How to Install a Wordpress Theme
This guide will show you how to install a wordpress theme. First of all, you need to have a running wordpress and a FTP Client application to upload your theme on your server. You can download latest wordpress version from official Wordpress website and for the FTP client application I strongly recommend FileZilla. It is an open source project and distributed free under the terms of GNU General Public License. You can check our How to Install FileZilla FTP Client guide for further help to download and install it.
Uploading Theme to Your Server
To start using a theme on your wordpress, you need to have the the theme files up in the server. So, open your FTP client and connect to your web server as the first step.
Your theme files have to be placed in “your-web-server/wp-content/themes/” folder. Therefore, double click on “wp-content” folder in your server, and inside it double click “themes” folder.
Now you are in the zone. Any theme you put in this “themes” folder will appear in your wordpress admin’s page theme selection section.
To start uploading your theme, browse to your theme files on your harddisk in the FTP client application related section and make sure you have the main folder selected to upload. (Some themes come with extra folders inside such as “theme/theme/……/theme files/”, in these cases you have to browse untill you get to the folder that has “theme files” in it. ) Start uploading theme folder that has the theme files in your hard disk to the “wp-content/themes/” folder on your web server as mentioned above.
Emphasis here; the newly uploaded themes location has to be “wp-content/themes/your-new-theme-folder/” and the theme files such as index.php, header.php ect. must be listed under “your-new-theme-folder”. Make sure it does.
Activating Your Theme
After the upload process finalizes, switch to your web browser and login to your admin page in your wordpress installation. Click on the “Appearance” on the left menu, it will expand, then click on the “Themes”.
It will open your themes section that lists available themes. The one you uploaded to your webserver as mentioned above, it should appear in the “Available Themes” list in this section. You can activate the theme simply by clicking to “Activate” link located just under the theme name and explanation or you can first try it by clicking to “Preview” link.
That’s it, if you followed the steps, your new theme should be ready to use. If you have any probelms during the installation, leave a comment and I’d be happy to assist if I can.
