30 Best Free WordPress Themes in 2023

Gone are the days when the word ‘free’ equated to less-than-average quality.

Nowadays, a lot of free products and services provide a great deal of value, including WordPress themes.  

Here’s the thing, though; with literally thousands upon thousands of free themes available for download, pinpointing the best free WordPress themes can be quite the hassle.

On that account, this post will shed light on some of the best themes for WordPress that are completely free.

So whether you’re looking for a niche-specific theme or a multipurpose theme, we’ve got you covered.

Let’s jump right into it!

How to Choose a Free WordPress Theme

As we mentioned earlier, there are literally thousands of free themes that you can choose from.

This begs the question of how to choose the best free WordPress theme for your needs.

Here are the most important factors to consider:

1. First Impression

Before examining a theme’s responsiveness, SEO-friendliness, and other technical factors of that sort, you should take a step back and consider your first impression of it.

First impressions last forever, so ask yourself the following questions:

• Is the theme well-designed?
• Is the theme aesthetically pleasing?
• Is the theme rated highly?
• Is the theme’s layout intuitive?

If the answer to these questions is yes, then you’re most likely looking at a worthwhile theme in terms of visuals.

2. Compatibility

Not every free theme you find online is going to be compatible.

If a theme captures your attention, you need to make sure that it’s compatible with WordPress as well as the latest versions of PHP.

If you opt for one of the themes listed in this post, you don’t have to bother with this consideration.

We’ve made sure that every single theme on our list is highly compatible with WordPress and PHP. 

3. Category

Another important factor to consider is the niche of your website.

There are free themes for a wide range of purposes and niches, including ecommerce, blogging, business, podcasting, portfolios, magazines, and more.

If you don’t have a specific niche for your WordPress website, or if you’re looking for a versatile theme that can work for more than one niche, there are plenty of multipurpose WordPress themes that you can pick from.

4. Optimization

Next, you want to make sure that the theme you’re about to use for your website is well-optimized for speed and SEO, which are two of the most important factors when it comes to search engine ranking, according to Google.

You should also make sure that the theme is mobile-friendly, seeing as mobile devices account for about 58% of all internet usage around the world.

5. Credibility

Last but certainly not least, you want to make sure that the theme is created by a reputable developer and that it has a high rating.

This is to ensure that it’s well-coded, well-designed, and secure.

The 30 Best Free WordPress Themes Today

To simplify your selection process, we’ve divided our top picks for the best WordPress themes that are available for free into different categories, each featuring five quality themes.

eCommerce

1. Storefront

Storefront is probably the most popular free ecommerce theme for WordPress out there.

It’s designed and built by WooCommerce’s developers, so WooCommerce compatibility issues are out of the equation.

Storefront excels when it comes to customization options, enabling you to choose from an impressive range of colors and multiple layout options that are all equally responsive and visually appealing.

Another thing that sets this WordPress theme apart is its dedicated extensions, which include a blog customizer, mega menus, product sharing, and more.

2. Flash

Flash is one of the most flexible and feature-rich WordPress themes out there.

Even though it’s in our ecommerce category, it’s really a multipurpose WordPress theme that works for just about any niche.

The reason why Flash is an excellent theme for ecommerce purposes is that it has WooCommerce integration.

This means that you can use it to create an online store.

Flash also supports quite a few page builder plugins, such as SiteOrigin and Elementor, for ease of customization.

In addition, it supports ThemeGrill’s one-click demo importer, allowing you to import content and widgets with one click.

3. eStore

As the name suggests, eStore is a WordPress theme that’s optimized specifically for ecommerce purposes.

It has WooCommerce integration that enables you to create a full-fledged online shop.

eStore is powerful and feature-rich, yet simple and intuitive, featuring several ready-to-use starter templates and custom widget areas that will get you up and running in no time.

This free WordPress theme is secure and well-coded, so you don’t have to worry about the security and overall functionality of your online store getting compromised in any way.

4. Botiga

If you’re looking for a clean and minimalistic WordPress theme for a future-proof ecommerce website, you can’t go wrong with Botiga.

It’s one of the best options on the list as far as providing a smooth shopping experience.

Botiga is one of our favorite ecommerce WordPress themes when it comes to customization.

You can customize everything from its product listing styles to its checkout and cart layouts.

You get to enjoy a lot of neat features with this WordPress theme, including badge styles, product filters, a scroll-to-top arrow, product recommendations, and more.

It’s definitely worth checking out!

