As I've already mentioned multiple times in this chapter and the previous chapters, nowadays, WordPress is perfectly capable of running any kind of website, and this situation is reflected in the number of available themes. Therefore, the first question to answer is: what do you need the theme for?
Depending on the kind of site you're planning to launch, you should focus on different types of themes. The following are some of the popular possibilities:
- Traditional blogs: These are the ones where the content is presented in a reverse chronological order, with only several pages of static content.
- Photo blogs: These are very much like traditional blogs when it comes to content organization, but in this case, the content consists mainly of photos. This is a popular type of blog among photographers and other creative individuals.
- Video blogs: These are much like photo blogs, except now we're dealing with videos.
- Small business websites and corporate websites: Most small business sites don't feature a lot of posts like traditional blogs. They usually focus on static pages for providing the most important information about the business (such as contact data and offers). This type is most commonly used by local businesses such as restaurants, cafes, hotels, and other similar businesses. Corporate sites are very similar in nature, but are much bigger and feature much more content.
- One-page micro-websites: Some people know very well that they need only a minimal online presence, effectively treating their new website as a modern business card. In this case, a solution like a one-page site is perfect for them. In short, one-page sites are just what they sound like; they consist of only a single page. However, due to clever design and structure of that page, the visitor can still get a rich experience browsing it.
- Online magazines: The main difference between traditional blogs and online magazines is that the latter feature a lot more content, with usually as many as ten or more posts being published every day. This requires good content layout and clear presentation.
- E-commerce stores: Traditionally known as online stores or shops, an e-commerce store is every website that offers a shopping cart functionality and allows its visitors to buy products, much like they'd do in a traditional store or supermarket.
- Software/app websites: These are websites that are devoted to promoting/selling a specific product. Nowadays, it's usually some kind of app or other piece of mobile software.
The trick when choosing a theme for your site is to understand its purpose and make your decision based not only on the appearance of the theme, but also on the thing you need the theme for, such as its capabilities, as well as options for further customization. The easiest way to do this is to pay attention to the categories of themes on the site where you're looking for them. For instance, if you go to one of the popular theme stores, such as the ones at https://themeisle.com/wordpress-themes/ or https://themeforest.net/category/wordpress, you'll see that they feature mechanisms for filtering themes by purpose. Here's how ThemeForest does this:
You can also do some research on the internet and notice what the standard is when it comes to the themes being used in your niche and for your type of site. For example, if you're thinking of launching a photo blog, find out what sort of themes other photo blogs use—do they feature a lot of sidebars? How big are the photos they publish? Are there a lot of static pages? And so on. The idea is this: don't reinvent the wheel. If there's a significant number of sites that are similar to the one you're planning to launch, then you should always try learning from them and then making an educated decision when choosing your theme.