In addition to the default theme included with your WordPress installation, you can also install your own WordPress theme to change the look and style of your site.
Managing Your WordPress Themes
To manage your WordPress themes, expand the Appearance menu in the WordPress Dashboard. Here, you’ll see the Manage Themes page.
At the top of this page, you’ll see your Active theme. In this case, our current theme is the Twenty Twelve theme. Here we also see an option to Customize. If you click this link, you’ll see a preview window that allows you to make changes to the Site Title and Tagline, to colors, to add a different background image or change the static from page.
If you return back to the Manage themes tab, you’ll see a list of available themes below the active theme. These are themes that have been installed on your WordPress site.
If you click the Live Preview link under any theme, you’ll see a preview of how your site would look with that theme. In the preview, you can navigate to different pages to see how the theme handles posts, archives, and other page templates. In the left-hand pane of the preview window, you can also edit the theme settings. These settings will differ, depending on what theme features the theme supports.
To accept the new settings and activate the theme all in one step, click the Save & Activate button at the top of the left-hand pane.
How to Install a WordPress Theme
1. To install themes, click the Install themes tab. You’ll see several links at the top of this page to search for themes by keyword or view the featured and newest themes from the WordPress theme directory. Here you can also filter themes by color, columns, width or features.
2. To upload a theme, click the Upload tab. After your theme has been uploaded, click Activate. You’ll now see this theme listed as your current active theme.
Kristen has been writing tutorials to help WordPress users since 2011. You can usually find her working on new articles for the iThemes blog or developing resources for #WPprosper. Outside of work, Kristen enjoys journaling (she’s written two books!), hiking and camping, cooking, and daily adventures with her family, hoping to live a more present life.
