Which WordPress Theme Should I Use? How to Choose a Theme for a Website (in 5 steps)

So you are wondering Which WordPress Theme Should I Use?
I’ll explain my five-step process of how to choose a theme for a WordPress website.

My favorite free themes:
Some of the above links are affiliate links.

So just a quick reminder that a WordPress theme is just “a website template with a certain layout and design.” Now most themes, can be heavily customized. Especially with drag & drop page builders like Elementor.

00:00 Intro and free vs premium
There are free themes & premium themes. This will influence how you pick a WordPress theme.
Now if you have a specific industry or type of a website that you are creating such as a dentist, cafe, or software company.

Then I would just directly go for a premium theme because you will have industry-specific tools included in the theme.

Such as appointment scheduler for a dentist or table reservation for cafes. You will get more features and just save so much time by using a premium theme.

On the other hand, if you are setting up a blog or personal website, then you will probably be okay with a free theme. Although, you will get more features if you upgrade.

For the premium themes, I use a website called Themeforest I like them because they have a lot of different options and pretty much a theme for every niche.
And for the free themes, you can check my 2 favorites oceanWP & Astra. But these you can just install directly in your WordPress dashboard
under appearance and add a new theme.

Let me show you my 5 step process of choosing a WordPress theme.

01:34 STEP 1 Make a list of features you would like to have.

So think, what is your goal with your website? Let’s use a dentist as an example,
as everyone can imagine what their goal with the website is.
A dentist might want visitors on the website to book appointments, display contact details, and maybe show services and prices.

So that means for features we want:
- Appointment booking widget
- Easy to find and use contact details
- Price page or price table

02:14 STEP 2 Search for your industry and view results

Now head to ThemeForest and in the search box, just search for the type of website you want.
I’m going to keep using the dentist as an example.

You can see that you will get a lot of results. Just open the themes that look promising in a new window. Do this until you have 5-10 promising options.

03:21 STEP 3 Check the theme demos

For each of these themes, you need to check the demos. Because it’s so much easier to start a website if you have some structure already in place and you mostly need to change the text & colors. So let’s take a look few of the dentist’s websites.

Remember your goals for the website, you are looking if the demo theme has the features you want. And that it looks more or less like you want it to look.

Remember that you will probably have to change these images, so make sure you have something similar or that you can take a photo like this.

05:31 STEP 4 Eliminate options that don’t fit your needs.

While looking at the demos, just close the tabs with themes that don’t match your criteria.
Do this until you have 2-3 options that you are happy with.

05:45 STEP 5 Decision time

In short, it’s time for you to select a wp theme.
Look at the theme layouts, reviews, the popularity of the developer, and price.
And based on these, the last step is to make a decision.
For me, the most important criteria for a theme is that it fits my layout and feature needs.

I also want the theme to load fast, so I run the demo site through the speed testing tool.
I’ll leave a link to this tool in the description. But basically, anything above 90 is good.

After that, I make sure that the theme has some reviews & sales. Also, I like to check if the developers of the theme are active. If they are, that means the theme will probably get updates and they have support if there are any issues with the theme.

And obviously, I look at the price, although there is not that much difference if you think about it in the bigger picture. The more expensive the theme the more features it has.

Some of the above links might be affiliate links.

[yagamilight]

Thanks for this good video. Based on your experience which one would you say is faster even slightly? "Ocean WP" or "Astra" ?

[ddrci]

can you recommend one premium e-commerce general store theme, please? It is electronic and other daily uses product general store.

[aaravshukla]

thanks man i am from india. love from india . can i use your video clips in my video on youtube in this channel ..
please confim..

[carsoundsintheworld]

Heey vraagje kan je mij een email sturen met jou seo diensten? En je nummer heb heel veel opdrachten voor je!