Do you want to know what the best free WordPress themes and templates for 2020 are? Well, wonder no more! We’ve you covered.
Themes and templates are an integral part of the WordPress experience. They provide the main design frame for WordPress sites and controls how your site content appears to your users. Hence, choosing a theme is really important.
Luckily in WordPress, there are tons of themes you can choose from. Best of all, you can tons of themes free of cost and they work amazingly well. Using a free WordPress theme, you can save money for other important things to grow your site.
Here, we’ve handpicked some of the best best free WordPress themes and templates you can use on your site.
How Did We Create our List?
Well, whenever you take the help of an article on the internet, it’s good to know the sources, as well as the method of the authors. Fortunately for you, we at SiteSaga have taken a lot of time and work to create this list.
First of all, we’ve checked WordPress.org for their selection of popular themes and analyzed the popularity of themes, user reviews, and stats like daily downloads, active installations, etc. So, most themes on this list are among the most popular themes.
Then we researched online, looking in-depth at what other blogs are saying about the product. And then we tried some of these ourselves, test driving them as a beginner would.
And so, without further ado, we present the top 20 free WordPress themes for this year!
20 Best FREE Themes for WordPress
1. Astra
Astra is one of the free WordPress themes which is generalized for making different types of sites. You can make a blog, online shop, or anything that you might want or need.
It works well with major WordPress plugins like WooCommerce, so you don’t have to worry about compatibility issues. Astra also ensures that your website will show up high on the list of Google searches, by using tools like Schema.org.
Astra is possibly one of the biggest names in free WordPress themes and has been highly praised for its intuitive design. Its layout is also beginner-friendly, so you don’t need to be tech-savvy to make a website.
2. OceanWP
OceanWP is a general-purpose theme, with tools for you to build any kind of website you want. You have the option to build a company site, or a blog, or anything else from scratch. On the other hand, you can choose to use the templates provided.
You also get a really large amount of templates and layouts with OceanWP. Whatever your needs may be, from business to personal website, OceanWP has you covered.
You can use this theme to make any kind of website, optimized for anything. You can even use this to optimize your website for mobile use, as nowadays the smartphone market is booming.
OceanWP also works with many major plugins, line WooCommerce and Elementor.
3. Neve
Neve is a simple, and fairly lightweight free WordPress theme, built with simplicity in mind. If you’re a beginner to the web designing scene, then you’ll love Neve, with its easy design and uncomplicated features.
It is really good for people who want a website built for speed. It boasts of various features, from minimal design to AMP(Accelerated Mobile Pages). All of these work to make your website as fast and easy to load as possible.
Neve is usually seen as a basic theme, but it also can create really flashy websites in the right hands. So beginners and the experienced are both going to love this!
4. Zakra
Zakra is another of the free WordPress themes, boasting many templates and layouts for you to choose from. It’s also very easy on the space, which helps your users get a nice and responsive experience on your website. No one likes waiting, right?
This theme also boasts of a lot of specific, niche templates and layouts. For example, small independent businesses can use Zakra’s themes to easily make a website. It can be for coffee shops, or candy shops, dentists, mechanics, etc.
Zakra is optimized for most major plugins. It also uses SEO tools to suggest keywords for you to use in order to improve the number of visits to your website.
5. Mesmerize
Mesmerize offers you beautiful design choices that you can use to make your website interesting. It lets you have a video as a background, add slideshows, or to add dynamic sounds and effects to your website.
It is really beginner-friendly and easy to use and has a wide library of pre-designed templates to get you started.
If, in any case, you feel like doing a minimal amount of work and creating a website, well fear no more! Mesmerize has a wide range of websites ready to go! Simply add text and a few other things you want to talk about on your website and voila! You have yourself a website. No need to mess around with widgets either!
6. Storefront
Optimized for WooCommerce, Storefront is all about, you guessed it, selling! It’s the official WooCommerce theme, created by the same team which built the WooCommerce plugin. So, if you’re thinking about making a name from your brand online, then this is the perfect combo!
All kinds of business, from big to small, can benefit from using this theme. There are several layout and color changing options, allowing you to customize the shop to your brand’s color scheme.
Storefront has so many features to make your website feel as close to a real shopping experience as you want. It offers countless ways to present your products, ways for your customers to access those products, and for you to sort out orders.
