Best WordPress Themes

You're viewing themes tagged: free.

Lap of Luxury

Lap of Luxury is a stylish two-column WordPress blogging theme with a bit of bling courtesy of its gold logo.

I’m not a fan of the spotty background, which makes reading a little harder than it should be, but it would be extremely simple to change the background to a flat colour, which would make the text very legible.

The right-hand sidebar allows for an ad at the top, with two columns of navigation below that.

The headlines are big and eye-catching, and the theme works very well with large photos used to accompany each post.

Lap of Luxury WordPress Theme

Demo and download

View the theme demo

More info and download

DePo Square

DePo Square is a beautiful, simple WordPress theme that provides Tumblr-like capacity to post photos and videos in the stream of your posts.

Designed by well-known web identity Derek Powazek, DePo Square is a minimalist-looking theme with elegant typography and effective functionality.

To use the theme ala Tumblr, you simply map your categories so as to allow you to use five pre-defined post types — Post (default), Status, Quote, Link, or Photo — and your content will be displayed in a format special to those types.

Just select your category mappings by visiting the “Current Theme Options” under “Appearance.” No CSS or other formatting is necessary.

The theme also has a neat widget space in the top header, allowing site owners to mix navigation with updates from Twitter and Flickr.

DePo Square WordPress Theme

Demo and download

View the theme demo

Download DePo Square

Charlene

Charlene is a minimalist two-column WordPress theme that uses white space beautifully to provide a crisp, attractive appearance that makes your content sing.

The theme offers large, clear headlines, a beautifully set out sidebar and stunning typography.

Charlene WordPress Theme

Demo and download

View the demo and download the free Charlene theme via Paper Tree Design.

Leviathan

Leviathan is a strong, simple, two-column WordPress blogging theme that works well on sites offering long posts and large images.

Leviathan is coded as a child theme of the Hybrid theme framework, meaning you’ll need to have both Hybrid and Leviathan uploaded to make it work (both are free).

The blue and white design gives your content plenty of breathing space, while providing clear navigation underneath the banner and allowing flexibility with a well-spaced second column on the right of screen.

The creators of Leviathan and Hybrid offer $US25 a year memberships providing access to tutorials and support for their themes.

Leviathan WordPress Theme

Demo and download

View a demo of Leviathan

Download the Leviathan theme.

The Seven Five

The Seven Five is a minimalist and semi-automatic ‘lifestream’ WordPress theme that allows you to integrate updates from multiple web services into your own homepage.

“This theme is intended for those looking for a simple, efficient and clean solution for integrating all the services you have come to love such as Twitter, Flickr and more,” the theme author says.

The Seven Five theme also provides all the usual blogging functionality of a typical WordPress theme.

The current release is compatible with Twitter, Flickr, Delicious and external RSS feeds.

Seven Five WordPress Theme

Demo and download

View demo of The Seven Five theme.

Download The Seven Five theme.

I Like Content

I Like Content is a simple, elegant and clean weblog theme that, as the name suggests, makes your content the sole focus of your site.

It’s a two-column theme that’s set up to showcase blog posts, large images, widescreen HD video and more, with a narrow second column for navigation.

Features include:

  • Widgetised sidebar;
  • Gravatar ready;
  • Beautiful typography;
  • Cross-browser compatibility.

I Like Content WordPress Theme

Download

More info and download

Work-A-Holic

Work-A-Holic is a stunning, clean portfolio WordPress theme allowing businesses or freelancers to showcase their work in style.

The theme also offers a blog component, and would work well as a site layout for artists, web designers, photographers and illustrators.

Among its features are:

  • Separate blog and portfolio sections;
  • Portfolio pulls latest thumbnail of the post and lists each of them on three columns;
  • Multiple image gallery container (slider) on portfolio posts;
  • Integrated theme options page for customisation;
  • Twitter integrated – shows latest Tweet
  • Separate sidebar on Portfolio and normal sidebar on Blog;
  • Three footer widgets.

Work-A-Holic WordPress Theme

Cost

Work-A-Holic comes in both free and paid versions, with the pro version offering extra customisation options and more dedicated support.

The Pro version of the theme is available as part of a subscription package, starting from $US49 for three months.

Demo and download

Visit GraphPaperPress to view the theme demo and download.

(Note: The download link above is an affiliate link. If you buy using that link, you’ll help support bestwpthemes.com.)

Wu Wei

It’s clean, minimalist, white and free. Wu Wei offers an attractive WordPress template that’s designed according to a grid system and provides options for site owners to break out of the box with large images.

As the theme’s owner puts it: “Information is presented in a logical manner, without any superfluous elements getting in the way. Just like the Taoist concept of wu wei, it’s knowing when to act, and knowing when not to act.

Wu Wei WordPress Theme

Demo and download

View the Wu Wei theme demo

More information and download

Journic

Journic is a stunning two-column blog theme with gorgeous typography and excellent use of white space that will make viewing your blog content a pleasure.

The theme includes a built-in settings page within the WordPress admin interface, including advertising and subscription management.

The theme is very flexible thanks to its wide implementation of widgets.

The colourful brush-stroke background is eye-catching but won’t apply to all uses of the design; luckily, it’s relatively simple to remove or replace the background image.

Journic Wordpress Theme

Demo and download

View theme demo

Visit the One Theme Per Month website for more information or to download the free Journic theme.

(Note: The download link above is an affiliate link. If you buy using that link, you’ll help support bestwpthemes.com.)

WPESP Portfolio

WPESP is a free WordPress theme that makes it easy to create and update a beautiful, crisp portfolio site for web design or art of any kind.

The grey-toned and grid-based theme is customisable so site owners can make it their own.

It includes a custom write panel to edit the content and a content slider to incorporate featured items on the homepage.

WPESP Portfolio WordPress Theme

Demo and download

View a demo of the WPESP theme

Download theme and more information