5. Orchid Store

Based entirely on the WooCoomerce plugin for WordPress, Orchid Store is a dynamic and stylish theme that can be used for different ecommerce stores, from fashion and jewelry to sports, cosmetics, and more.

Orchid Store is compatible with Elementor, which is a popular page builder that enables you to extend your website’s pages and customize them to your liking.

Orchid Store is 100% media-responsive, with an excellent load time, regular updates, and free support.

It’s also compatible with plugins like WooCommerce Membership, WooCommerce Subscription, YithWishlist, and more.

Blogging

1. Ashe

If you’re looking to start a blogging website that’s centered around food, travel, lifestyle, or other similar niches, you can’t go wrong with this free WordPress theme.

It’s one of the highest-rated free WP themes out there, with tons of reviews and testimonials to back it up.

It’s also worth noting that it has WooCommerce integration, so you can make money using this WordPress theme.

With Ashe, you get to choose from a bunch of different layout options based on your aesthetic needs.

You also get to enjoy neat features such as promo boxes, which you can use to highlight significant ads.

2. Cenote

Similar to Ashe, Cenote is a popular blogging theme for WordPress, boasting a modern layout with a clean, sleek, and highly responsive design that’s guaranteed to appeal to most aspiring bloggers.

Cenote offers full-fledged WooCommerce support for ecommerce purposes.

It’s also one of the best blogging themes for WordPress in terms of customer support.

Another thing we like about this WordPress theme is that it’s quite customizable.

It has several custom widgets that you can choose from, as well as widget areas, and you can easily drag and drop each theme element.

3. Heuman

Heuman is another top-tier WordPress theme for blogging that offers unlimited widget areas, several post formats, customizable layouts, featured sliders, and a lot more.

One of the things that set this theme apart from other free blogging themes is that it features the Sharrre plugin for social media sharing, with an individual share count for each post.

What’s more, this theme supports the Hueman Addons plugin, which means you can integrate more features and functionalities into your website, from a social sharing bar to blockquotes, shortcodes, and more. 

4. Gist

Gist is one of the most versatile WordPress themes that are available for free.

Though it’s used mostly as a blogging theme, it doubles as a news or magazine-style theme just as well.

What we love the most about Gist is that it’s user-friendly and simplistic without being boring.

Everything from the font and color options to the typography is bold and prominent.

We also like that this flexible WordPress theme is cross-browser-compatible and highly responsive.

There are also a lot of custom widgets, covering everything from social and author options to meta, copyright, footer, and sidebar options. 

5. Hemingway

If you’re looking for a simplistic yet stylish and bold WordPress theme for your new blog, Hemingway is right up your alley.

With its striking colors, large images, and sharp typography, this comprehensive free WordPress theme surely stands out.

With Hemingway, you get to choose from four different post formats.

You also get to change the theme’s accent color to suit the image you have in mind for your WordPress website.

The design of this theme is responsive and looks great on virtually all devices, from a small 3.5-inch iPhone screen to a large 27-inch iMac.

Talk about mobile-friendly!

Business

1. Sydney

Boasting tens of thousands of downloads and an excellent rating, Sydney is one of the most popular free WordPress themes for business and agency websites.

Some of Sydney’s most notable features include WooCommerce integration, 600 Google fonts, and plenty of page templates.

The theme also uses the Elementor page builder plugin for easy block-based customization.

This free WordPress theme features the parallax background feature that adds a great deal of aesthetic appeal by creating a 3D effect as you’re scrolling down.

2. Hestia

Hestia is a well-known WordPress theme that’s widely used in professional and business websites, as well as online stores.

It sports a modern, sleek design that will surely seize the eyes of your visitors.

One of the reasons why Hestia is so popular is that it allows you to create a minimalistic 1-page site.

The theme is also retina-ready and SEO-friendly.

Another reason why Hestia is popular is that it’s compatible with more than just one-page builder.

It’s compatible with Elementor, Beaver Builder, and more!

3. Colibri

When it comes to ease of customization, very few free WordPress themes can top Colibri.

This theme offers 34 homepage content blocks that are already pre-built and ready for use.

What’s more, with Colibri, you get to choose from five different header designs.

Not only that, but you also get to combine drag-and-drop elements to create your own custom content blocks.

Although this free responsive WordPress theme is best suited for business, agency, and professional websites, you can use it for just about any website type or niche, thanks to its high customizability.

4. Spacious

Boasting thousands of installs and a lot of positive reviews, Spacious is a top-notch WordPress theme for small business websites as well as online stores.

One of the things that set this theme apart is that it’s optimized for speed and SEO.