7. Sydney
Do you have a business that you need to keep track of? Are customer relations, company workflow, and event scheduling giving you a headache? What you need is Sidney!
Sydney is a WordPress theme that is specialized for medium to large businesses, and lets you keep track of all the working of such a business. It is extremely detailed and works well for all kinds of businesses.
It’s really popular among companies and corporations. It has features that let you keep track of things like employee details, customer relations, and the like. You can also set company timetables, or schedule meetings and other important events.
In short, for a company website, this theme is a must!
8. GeneratePress
GeneratePress is a theme that emphasizes speed. Even on a very poor internet connection, your users will be able to use your website, and it certainly works faster than websites that use other, more feature-heavy themes. It uses up only 15KB of space. Which is less than an image file!
It comes with tons of widgets, as well as a lot of compatibility with major plugins like WooCommerce. It works well with the Elementor page builder as well. This means that, although it is really light, it doesn’t skimp out on usefulness.
Definitely give this theme a try, especially for simple, lightweight websites.
9. Ashe
Ashe is probably the best blog making WordPress theme free on the market. That isn’t to say that you can’t make a blog with another theme, but Ashe makes them all pale in comparison
From fashion to food and music, Ashe has templates and layouts for all of them. It gives you the blog making experience that you’ve always wanted, with ease. You can easily add and remove content, add different kinds of media, and just have a nice, interactive blog overall.
Ashe is also SEO optimized, so you can reach a wider audience with your blogs and articles.
10. Shapely
Shapely is a multifunctional WordPress theme that provides outstanding functionality. It can be used for anything ranging from company sites to blogs and so much more. Although, it perhaps might be a bit suited for professional business sites rather than blogs.
Shapely is also compatible with a lot of major plugins like WooCommerce, Elementor, etc. It has a fairly easy to use layout, although it’s feature-rich nature might make it a bit overwhelming for beginners.
Shapely is a tad bit hard to customize, simply because it might not be the most beginner-friendly. Overall, however, it is a solid theme with a lot to offer.
11. Go
Created by GoDaddy, Go WordPress theme is a very powerful theme that you can get for free. Building your websites from scratch and integrating different features is a very easy task if you go with it.
Even though it takes some time to get used to, the flexibility is what makes it a popular theme. Instead of the theme-based features, the Go theme is more focused on providing a customizable experience. It allows you to utilize its block style editor and piece together your site according to your need.
It’s a Gutenberg based theme which also supports 27 different languages. Go theme is one of the best free WordPress themes especially for small businesses. It provides users with the ability to custom design every page of the site and works great for portfolios and artists.
12. Hestia
A popular multipurpose theme, Hestia, is one of the best free WordPress themes. It allows you to create websites for almost every niche out there. It’s built on a one-page layout that provides a clean and elegant interface, especially for small businesses and startups.
Hestia is fully compatible with the most popular eCommerce platform, i.e. WordPress WooCommerce. This also allows you to create your online stores and include eCommerce features with no hassle.
Being a responsive and mobile-friendly theme, it also ranks up better in search engine results. Hestia comes with the Orbit Fox integration that allows you to add different functionalities to your sites like widgets, social sharing icons, and more and make it more feature-rich.
13. ColorMag
Very popular among publishing sites like news, magazine, TV channel sites, and more, ColorMag has grabbed our attention for being a popular free WordPress magazine theme. It’s a fully responsive WordPress theme that helps you create magazines and news sites with ease.
ColorMag is an SEO optimized theme for WordPress that is compatible with many different browsers and optimized for better performance and speed. It’s compatible with WooCommerce and also different page builders like Gutenberg, Elementor, and more. It also comes along with different customization features like advanced typography, multiple color options, different widgets areas, and more.
However, having these features doesn’t mean it gets complex. In contrast, it’s implemented in a way for you to easily access these features and customize your site as you need. You can also import a prebuilt demo with a simple click.
14. Customify
The very lightweight and flexible theme, Customify is one of the best WordPress themes you can get for free. It’s a theme built especially by keeping usability and speed in mind. This means it prioritizes speed and ease of use over others.
However, this doesn’t mean it loses functionalities. Customify is a feature-rich theme that is highly customizable to your needs. It comes with features to make any kind of websites like an online store, portfolio, and more. Moreover, it’s compatible with different page builders like Elementor, SiteOrigin, and Beaver Builder.
