Free or Premium WordPress Themes? Which one should I choose?

Using WordPress means exploring a dynamic open-source community. One of the many features every user admires most about this platform is the opportunity to gain access to tons of vibrant resources to personalize their websites. You’ll be amazed to discover a considerable number of optimal themes are available on the WordPress Themes Directory. In return, companies and developers contribute to the WordPress community and provide astounding GPL-licensed themes for billions of users.

The next thing that comes to your mind is the cost of them? Well, the good news is they come for free.

Now, the next question is that pop-ups, if plenty of excellent free WordPress themes are available, why do users go for a premium WordPress theme?

Reading through this article, you’ll explore the salient features of free and premium WordPress themes to find the difference between them and which option is perfect for you.

Differentiating between Free and Premium WordPress Themes

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Free WordPress themes are pretty basic and old-school; they have no distinctive features that make them appealing. On the contrary, paid WordPress themes are packed with advanced features and are highly-functional.

A free theme might be ideal for you if you want to make a simple blogging site. However, if you’re opening a footwear store, you should go for a premium theme because it offers optimum features to enhance your visibility and grab customers’ attention.

Perks of Free WordPress Themes

When we say free themes, we mean those themes that are available in the WordPress repository. You should always download free themes from reliable sources. Never download themes from untrustworthy sources.

Free of cost

Spending lavishly in the initial stages is quite difficult for small business owners and bloggers.

The most notable benefit of the free WordPress theme is the price, free. It facilitates users to start-up their blog or business without paying a single penny. Isn’t that great?

However, upon hearing the word, free users get cautious. How is it possible that others are selling paid themes, and someone is giving it to you for free? It sounds too good to be true, but maybe there’s a catch?

Users believe free WordPress themes are of low quality. Well, it’s quite the opposite.

Strict review process

WordPress never compromises on quality. They maintain high-quality standards. WordPress themes go through a notoriously strict review process before they are added to the theme directory.

A team of highly qualified developers examines and reviews free themes before adding them into the WordPress themes directory.

The theme review team test free themes on various things, including;

• Standard Compliant Code
• Quality CSS and HTML
• Support for standard WordPress features
• Security
• Privacy

Now you can imagine how much hard work it takes to develop a quality free WordPress theme that gets approved by the themes review team.

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Why am I getting It for free?

If it takes so much hard work to develop a WordPress theme, why are you getting it for free?

The reason is pretty awe-inspiring.

Developing free themes helps developers improve and sharpen their skill set, as, after the review process, the review team suggests or recommends changes.

They also get a golden opportunity to showcase their hard work on such a vast CMS platform. It might even open the doors to a successful career.

So, for now, you might be planning to choose a free theme for your site.

But wait, let’s talk about the catch before you make this choice.

Drawbacks of Free WordPress Themes

Drawbacks of free WordPress themes are seemingly subjective. What one would consider a flaw might not concern others.

Let’s dig in and find out what are the drawbacks of using a free WordPress theme.

Limited developer support

A developer’s support is a must. Through WordPress forums, developers can offer support to users. However, developers are not constrained to reply to users’ queries.

Less number of features

A common perception about free WordPress theme they offer every feature: the truth is many advanced features are not provided in free ones. Features like creating landing pages or using shortcodes usually lack.

Common visual design

Free themes are blessings in disguise; many bloggers and websites use them to save the cost. Therefore, your website design will not be distinctive from the rest. Also, a limited number of options are available to customize the visual representation of any free theme.

Lacks warranty

Before purchasing anything, we often question the warranty. Unfortunately, free themes come with no guarantees. It means if something wrong happens, you have to deal with it yourself. No one will come to rescue.

Quite a lot of drawbacks. However, you still have not paid for it, so hold your horses.

Instead of leaving a 1-star rating, we recommend you politely give your suggestions to the developer. There are a significant number of chances of positive response.

Perks of Premium WordPress themes

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Thousands of premium WordPress themes are available for purchase. Compared to free ones, users believe premium themes are better in terms of functionality and features.

Rich features and customization options

The massive benefits you get from a premium theme are advanced features and extensive customization options.

Because of the cut-throat competition, theme sellers try to offer extra features at affordable rates.

Those additional features include;

• Shortcodes
• Unlimited choice of colors
• Drag and drop builders
• Multiple templates and layout

Quality support and regular updates

When it comes to developer’s support, premium WordPress themes surpass free ones.

Premium WordPress themes offer quality support to users. Frequently they are updated to fix errors and improve user experience.

Sleek visual display

Since users have to purchase premium themes, therefore they are not commonly used.

You get the benefit to personalize premium themes and make them more attractive.

It assures that your site will tempt your visitors with a unique visual appearance.

Drawbacks of Premium themes

You might now be thinking premium themes are too perfect to choose from. But hold on, not every premium theme is perfect.

Premium WordPress Themes also have many drawbacks. So let’s check them out.

Poorly coded

Premium themes look pretty attractive, but you might not know how well-coded they are until you face any compatibility issue. It happens because the theme review teams do not strictly examine them.

Theme bloat

To increase the number of sales, developers add unnecessary features in paid themes. Probably, you might never use them, but they will adversely affect the speed of your site.

Crossing over plugins domain

At times, into the plugin domain, these premium WordPress themes cross over. It can be very frustrating since they start offering you unwanted features.

To remove them, you have to switch your site theme.

Where to buy Premium WordPress Themes?

Earlier, we recommended you always download Free WordPress Themes from trustworthy sources. Similarly, we suggest you purchase Premium WordPress Themes from a reliable theme shop.

We recommend you to shop for premium themes from Themify and StudioPress.

Which one should I choose?

If you’re still confused about which one you should go for, sit down and think for a while.

Think deeply and ask yourself; you will get the answers.

Enlisted below are a few questions that can help you in making the right choice.

• Do you need advanced features or simple ones that are enough for you?
• Are you capable of troubleshooting WordPress issues by yourself, or you need assistance?
• Do you want a fancy looking store, or a simple layout is enough?

Endnote

Apart from us, we encourage you to take advice from WordPress experts and forums. Just make sure to follow the above guidelines so you can make a wise choice.

Author Bio:-

Islah Ejaz is the senior content writer of Reviewsed.com and a consumer tech expert. He’s been writing about the tech industry since 2012.

Featured Image Source: Scepter Marketing