The best free WordPress themes for December 2013
DevDmBootstrap3
Unlike many themes which are designed for beginners, this theme with the funny name was created for developers. DevDMBootstrap3 is for developers who are already familiar with Twitter Bootstrap and is a mobile-first theme. The sleek interface makes it easy to develop for the web even quicker.
Fresh Lite
What’s nice about Fresh Lite is that this responsive theme works using drag and drop tools, making it very easy for beginner WordPress users. The simple theme includes a slider, sidebar and touch-friendly buttons as its top features.
Fruitful
Fruitful is a simple, responsive theme that is built with a lot of options for use. It’s easy to use and style, comes with plenty of options for logos, background images, menus, social icons and a slider. Plus this theme is WooCommerce-ready. You can also customize the CSS.
Clean Black
You get exactly what you expect with Clean Black, a dark minimalist theme. The simple theme includes search, a favicon option and number paging navigation. Clean Black is fully responsive.
Codium Grid
Codium Grid is a fully responsive theme that features a super-clean look and feel. It is designed so that the user only has to think about content in the build process. It is customizable in terms of color, backgrounds and header and is widget-ready. (The Instagram widget is particularly nice.) This theme also has some great built-in search engine optimization tools to make getting online a breeze.
Delighted
Delighted is a highly customizable lightweight theme that’s made just for bloggers. One of the best options is the featured image option, which is available on main and single pages to add an element of sleekness to the overall design. Color and language options are endless with this theme.
GreenPage
GreenPage is a simple blogging theme with a sharp layered look. The theme has plenty of room for featured or thumbnail images, blog posts and sidebar and header navigation.
Shopping
While there are not a large number of free e-commerce themes out there, Shopping does offer some basic sales functionality in a free, WooCommerce-based theme. The simple theme includes plenty of room for product images, prices, ratings and sales information.
Neutro
Neutro is a responsive theme built in the super-trendy flat design style. What makes this theme unique is that it includes a touch-ready content slider, which is perfect for mobile and tablet devices. Neutro is designed with photos in mind as well with a nice display space. You can customize the theme’s CSS and a variety of other features as well.
OneColumn
Simple and mobile-friendly are the key highlights of OneColumn. The basic theme includes some customization options but nothing fancy. As the name implies, it is designed with a single column for blogging and has room for images, search and recent posts. While this theme might not have enough goodies for more seasoned users, it is perfect for beginners.
WP Jurist
While WP Jurist is marketed to legal firms, this fully responsive theme could work for a variety of business types. The design is simple and bold. It includes a slider, widgets and a separate blog template with the option to add author bios. Plus, WP Jurist includes a large number of customization options to help make the theme your own.
ZeeMinty
This lightweight business-oriented theme features a large header image to attract users. The card-style theme is responsive and has plenty of room to customize it from color to type to different sidebar options.
Hannari
Hannari is a simple business-oriented theme with a simple design and plenty of bonuses for a free theme. The responsive theme includes tools such as a site map, SEO optimization, a contact form and email newsletter integration. Hannari also includes social media widgets and a variety of customization options so that you can use the theme without worrying that your site will look too much like someone else’s.
Writr
Look like a pro blogger with Writr, a responsive theme in the flat design style that is simply beautiful. The theme looks great on a variety of devices and has extras that are often only associated with premium themes. Some of the best bonuses are the custom header, background and gravatar options and post format icons. Writr also includes an infinite scroll, multiple column width options and different sidebar options. The theme is social-media ready as well (with another set of nifty icons) and includes six color palette options.
Hueman
If a magazine-style theme is your thing, Hueman is a simple theme with a focus on strong visuals. The fully responsive design is modeled in the flat style and is set up for use with high resolution images. This theme makes for a great platform for storytelling or a portfolio.
Modern Real Estate
Modern Real Estate targets real-estate professionals with a plugin that allows for the addition of agent profiles, property listings and customer testimonials. The almost-flat responsive theme has a simple look but can be customized in a variety of ways.
White Paper
White Paper is a super-light blogging theme. The minimal design is designed to showcase simple text and photo content without a lot of bells and whistles. The theme is responsive and incredibly easy to use, making it a simple choice for first-time bloggers.
Mountain Creek
This simple dark theme is designed for showcasing photographs and slideshows. The responsive theme includes a nice sidebar option and plenty of social media icons and tools. The rustic background makes this a perfect fit for sites related to nature or the outdoors. The theme allows for customization as well and includes both Facebook and Twitter integration.
ProMax
This responsive magazine-style theme includes a ton of widgets that make it easy to connect to social media. But the biggest bonus that comes with ProMax is built-in connectivity to Google AdSense and placements for common advertising sizes. The ad-ready features are easy to use and great for a blogger looking to jump into the world of blog revenue generation. ProMax includes a variety of customization options as well, from color to background and customer header and favicon.
Time Turner
Time Turner is designed for designers who still want to work in the skeuomorphic style. The theme features simple textures, shadows and design tricks throughout. The portfolio theme is responsive and offers plenty of great photo and image display spaces. It includes five color options, slider, calendar and search features.
The Newswire
This fully responsive theme is designed for sites that have a focus on news-style content. One of the best features of The Newswire is the large slider. The theme also includes “sticky posts,” multiple navigation options and plenty of color and font customization.
WiziApp
While most of the WordPress themes featured here are for desktop devices or feature responsive templates, WiziApp is designed just for mobile devices. The theme has showcases an app experience for mobile web users and features touch controls for small screens with iPhone, Android and WP8 compatibility. The vertically-based theme includes space for a header image and single column of posts.