WordPress is the most popular CMS on the net today for a variety of reasons – it’s free to download, easy to use, and even easier to customize. If you’re still looking for more reasons to use WordPress, check out these free themes that not only look great on the computer but preserve your site’s functionality on mobile devices.
Themes that automatically scale or adjust themselves to adapt to a mobile environment are called “responsive” themes. Users today are just as likely to visit your site from a laptop, tablet, or mobile phone as they are from a computer. If they have to zoom or rescale your site on their mobile devices in order to access its content, Google might not flag it as mobile-friendly, which can hurt your SEO. Responsive themes are the obvious choice if you want to maximize traffic to your site and ensure a good customer experience. This might sound like a fancy adjustment, but there are actually hundreds of free responsive themes out there that look great on any site. Below, however, are a few responsive themes that not only look great, but are easy to customize and increase your site’s functionality.
Shapely
Possibly the most popular free theme on WordPress, this responsive theme is built with optimal web development in mind. It fully supports high-retina displays, which means gorgeous graphics, clear text, and sharp vector icons for your site. Though it’s often marketed toward sites with lots of audio/visual content, this theme is actually highly adaptable. It offers features that increase functionality for any site-type and is highly compatible with plugins like Contact Form 7, Google Analytics, Yoast SEO, and Gravity Forms.
Illdy
If you’re looking for something a little more avant-garde, Illdy is the theme for you. Equipped with a dizzying array of design features, this theme comes with configurable widgets and retina-ready icons, as well as a multitude of premade layouts and template pages that are unique, sleek, and modern. This theme is known for its ability to seamlessly integrate plugins, so its range of functionality is literally endless, and never compromised by a small mobile or tablet screen.
Tyche
This theme is perfect for an eCommerce site. The default settings are sales and marketing oriented, with a banner for ads and a shopping cart already built-in. Free shipping and a subscription log-in account are just a few of the extra features you can add to your pages to make them as friendly as possible for your customers. Page templates and designs include Featured, Most Wanted, Trends, and other business-oriented options. The layout and color scheme are intentionally simple to give the site a sleek and professional design, but if you want something a bit more flashy, customizing this theme is extremely simple. It’s also highly compatible with WooCommerce and other eCommerce plugins.
Allegiant
Allegiant is an incredibly versatile theme that has somehow devised a layout that works for almost any site type. This theme is a particular favorite for businesses because of features like a team member page template and a built-in portfolio feature. This theme makes customization very smooth and easy, even at the most minute level. Adjustments like fine-tuning the sidebar, rearranging the headers, and customizing your plugin post types are refreshingly easy to make and translate across devices, whether the customer is viewing your site from a laptop, tablet, or mobile phone.
Sydney
This is another theme designed with business sites in mind. While this theme offers most of the expected business-oriented features, the fluid layout design is the reason this theme is so popular. It seamlessly preserves your site’s look across devices, and though it is designed to a business site, it can be easily customized for any site type. The parallax scrolling features is something you often only see in premium themes.
Pixova Lite
If you’re looking for something small and simple, Pixova Lite is a one-page theme that still looks sleek and professional. Though it has a relatively simple design, it comes with options to set widgets, change sections displays, add logos, and other enhancements that greatly expand the site’s look and functionality.
Corporate Plus
This theme is specifically designed for corporate websites or professional freelancing platforms in mind. It comes with both single and multiple page layouts and offers premade pages for portfolio, about me, services, image slider, and other business-related features. If you want to attach a separate blog page to your professional website, this theme has an option for that as well.