If you have recently searched for ‘the best free WordPress theme’, you might have realized how many are there. Having plenty of choices is quite awesome, yet it is often overwhelming and confusing. You can find thousands of free templates in the official WordPress theme database, selecting a perfect theme from such a huge collection is time-consuming as well as a painstaking task. And it’s not getting any easier with numerous themes being submitted every day by developers across the world.
No doubt, WordPress is ever-improving to be more user-friendly, which is why it has successfully evolved to be the most popular Content Management System. Seemingly unlimited resources, impressive functionality, and ease of use make WordPress the first choice for most people going online. At the same time, WordPress offers plenty of amazing free resources including free themes, plugins, support communities, and more.
Creating a website is no more a puzzle to solve – just pick a free theme, tweak it a bit and you have a website ready.
Unbelievably, there are lots of free WordPress templates that provide beautiful, simple, and incredible user experience, but you can also have the option of paid premium themes. Premium themes can be complicated for regular WordPress users. Some premium themes are filled with so many features that you may never use if you want to create a simple website for your business.
While on the other hand, you can often hear comments that free themes are risky because they aren’t supported as well, or they are designed by amateur developers. In some respect this is true, so it’s very important for you to ensure that your free WordPress theme is a quality design with decent support.
Most of the free themes are not only great looking, but they provide functionality better than some of the themes you would have to pay for. That’s what we’re looking at today, the top 10 free WordPress themes that you can proudly call your own, for the price of nothing. Free themes are ideal for bloggers and people who simply want to make an online journal of their thoughts, but they also work wonders for legitimate businesses that want to save some cash for other endeavours.
Before we get to the list, see the vocabulary for website themes.
- SEO – refers to search engine optimization or the process of optimizing a website so that people can easily find it via search engines like Google.
- Responsive WordPress theme – smoothly adjusts its layout based on the screen size and resolution.
- Parallax scrolling/background – involves the web page’s background moving at a slower rate to the foreground, creating a 3D effect as you scroll.
- Slider – is a slideshow that can be added to a web page.
- WooCommerce – is a free eCommerce plugin that allows you to sell anything. It is the world’s favorite eCommerce solution that gives both store owners and developers complete control.
- Plugin – is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website.
- WordPress Customizer – allows site admins to tweak a theme’s settings, color scheme or widgets, and see a preview of those changes in real-time.
- Widget – A widget is a simple application extension that is often part of a larger application already installed on the device. Widgets come in all shapes and sizes, are customizable, and reside on any available Home screen for quick access.
- Mega Menu– is typically defined as a drop-down interface that is triggered by the user hovering over a link or defined area.
1. Sydney
Sydney offers beauty, simplicity, and power – a complete way to create an excellent online presence. Sydney is a free WordPress theme that is loved by millions of people and can be called one of the greatest themes ever. It provides plenty of customization options like access to all Google fonts, full color control, layout control, etc. Hence, you have the freedom to build a unique design. Consequently, you can use the theme for any website including freelancer website or portfolio, company website, business/product landing page. It is fast loading, SEO friendly and performance optimized.
Features:
- Responsive design
- Parallax backgrounds
- Easy to use front page blocks
- Slider or static image header
- Social icons
2. Hestia
Hestia is a beautiful material design multipurpose free WordPress theme. It is suitable for creating various types of websites including business, corporate company, portfolio, eCommerce, etc. The theme is fully compatible with the eCommerce of WordPress WooCommerce.
Therefore, it is an excellent choice for creating modern online stores. Hestia theme integrates with the popular free page builder plugin by SiteOrigin, which enables you to build responsive grid-based page content that adapts to mobile devices with pixel-perfect accuracy. The theme is based on WordPress Customizer tool which lets you customize almost everything with real-time live previews.
Features:
- Free responsive multipurpose theme
- Spectacular design based on Material Kit
- SEO Friendly theme
- Compatible with all the major WordPress plugins
- Mega menus
3. Zerif Lite
Zerif Lite is an outstanding creation – one of the best free themes for WordPress. This theme is one of the most popular templates, loved by many for its amazing capabilities and great design. Zerif Lite is responsive and adapts well to any device, ensuring a perfect look on all types of screens. Additionally, you can use the theme for creating multiple types of websites: corporate business websites, agency, single page, portfolio, eCommerce/ WooCommerce websites, etc.
It is an entirely WordPress Customizer based theme so that you can instantly make changes with real-time previews. Though, keep in mind that Zerif Lite theme cannot currently receive maintenance and security updates to the theme without an extra plugin.