It comes with pre-built site demos and templates that you can import to start customizing. You can easily customize different parts of sites including headers and footers according to your need.
15. Polite
Especially for blogs and magazines, Polite is a great WordPress theme you can get for free. It’s a very minimal and clean theme that comes with a responsive and mobile-friendly Masonry layout. Masonry layouts are the stylish grid system templates based on columns. They are also called Pinterest style layout.
The polite theme is the complete masonry theme for WordPress with great homepage and single page layouts. It comes with custom widgets and user-friendly settings.
It also offers features like an off-canvas slider, multiple sidebar options, a featured slider, and many more that help you customize your site according to your need. You can also change the whole site color with a single click using its primary color option.
16. Hello Elementor
Self-proclaimed as the fastest WordPress theme, Hello Elementor, is one of the best free WordPress templates. Made by Elementor, it’s perfectly compatible with the Elementor page builder. Since it’s a super lightweight and minimalist theme, it works great as a blank sheet. This allows you to customize and convert the site to any kind of site and design.
Hello Elementor is optimized for speed and always loads up your landing pages fast. It’s fully compatible with many popular WordPress plugins like WooCommerce, UpdraftPlus, Wordfence, and more. It’s optimized for SEO, so your site appears higher in search engine results.
You can easily create a site according to your need that is fully responsive and mobile-friendly along with different features it needs. It is a free and open-source theme which means it’s available for the community to contribute and add new features. This helps the theme get new features and big-fixes as fast as possible.
17. Twenty Twenty
Since it comes as the default theme for WordPress 5.3 and above, Twenty Twenty is no doubt a free and feature-rich theme. It’s the first default theme for the new Gutenberg WordPress block editor. It comes with all the basic features a WordPress theme would need to have on top of being a very elegant and responsive theme.
Twenty Twenty is a minimalistic theme that allows you to easily showcase your content and posts on your site using its attractive design and layout. Moreover, it’s super easy to customize to suit any kind of website.
Focused on readability and accessibility, it makes your content stand out and edit them with ease. You don’t have to go through with no additional setup and simply start adding your content with no hassle.
18. OnePress
By FameThemes, OnePress is a fully responsive one-page WordPress theme great for product landing pages and small business sites. It offers clean, beautiful, and professional one-page designs to build attractive single page websites.
OnePress comes with 2 different demos that you can use as the foundation for your site. You can easily import them using their one-click import. It comes with all the basic features and elements of a site that you need to make your site stand out and look beautiful. It’s fully responsive and works well with different devices and screens.
It’s compatible with the Gutenberg editor and integrates features like post format, sticky menu, social linking, and more. You can also install additional plugins to make your one-page styled website more featureful.
19. Rife Free
Rife free is a beautiful free WordPress template that comes with 7 ready-to-use and elegant demo layouts. Although famous for its compatibility with a portfolio-style website, it works great with almost any of the sites you are aiming for. Even selling your product and services is very easy because of WooCommerce compatibility.
It even has a one-page design mode if you’re looking for one-page layouts. It’s a very responsive theme that’s also translation ready. Moreover, it comes with a huge library of fonts from Google and over 450 customizer options to change up.
Rife Free is also perfectly compatible with the Elementor page builder to help you customize the site according to your requirements. Additionally, it supports other popular drag and drop page builders like WPBakery and more.
20. Vantage
One of the oldest themes from SiteOrigin, Vantage is a great free WordPress theme. It’s a very responsive multipurpose theme that supports a wide number of third-party plugins. It comes with an easy drag and drop interface that allows you to have complete control over designing your page.
Vantage works well with the SiteOrigin page builder and widgets bundle that comes with a variety of widgets to integrate into your site. It’s also perfectly compatible with the WooCommerce plugin to help you sell your products and services online. You can also integrate sliders on your site using the Smart Slide 3 integrations.
You can easily create your customizable and professional site using the Vantage theme which is the most popular theme from SiteOrigin.
Conclusion
Here, we’ve presented to you 10 free WordPress themes. All of these themes are absolutely free, so we hope that those of you on a tight budget(or not) have an idea of what you’ll use to create your website.
Also, check out our article on the best WordPress plugins and tools for your site.
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