness

Your WordPress theme plays a crucial role in the SEO friendliness of your site. A catchy theme can still generate poorly coded HTML code, which could affect the performance of your site on search engines.

It may be difficult for beginners to analyze a theme's source code themselves. That's why many WordPress premium theme developers will let you know that their pages are optimized for SEO.

You can also take a look to see if the page generates correct HTML5 by checking it with the W3C Markup Validation service. However, note that the W3C tool will generate many warnings which are nothing to worry about.

9. Ratings and reviews

Check the ratings and reviews for a WordPress theme

Another solid indicator of the quality of a WordPress theme are the ratings and reviews provided by their users. If the theme is sold on a third party market, you will see customer reviews.

Read Also: Professional web designer

For free WordPress themes, you will find the ratings section right below the download button. It will show the number of reviews and stars provided by users. If you click on 5 stars, they will show you all the reviews that gave the theme 5 stars.

Read reviews and ratings of other users' themes

Almost all WordPress themes can get some negative reviews. but if the number of negative reviews is unusually high, then read them carefully.

How to install a theme in WordPress

Installing a WordPress theme is really simple. First you need to download the zip file of the theme to your computer.

Then access the WordPress administration area and go to the Appearance »Themes page .

Themes page in the WordPress admin area

At the top of the themes page, you need to click the Add new link .

This will take you to the Add new theme page. You can use this page to search for free themes to install. But since we have already downloaded the theme, you simply need to click on the Upload theme link at the top.

Upload a theme

Now you will see the loading box of the theme. Click the Choose File button to select the theme zip file previously downloaded to your computer, then click the Install Now button.

Upload and install the theme zip file

WordPress will now load the theme from your computer onto your website and install it for you. When finished, a success message will appear with links to preview or activate the theme.

Theme installation successful

If you don't want to use a theme immediately, you can click the live preview button to test the theme without activating it.

Note that you will need to activate a theme to use it on your website.

For more detailed instructions, see our beginner's guide on how to install a WordPress theme.How to install a theme in WordPress

Read Also: Wordpress Development Services