How to Change a WordPress Theme (Without Breaking Your Website)

The process of changing themes without changing your website's core functionalities can take a bit longer than just clicking on the Activate button. 🅰️ This tutorial will show you how to do it safely, step-by-step. 👇

Choosing the perfect WordPress theme can take some time. As websites grow and expand, owners might feel the need to change their WordPress themes so they can accommodate their site's new necessities.

Changing your WordPress theme only takes a few moments. However, if you want to do it safely, switching themes can be a little more time consuming. That is because your website's features are closely tied to the theme you are currently using. Therefore, changing themes abruptly, might cause a loss of useful functionalities, and potentially break your site.

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🕘Timestamps

0:00 How to Change Your WordPress Theme Safely
1:03 Set Up a Staging Copy of Your Website
2:26 Install Your New Theme and Preview It
3:23 Activate Your New Theme
3:46 Resolve Errors and Replace Missing Elements
5:01 Push Your Staging Website Live

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📚Other useful guides on WordPress Themes

For more detailed information on how to change a WordPress theme:

Find out how to customize a WordPress Theme:

WordPress Free vs Paid Themes: Which is Right for Your Next Project?

How to Delete a WordPress Theme (3 Effective Ways):

The Best Free And Premium WordPress Themes

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🔇This video has captions (translated by real humans!) in English, Spanish, Italian, French, Portuguese, German, Dutch, Japanese, Danish and Swedish. Click on the CC to set your preferred language.

#SwitchThemes #ChangeWordPressTheme #NewTheme

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[lealrestore]

Wow! A guy with a message that is easy to comprehend. This man knows how to communicate.

[BayWeli]

Do you think it's easier to reset the WordPress and add the new theme instead of changing it? Wouldn't that make it easier o avoid any complications, especially for people who don't have a lot of tech skills? I would really appreciate your advice. Thank you for sharing this great video!

[Mj.nuristani]

wow, your content looks very good. Clean, HD, Update and perfect for year 2021. Great video, thank you for all the hard work.

[flamissia]

Thank you Mike, this was very clear. I just switched to Kinsta and am super pleased with the excellent support, help articles and easy-to-follow videos like this one! Just didn't say how to push the staging site live on Kinsta, nor is there a link to a video showing how to do so in the notes. Thank goodness "Tony Teaches Tech" came to the rescue with a video specifically about this.

[codeAlongwith]

My old site works on shortcodes and the original database is too large to download completely, so that is fun!

[EnglishSquared]

Do you have a video on setting up a staging area?

[Bertthemovieguy]

How do you switch your staging site to your new website once you know everything works how you want it?

[williamthiek]

wow! changing a theme is not a child's play.

[thedepravityscale]

Hi! Lets say I have a live website where users can register a profile. If I created a whole new website on a staging area that also has that same profile feature, would it be possible to push that new website live (replacing the current live site) without losing the users' profile information?

[EliTessadroo]

hello! by mistake I changed the theme and lost all the content. Worst than that, new entries doesn't appear anymore.. Please, help! how do I make everything show again, does anyone know? I put my site in blank but still entries doesn't show (they're marked as published publicly).
Thanks indeed

[Glass-Eye]

I’ve managed to change my theme, but only the blog page changed. My homepage didn’t. What did I do wrong?

[fredberri]

Mike, thank you for the video. I find WP extremely complicated particularly since the WP updates with a huge learning curve. I am an author not a computer person. There must be a simpler way. Any suggestions for a theme for writers?

[imweirderthanyou]

Um i dont have the active theme button does this only work on premium?

[JC-temd]

It looks like a hassle, why not just delete the old theme and replace with the new one, or delete the current website and create a new one