What are the main criteria when choosing a WordPress theme?

[Marc van Leeuwen]

Please share your advice on choosing a WordPress theme. I am selecting a Wordpress on Themeforest and found difficult for this task, there are many beautiful themes there and they made me confused when trying to find a good theme for me.

 

[Rob Whisonant]

It's basically personal preference. I like to use simple themes that are pleasing to the eye. Is your site just a blog? Then go with a blog theme. Is it more of a news source? Then go with a news theme. Is it more of a magazine? Go with a magazine theme.

Just pick one. You can always change themes later.

 

[vishwa]

You can choose any WordPress theme which you like. It solely depends on your choice. However you can categorize your themes. For example if you have a business blog than you go with business theme, If you have a news site than you can go with news theme. Themeforest have some of great themes. However My personal suggestion is to my the Sahifa theme from themeforest. Hope it will help you.

 

[YARTranslations]

At first, try to look for competitors' websites and determine what you are looking for in your website, How it should be organized, how it should look and what the theme options you are looking for.
Then start for a theme that have your determinations or at least most of them, so you don't pay a lot for customizing it.

 

[ivanab]

It really depends on what you are trying to do!

I found Newspaper 7 theme to be great for bloggers, and authority sites.

Especially if you are trying to monetize by adsense.

I think they sold over 50K copies, and I simply LOVE it!

Of course... if you are more on a business type - products and service selling. I would buy optimize press.

 

[Ron Killian]

As already said, no one can really answer your question, it's too vague. Depends one what your doing., or what you want to do.

Just be careful, these days it seems so many theme creators are loading up (bloating) many theme's with all the fancy features and options.

Might be best to write down what you need the site to do, what features/options you must have.

 

[vaughn]

The following 9 are criteria for choosing a word press site:

1. Don't go for complex themes. It may take more time to develop.
2. Check whether the theme is mobile friendly or not. Google lists mobile friendly sites top.
3. The theme should be compatible for all browsers
4. Before working on theme, do research on popular plugins
5. Your site may related to multiple languages, so go for multiple language supporting theme.
6. Check for page builders used by the builder, and go for normal one
7. Check if the theme has great documentation and help buttons for future review
8. Theme should should be SEO friendly
9. Theme should contain ratings and review buttons.

 

[ulterios]

Choosing a WordPress theme should always be done by making sure that the theme has the features that you are looking for as well as function the way that will be best for you, your site and it's visitors.

Don't go strictly by how "Pretty" a theme looks since most themes can be made to look good with either some styling modifications or some design thought put into setting up the site.

Go for a theme that most closely fits your needs (all of them), those of the website and more importantly, the needs of the visitors that will be using your site. If you need to do any kind of modifications to make a theme fit your needs then those are usually done quite easily.

Also, don't buy a theme without looking at the publisher/developer/etc. and their update frequency, especially on theme forest! Many publishers there will have a theme added to the market, maybe update it once or twice, then abandon the theme and updating it. You don't want to buy a theme only to find out that it isn't getting updated with the latest security fixes or compatibilities with WordPress and the major plugins.

Good Luck.

 

[Lothian]

It must me mobile-friendly. It must be easy to understand and use by the users. It must made for SEO, load quickly and fast both on desktops and mobiles, but more importantly mobiles.

 

[Elegant_Designs]

Firstly, it must have the functions and features you need. Definitely needs to be mobile friendly as well as seo-friendly.
The design and feel of the theme which can be very subjective, usually clean design is safer these days even though it could be boring at times. This is when professional and beautiful photos comes into play; especially if you are selling products. Does the theme developer provide great support, if the developer doesn't update the theme and does not help his/her customers, best to avoid as wordpress will keep updating its' platform and newer versions may affect the plugins you are using as well as theme.

I will suggest you tabulate the requirements which you need first, and if necessary, contact the theme developer to see if the theme you are interesting in is able to fulfil your requirements.

 

[YacaZG]

In my opinion lifetime updates are very important (it's not often in offer). Usually we buy a one year update and few month's of support. Is this enought? I don't think so

BTW. I love Divi

 

[meganemma]

it's closely depend on your choice. But I think simple theme is always great.

 

[TracyMoon]

It depends on what your website does. For me I choose a very basic theme for a review blog "Twenty Thirteen".

 

[smsmbooster]

I see some themes is too heavy, you should try it first. Use chrome developer console to see how slow it is before determine which them you want.

 

[kim16]

Please share your advice on choosing a WordPress theme. I am selecting a Wordpress on Themeforest and found difficult for this task, there are many beautiful themes there and they made me confused when trying to find a good theme for me.

For me, overall functionality is of great importance to consider. I'm sure this especially applies to business websites. Coz nobody would want visually-appealing sites but lags almost all of the time.

Please share your advice on choosing a WordPress theme. I am selecting a Wordpress on Themeforest and found difficult for this task, there are many beautiful themes there and they made me confused when trying to find a good theme for me.

To start off, what type of website are you trying to create? There are a lot of types ranging from personal to eCommerce. So in order for to get a clearer view on which among the roster of themes you are going to select, I recommend that you decide on the type first. Because your preference will determine the framework that suits you best.

 

[tyggis]

The main thing is that I know the theme is well supported if there is a bug. This is a must have. Then usability. Then design.