Features:
- Parallax scrolling design
- Custom backgrounds
- Demo content available
- Mega menus
- WooCommerce ready theme
4. ShopIsle
ShopIsle is a free eCommerce WordPress theme for creating an exciting online shop. ShopIsle presents an astonishing design that is both eye-pleasing and compelling to the audience. It features full-screen image sliders, parallax effect, video backgrounds, etc. that makes your site look magnificent. The theme has better integration with WooCommerce plugin.
Therefore, you have multiple ways to display your products systematically. It has a fully responsive design so that your site will be ready for any device. It looks perfect on desktops, tablets, smartphones or mobile devices.
Features:
- Fully responsive WooCommerce theme
- Easy contact form
- Impressive ‘about us’ page
- Beautiful blog page layout
- Supports major WordPress plugins
5. Accelerate
Accelerate is blazing fast and lightweight. It is a WordPress theme that is created to provide users the ease of use and speedy websites. You can instantly begin building a site. Accelerate is a free responsive multipurpose theme that is suitable for small, medium or big businesses, corporate agencies, creative websites, travel, fashion blogs, etc.
It features a beautiful business template, more than 5 custom widgets and even more widget areas, awesome sliders, etc.
Features:
- Fully responsive design
- WooCommerce compatible
- Live Customizer
- 5+ Beautiful custom widgets
- Extensive color customization
6. Illdy
Illdy is clean, slick and pixel perfect – a free WordPress theme. The theme is responsive and looks stunning on any device including mobile devices. Illdy has a gorgeous and graceful design, grand functionality, and incredible support. It has WordPress Customizer, thus, you can easily create your website in live preview mode.
Due to its extensive features, you can use it for different types of websites including business, landing page, portfolio, etc.
Features:
- Retina ready theme
- Unlimited color options
- Single page design
- WooCommerce support
7. Himalayas
Himalayas is a modern one-page style theme for WordPress which makes the best use of stunning parallax scrolling. It offers you the feel of serene, natural, breathtaking beauty of the high of Himalayas. Full page sliders and all the other content blocks appear smoothly and gently to please the viewers’ eyes.
It is fully responsive and scalable to any device maintaining the pixel perfect look. Based on WordPress Customizer tool, it is easy to customize the theme.
Features:
- Best One-page Parallax WordPress template
- Outstanding slider
- Primary color options
- WooCommerce compatible
- Wonderful custom widgets
8. Parallax One
Parallax One is a simple and elegant WordPress theme that can be used for any purpose. It comes with a clean and beautiful design, created to put content first. The theme’s classy look is enforced by a trendy parallax effect, hence the name of the theme.
Parallax One comes with a shop section, smooth scrolling, and a modern appearance. Overall, a highly customizable WordPress theme.
Features:
- Responsive structure
- Parallax effect
- Custom logos, icons, and menus
- Multiple color schemes
- Tons of social icons
- Google Maps integration
9. Color Mag
ColorMag is a clean and modern theme for magazines, newspapers, and publishing sites. The theme has an elegant and beautiful look, with colorful buttons, featured slider, and an intuitive content structure. ColorMag has a multipurpose design, which fits any topic you want to write about.
Features:
- Responsive design
- Primary color
- Boxed and wide layout option
- WooCommerce compatibility,
- More than 15 widget areas and more than 5 custom widgets
- 6 social icons
10. Spacious
Like the name, it is spacious, spectacular and startling. Spacious is one of the best free WordPress themes you have ever seen. It has a promising design and powerful features that allow you to create elegant websites. It is a multipurpose theme that can be used for different kinds of websites including business, portfolio, blogging, agency, landing page, etc.
Additionally, it has a deep integration with WooCommerce plugin so that you can also create an online shop like website, using this theme.
Features:
- Highly customizable and easy to use
- Beautiful business template
- 5+ Awesome custom widgets
- Live Customizer support
- Full-color control
Bonus Theme – Jupiter X Lite
Jupiter X Lite is the free version of the popular Jupiter X WordPress theme.
Here are some of the main features available in the Lite version.
- 30 elements to build your pages
- 6 readymade website template (Service, Agency, App, Portfolio, Life Coach, Yoga)
- 1 readymade product single page
- 1 readymade product single page template
- Modest portfolio and blog customization
- Ability to customize post single pages (image, title, date, categories, related post, comments, etc.)
Conclusion
You don’t need to invest hundreds of dollars on all the upfront costs of starting a website. In fact, with these 10 free WordPress themes, you can make your website look great, function well, and fulfill your vision all with a small budget!
But the journey doesn’t end here – you still must do your research and consider the factors, such as the quality design of your WordPress theme, and whether it has decent support. From there, carefully select a free WordPress theme that best suits your needs.
Sounds good? Great! Now it’s time to take some action and start building your WordPress website!
