Install a WordPress template in 3 easy ways

WordPress templates or themes provide you with a wide range of options that enable you to control the look and functionality of your website.

A WordPress website comes with a default theme (the current one is Twenty-Two ), which is usually a simple design with limited functionality. You can of course replace this default template and install a different WordPress theme that suits your site’s needs.

There are a huge number of wonderful WordPress templates that suit all needs, some of which are free and some are paid. All you have to do is search for a WordPress template that suits you and install it.

How to install a WordPress template

There are three basic ways to install a template or theme on your WordPress site, which we will explain to you in detail:

1- Install the template through the WordPress website control panel

This method is considered the easiest and is suitable for all types of templates, whether official templates or third-party templates. All you have to do is download the template from its main location to your local device in the form of a compressed ZIP file (only ZIP files can be uploaded, other formats are not supported)

Then go to the site control panel. You can access it through the link Your_domain/wp-admin and choose the Appearance tab > Templates > A window will appear showing you all the templates installed on the site. Click on the Add New button

Then choose Upload Template <, click the Choose File < button, and select the ZIP file for this template.

After successfully completing the process of uploading and installing the template. You can preview the template by clicking on the live preview link to preview how the template will look on your site before activating it and testing the possibility of customizing it.

If you like the result of previewing the template, click the Activate and Publish Now button from the preview page to activate the template on your site, or activate the template directly by clicking on the Activate link as shown in the previous image.

You can also go to the Templates page to review all the templates installed on your site and choose another template.

Thus, you have completed the process of installing a WordPress template on your site through the site’s control panel. Now visit its website and see its new design.

Through this easy method, you can upload most WordPress templates, but you may encounter a problem with this method if the template size is large. In this case, you can use the FTP protocol to add this template to your site, as we will explain in the following method.

2- Install the template through the FTP protocol

You can install the template manually by uploading it directly to your site’s hosting server. You will need to access the server files and the easiest way to do this is by using the FTP file transfer protocol.

All you have to do is connect to your site using an FTP client program, then go to the themes folder located inside the wp-content folder in the site’s root folder and upload the template to it.

In this case, you must decompress the file before the uploading process, or upload the compressed template file and then decompress it after the uploading process on the server is complete, and do not forget to delete the compressed file after completion so as not to consume server resources.

Now if you go back to your site’s control panel > and choose the Templates tab > you should find the template you uploaded. Then select this template and click the activate button to install it on your site.

3- Search for the template from the site’s control panel .

You can use this method to install free themes found in the official WordPress theme directory and easily install them from within your site’s control panel.

Log in to your site’s dashboard and click Appearance > Templates > Add New . Now you can search for a template with a specific name by entering the name of this template in the search box. For example, we will search for the Astra template to install on the site.

If you do not want to install a specific template, you can search for appropriate templates from thousands of templates, where you can view the available templates on the official WordPress website, either through the most popular templates, the newest templates, or favorite templates.

You can also filter your search to find templates that meet certain characteristics by sorting templates by characteristics to find templates that suit the nature of your site.

Such as searching for templates by title, such as blogging, e-commerce, or news templates. Searching for templates with specific features, such as templates that allow modifying the background or logo, or full-width templates. Or templates with a specific layout, such as templates that provide a grid layout or a layout with a specific number of columns and other options.

All you have to do is select the features you want in the template you are looking for and click the Apply button to find the appropriate templates and install them on the site.

Important steps after installing the template

After you install and activate a WordPress theme on your site, the template may suggest that you install some important plugins associated with this template. You can install these plugins to get additional features to your theme or import demo content to test how your theme works optimally.

Well-designed templates separate all the functions that the template performs from the template’s appearance and provide them to users through associated add-ons that can be installed from within a zip file located within the template folders, or from the official WordPress repository, or from any other site as part of the template installation process.

Then you must customize the template and adjust its settings through Appearance> Customize. The template customization window will appear as follows.

From here you can make the necessary modifications to your site’s appearance , such as customizing your site’s logo , changing the fonts used, adding and adjusting menus, adding widgets , customizing the site’s sidebar , or other options that differ according to each template to prepare it appropriately.

Questions and answers about installing WordPress themes

What are the most important factors in choosing a template to install on my site?

There are thousands of WordPress templates available, whether free or paid, which may confuse the website owner, so when choosing a WordPress template, focus your attention on the following elements.

Make sure that the template design is responsive to all screen sizes (tablets and smartphones).
Check if the template is SEO-friendly.
Choose a template that has a professional, practical, and appropriate design and layout that matches the content you plan to publish.
Choose a template that is as easy to customize and use as possible.
Choose a template that is built-in with the necessary functionality to run your site so you don’t have to install external add-ons to your site.
Choose a template that has a high number of active downloads and high positive reviews.

What should I do if the template cannot be installed, or the theme is not installed correctly?

If an error occurred installing a WordPress theme, you must check several things:

1. Make sure that you downloaded the ZIP file of the template correctly and that it is not damaged or damaged. In this case, you will see a message like “The package cannot be installed. The template installation has failed” or “The following templates are installed but incomplete” so download the file again. From the official website of the template and try installing it again.

2.Also make sure that you select the correct zip file for the template and do not select a different file by mistake, as the template file may be a zip file inside the zip file you downloaded. In such a case, you should first unzip the file and then download the template file directly. So you have to make sure that you have downloaded the correct file that contains the template file structure correctly.

3. Finally, make sure that the PHP version of your hosting control panel is up to date. If your PHP version is outdated, then you may not be able to install the template correctly. But be careful, updating the PHP version may cause some problems to your site, so take a backup copy before doing this step.

Is it better to install a free or paid WordPress theme?

In fact, paid WordPress templates and themes are characterized by a more professional design than free templates. They are also very easy to customize, especially by beginners, and are SEO-friendly, so it is preferable to rely on paid templates from the beginning.

But if your budget does not allow purchasing a paid template, you can of course start with a free template that takes into account your requirements in the beginning and switch to a paid template later.

When I install a new template to replace a previous template, what changes will occur to my site?

When you install a new template on your site, the appearance and design of the site will change, while the basic site information and settings will remain the same.

For example, if you use a static page as your home page, this setting will not change when you change the template. Plugins installed on the site will continue to work as long as they are not linked to your previous theme. You may also need to reconfigure the menus and widget areas again.

As for the content, your existing articles and pages will remain as they are. However, some things related to the old template may be deleted, such as the content displayed through the template’s shortcodes .

Some templates also come with additional template-specific options and tools for customizing the home page. If you use such templates, your customized home page will disappear when you install a new theme.

For more, read: Changing a WordPress template without unexpected problems!

term:

Anything that the website owner loses when changing the template and installing another is known as plugin territory . This term states that functionality must be provided through plugins and not through the template to avoid losing it when changing the template.

Conclusion

Choosing a suitable template or theme and installing it on your website, blog, or online store are among the basic steps that you must take care of.

Instead of using the limited default WordPress theme, we recommend that you find a WordPress template that suits your purpose and replace it with another template that is more professional and better suited to your site’s requirements.

In this article, we have reviewed for you different methods that you can use to install a WordPress template on your site, and you can follow the appropriate method among them.