Today I am going to write just another WordPress tutorial that will teach how to install a WordPress Theme. I know, it’s easy to install a theme for people who use WordPress every day. But what if you haven’t used WordPress before and today is your first day using this amazing web software? That’s why I decided to write this step-by-step tutorial that will help a new WordPress user to install a WordPress Theme.
Don’t worry, it’s not a rocket science. WordPress makes it very easy to install/change a Theme. To install a WordPress Theme you must have a working version of WordPress already installed. Then you have to find a theme that you like and want to install on your website.
There are two ways to install a new theme:
WordPress Upload
FTP Upload
WordPress Upload
First what you need to do is log in to your Dashboard (Admin Panel). To do that navigate to login form ( www.your_website_name.com/wp-login.php ) and enter your login and password.
Remember, your user must have an administrator’s permissions in oder to install a Theme. After that you will be redirected to your Dashboard. Find an Appearance tab in the left menu and click on it.
Then you will see two tabs on a top of the page that you just entered: Manage Themes and Install Themes. In order to install a new Theme you have to click on Install Themes tab. You will find a few options in that page:
- Search (You can search a theme in Free WordPress Themes directory)
- Upload (Upload a WordPress Theme if you have a .zip file of that Theme)
- Featured (Choose a Theme from Featured WordPress Themes)
- Newest (Choose a new WordPress Theme)
- Recently Updated (Choose a recently updated WordPress Theme)
If you have a .zip file then click on Upload. Then choose a file and click on Install Now. Then you need to activate your theme. To activate a theme go to Appearance > Themes and click on Activate link under a theme screenshot.
If you want to get a theme from a WordPress Themes directory then just find a theme that you like and click on Install Now link under a theme screenshot.
After that you can activate your theme. Just click on Activate link.
FTP Upload
First, you have to have a FTP access to your website. Also you need a software (for example: FileZilla or Cyberduck[Mac Only] ) in order to connect by FTP.
Remember that you need to upload the non-zipped theme folder into the /wp-content/themes/ folder on your server (hosting). After that, you can activate your theme in your Dashboard.