In my previous post How to install WordPress(Step by Step Guide of WordPress installation), we have covered all important steps needed to install WordPress and set up your blog. If you have yet not installed WordPress, I will strongly recommend you to read it before starting.

In current post, I will detail the steps needed to successfully and securely install WordPress theme on your blog. Basically WordPress themes are a way to change look and feel of your blog. You can understand themes as a way to skin your blogs or websites. But WordPress themes are not just limited to changing style of your weblog but are a way to define presentation of matter on your blog.

By default WordPress comes with some basic themes named Twenty Ten, Twenty Eleven and just launched Twenty Twelve. These themes are provided by WordPress for free of cost and you can host your website using themes. But the above mentioned themes are very basic themes and can not be used for specific branding and needs. So lets begin our quest to find new themes and installing them on blog

Searching a theme right for you!

The WordPress Theme Directory is the official theme directory by WordPress. Themes are listed here after rigorous checks on coding standards or prevention from any malicious code. All themes listed here are free of cost and come in variety of categories to match your needs.





In the above image you can have a glimpse of WordPress theme directory. Themes here are categorised on basis of colours, column, width, features etc.
The other way to get themes is to look for themes on various theme design studios. You can get some themes for free while others will need you to pay money. Search for the one that suits your needs best and download it for next step to begin. So now you have a theme ready and now we have to install it on your WordPress blog.

Lets Install WordPress Theme

1. Install new WordPress Theme using Admin Panel:

   • Login to Administration panel of your WordPress installation.
   • Open Appearance panel and inside that select Themes.
   • When insides the Themes page, from the tabs on top select “Install Theme”
     
     
     
     
   • Use Search box to search the theme you would like to have on your WordPress blog. You can do search using various filters listed there and get the best result for you.
   • Click on Preview link to understand how theme look and then hit Install Button to install theme on your blog.
   • Alternatively, you can use “Upload” option from the menu above search box to upload zip file of theme you have already downloaded from internet.

   
    

2. Manually Install WordPress Theme(using FTP):

Here we will see how to use FTP Clients to install theme directly on your server without using administration panel. FTP Clients are the software used to transfer files from your computer to your hosting service securely.

• Download the theme archive and extract the theme on your computer. Make sure that you do not alter the directory structure of theme. For more information, it is always advisable to read the documentation provided along with theme.
• Use a FTP Client to connect to your host web server. To get more details about FTP clients read it here, else download FileZilla.
• Inside your web host, browse to the wp-content/themes/ directory.
• Upload the theme folder you saved in step-1 inside theme directory in your web host.

Ones you are done with above process, you have successfully uploaded theme on your blog. Now all we need is to activate theme from the Administration Panel. For this login to Administration Panel, inside Appearance select Themes. In this page you will see a list of themes installed on your blog. Select and click “Activate” on the one you uploaded and the theme will get activated. Now visit your blog and verify that theme is working correctly.

Wasn’t these steps to Install WordPress themes easy to follow. I am sure, it was like a piece of cake. Unfortunately if you are stuck somewhere, let us know via comments and we will help you as soon as possible.