So, you’re guaranteed fast loading speeds and a solid presence on SERPs. Also, the theme is supported by all popular browsers.

Spacious has WooCommerce integration, which means you can build an entire online store with this flexible free WordPress theme.

You also get to choose from a range of templates, color options, and ready-to-import demos.

5. Kadence

If you’re looking for an ultra-fast, lightweight theme for your WordPress-based business website, Kadence is the way to go.

This theme strikes the perfect balance between high-quality designs and fast loading speed.

Kadence offers plenty of templates to choose from based on the image you have in mind for your WordPress site.

You can use it for other types of sites as well, not just business websites.

You can customize the buttons, color palette, and typography to your liking with this theme.

There’s also a drag-and-drop editor that you can use to adjust the header and footer.  

News/Magazine

1. MagazineX

Whether you’re a small-time journalist or a large news corporation, MagazineX is one of the most well-rounded free WordPress themes in the category of news/magazine-based themes.

From the sleek, aesthetically pleasing design to the high responsiveness and SEO-friendliness, this Gutenberg-based theme delivers an excellent user experience at a lightning-fast speed.

There’s plenty of room for widgets in this theme.

There’s also an advertisement space for ad displays.

We also like that this theme does a great job of balancing color and contrast for a striking visual.

2. ColorMag

ColorMag is yet another WordPress theme that places a lot of emphasis on speed optimization.

With this theme, you don’t have to worry about your pages taking a long time to load.

There’s a lot to like about this theme. For starters, it’s compatible with WooCommerce.

It’s also compatible with a lot of the most popular page builders out there.

Another cool feature is the news ticker header, which, as you might have guessed, is a section that’s dedicated to the latest headlines.

It’s positioned at the top of the page so that it’s the first thing your visitors see.

3. CoverNews

Offering high responsiveness, cross-browser compatibility, and a host of handy features, CoverNews is a retina-ready theme that’s designed to capture the attention of audiences from the very moment they land on your site.

This magazine theme has a live customizer that enables you to adjust and customize every single element based on your needs.

All the changes you make can be viewed in a real-time preview mode.

With CoverNews, you get to enjoy three starter sites that are ready for you to use right out of the gate.

You also get to enjoy seven custom widgets.

This free WP theme is definitely worth considering!

4. News Portal

If you’re looking for a free news/magazine theme that sports a modern layout, News Portal might just be what you’re looking for.

Though it’s not as popular as MagazineX and ColorMag, it stands out with its unique features.

One of the most notable features this theme has to offer is category tag coloring.

With this feature, you can customize the color of every single category tag on your website.

This ensures easy site navigation.

Another cool feature is the news ticker, which helps display breaking news and significant headlines on your website’s homepage.

The theme has an excellent rating overall, and it’s very well-designed.

5. Newsup

Newsup is another modern WordPress theme that’s perfect for an online news website.

It features WooCommerce integration and offers an ad widget, so you shouldn’t have any problem monetizing your site.

There are quite a few design elements that we like.

For starters, there are a bunch of social icons that you can use in your website’s footer and header.

Examples include Pinterest and YouTube icons.

There’s also a super-responsive slide banner with a grid-list functionality for displaying your latest posts on your site’s homepage.

The multi-content layout is also a strong selling point.

Portfolio

1. Inspiro

Inspiro is a free portfolio theme for WordPress that’s perfect for photography and videography content.

The theme is WooCommerce-ready and it’s compatible with popular page builders.

Inspiro is pretty lightweight, so you’re guaranteed a blazing-fast loading speed.

It has a modern design that’s guaranteed to capture your visitor’s attention, coupled with your video and photo content, of course.

Another thing that’s worth noting is that this theme has a fullscreen area that supports self-hosted video backgrounds, as well as Vimeo and YouTube video backgrounds.

How cool is that?

2. Virtue

Virtue is a simplistic yet well-designed and well-coded theme that you can use to create your online portfolio without any fuss.

It’s highly customizable, with several fonts and header menu options.

This theme is both responsive and mobile-friendly, so rest assured that it looks great on just about any screen size.

It’s also compatible with WooCommerce, so you can integrate an online store if you want to.

Although we’ve listed this theme under our portfolio category, it also works for a wide range of other purposes.

For example, you can use it for a personal site, online store, or even a business/agency site.

3. Hitchcock

Hitchcock is a photography-dedicated WordPress theme that’s entirely free—no pro features at an extra cost or a premium theme version.

The theme has a pretty good rating and a solid number of installs.

This WordPress theme has a three-column grid layout that’s simplistic yet visually appealing.

The theme’s posting format should be right up your alley if you’re looking to include text content below every image.

It’s also worth noting that this theme makes use of the Jetpack Infinite Scroll feature.

This means that when a user reaches the bottom of a page on your website, more posts will load automatically.

4. Tracks

Tracks is another minimalistic WordPress theme that embraces the beauty found in simplicity.

It has a unique two-column grid layout that enables you to showcase both posts and images on your homepage.

If you have more than one project that you’re trying to display on your homepage, you’re going to love this theme. Its clear typography and clean, high-class design are guaranteed to win you over.

Although this theme isn’t as popular as some of the other options on our list, it maintains a solid 4.97/5 rating, as per WordPress.org reviews.

So, you can rest assured that it’s a quality, well-coded theme.

5. Rife

If you’re running a creative business and you’re looking for a suitable WordPress theme for your website, you have to check out Rife.

It’s one of the best options on the list in terms of customization options.

Some of the most notable customization options that this theme offers include a mega menu, one-page mode, a brick gallery, and text animation.

The latter feature makes your text content look as if it’s being written live.

Rife flaunts a highly responsive slider that supports images, videos, and a range of other types of content.

All in all, this is one of the best-looking and most feature-rich portfolio themes.

Multipurpose

1. Astra

Out of all the themes reviewed in this article, Astra is hands down the most popular, boasting over a million downloads and a 5/5 rating.

It’s a multipurpose WordPress theme that’s perfect for all websites.

With Astra, you gain access to over 100 well-designed templates that will help you get up and running with a few clicks.

You also get to use popular builders like Beaver Builder, Elementor, Divi, and more.

Not only is Astra the most popular theme on the list, but it’s also one of the fastest and most SEO-friendly, thanks to its almost negligible size of under 50 KB.

Yes, you read that correctly; this theme is under 50 KB! It’s pretty much a premium theme offered for free.

2. Hello Elementor

Hello Elementor is another popular multipurpose theme with over a million installs.

It’s lightweight, SEO-friendly, and, as the name suggests, it’s made specifically for the Elementor plugin.

Seeing as this theme doesn’t come with any built-in templates, you’ll have to use one of the templates found in Elementor’s template library.

You can then customize the template to your liking, if need be.

It’s worth pointing out that this theme doesn’t have unique bells and whistles.

It’s a bare-bones theme, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

After all, over a million people have used it with their unique needs and customizations.

3. OceanWP

Boasting hundreds of thousands of downloads, OceanWP is an outstanding multipurpose theme that offers 15 demos for different types of websites.

You can use it for a personal blog, business website, and more.

OceanWP has WooCommerce integration, meaning you can use it to build an online store.

Speaking of which, the theme has a bunch of native online store features, including checkout points, shopping cart pop-ups, and more.

OceanWP also grants you access to a bunch of different extensions that will help you expand your site’s functionality.

This includes a custom sidebar, social media icons, a sticky footer, and a post slider.

4. Customizr

Downloaded almost four million times and used in over 60,000 active websites, Customizr is an all-purpose theme that’s especially suited for small business and ecommerce websites.

This theme is among the very best when it comes to responsiveness.

No matter the screen size, this theme will look nothing short of perfect on any device.

In addition to being highly responsive, this theme features a lazy loading functionality that helps enhance loading speeds.

It also uses a parallax effect and is WooCommerce-compatible.

5. Neve

If you thought Astra is the lightest theme on this list with its 50 KB size, think again!

Neve, with a page size of 32 KB, is as light as lightweight can be.

This translates to blistering fast loading speeds.

And if that’s not enough, what if we tell you that this lightweight theme is compatible with WordPress AMP, which is a plugin that guarantees ultra-fast loading speeds on all mobile devices?

It does so by trimming down HTML files.

This multipurpose theme can be used for different types of websites, from online stores to portfolios to business sites.

It’s SEO-optimized, well-coded, undergoes regular updates, and offers full support.

Frequently Asked Questions

Wrapping Up

There you have it; 30 of the best free WP themes for just about every niche you might have in mind.

Whether you’re looking for a blogging, business, ecommerce, or multipurpose theme, one of the above-listed free themes is guaranteed to meet your needs.

There are countless other WordPress themes that are free, along with premium WordPress themes that drop for free every now and then, but we assure you that the ones listed in this post are the best of the bunch.

That being said, if you come across a theme that you like, apart from the ones listed in this post, make sure to take all of the factors we discussed above into consideration before deciding to use that theme.