59 Best Free WordPress Blog Themes for 2025 (Expert Picks)

Finding a great free WordPress theme can feel like searching through a massive clearance sale. There are hundreds of options, but not every free theme is actually worth your time.

That’s why we actively test themes ourselves here at WPBeginner. We’ve sorted through the clutter to find the real gems that work as promised.

Out of all the free blog themes we tested, Sydney is our personal favorite. We love how many design options you get right out of the box, and it’s a fantastic choice for bloggers of all levels.

But your ideal blog theme might be different from ours because every website has unique needs. A food blogger might want a clean, minimalist design, while a news site needs space for featured images and headlines.

That’s why we didn’t stop at just one theme. We’ve found the best free WordPress blog themes for all kinds of websites, testing each one thoroughly so you don’t have to.

Keep reading to find the perfect free blog theme for your WordPress site!

In a hurry? No worries! Check out our top picks for the best free WordPress blog themes.

How We Test And Review Free WordPress Blog Themes

Ever notice how theme demos look perfect until you try them yourself?

That’s because there’s so much more to a WordPress theme than what you see at first glance. Think of them as blueprints or WordPress blog templates for your site.

Each one comes with its own mix of elements – from layouts and backgrounds to headers and navigation menus. But the real test isn’t just how they look – it’s how well they actually work.

We don’t just take screenshots at face value. Instead, we get our hands dirty.

We install each theme on our test site and put it through its paces. Think of it as a test drive before you buy (even though these themes are free!).

We check everything from the layout and design to the nitty-gritty features, so you don’t have to waste your time.

Here’s exactly what we looked for when testing these free WordPress blog themes:

• 🎯 User-friendly layout – A user-friendly layout helps visitors read your blog posts and navigate through your blog easily.
• 📱 Responsiveness – A fully responsive theme makes your blog look great on all screen sizes and devices. We also call this being ‘mobile-friendly.’
• 🎨 Customization – The theme should be customizable using the WordPress editor and any page builder. This way, you can edit fonts, colors, backgrounds, and other details of your WordPress blog.
• ⚡ Speed – The theme should be fast and not affect the page loading time on your site. This way, your site can be fast and SEO-friendly.
• ⭐ User reviews – Even though we spend a significant amount of time testing, we also make sure to see what other users are saying. We only considered themes that are popular and highly rated by real WordPress users.
• ✅ Only WordPress.org themes – We only choose themes that are available on WordPress.org. That means that every single theme included here meets the high standard set by the official WordPress theme review team.

We considered all these factors when selecting the best WordPress blog themes so you can easily set up your blog and get online right away.

Now, here’s our comprehensive list of WordPress blog themes (free)!

1. Sydney

Sydney is an impressive WordPress blog theme, offering a balance of customization and ease of use. If you want a free theme that makes your blog look professional without being complicated to use, Sydney is our top pick.

Want to read more details? Check out our complete aThemes Sydney review!

Sydney is highly flexible and can be used for virtually any type of blog, from food and fashion to business and beyond.

It gives you 6 different blog layouts, plus a fullscreen slider, the option to upload your logo, set your header image, use a sticky navigation menu, and more. It’s also compatible with drag-and-drop page builders, particularly Elementor.

In addition, we really liked how Sydney is lightweight and loads super fast, which is important for keeping readers on your site.

While the free version of Sydney has everything you need, Sydney Pro comes with even more powerful blogging features. These include a reading progress bar, featured posts, social sharing, and more.

2. Neve

Neve is a lightweight WordPress blog theme. It’s perfect for anyone who wants a fast-loading site without compromising on style and features.

We’ve used Neve on several projects, and we’re always impressed by how quickly you can get a site up and running. The free version of Neve is perfect for small businesses, bloggers, and even online stores.

It also comes with tons of starter sites that work great for personal blogs, portfolios, business blogs, and eCommerce websites. You can choose a starter site and import it in a few clicks.

Plus, the free Neve theme has a minimalist layout with beautiful colors and typography. Some of its features include navigation menus, a search bar, social sharing buttons, and a featured content slider.

You can also easily customize Neve. It’s compatible with popular page builder plugins like Elementor Pro, Divi, and Beaver Builder.

3. OceanWP

OceanWP is an incredible free WordPress blog theme. Our team used it on countless projects, and it constantly amazed us with how much it offers. It’s like having a premium theme without the price tag, literally.

If you’re a fan of page builders like Elementor Pro or Beaver Builder, OceanWP should be your top pick. It integrates seamlessly with these popular tools, giving you ultimate control over your design.

One of our team members recently built an eCommerce site using OceanWP and Elementor, and the combination was unstoppable.

But even if you prefer the simplicity of the block editor, OceanWP has you covered. It works beautifully with Gutenberg, allowing you to create custom layouts and designs with ease.

Plus, it has built-in support for WooCommerce, making it a no-brainer for anyone looking to sell products online. And with unlimited modal forms and pop-up windows, you can capture leads and promote special offers like a pro.

OceanWP can be used for any WordPress blog or website, including portfolios, magazines, news sites, and professional business websites.

Additionally, it includes multiple layout choices, full-width pages, navigation menus on the top, custom logo support, multiple sidebar areas, beautiful image galleries, and more. We love that OceanWP is a powerful theme, but still very easy to set up.

4. GeneratePress

GeneratePress is an excellent free WordPress blog theme built for performance. We’ve seen firsthand how it can boost site speed. Plus, it plays nicely with the block editor and all your favorite page builders.

When we installed GeneratePress, we noticed that the theme added super small-sized pages, meaning the page load time is extremely quick.

Plus, the theme is fully compatible with eCommerce plugins like WooCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads. That means you can use it to sell your physical and digital products easily.

It’s translated into over two dozen languages. We also liked that the theme comes with color controls, dynamic typography, multiple navigation areas, sidebar layouts, and widget areas.

GeneratePress provides a solid foundation for any type of website, personal blog, or online store. The free version of GeneratePress is enough for you to get started.

5. Kadence

Kadence WP is another of our top choices when it comes to free WordPress blog themes. It’s packed with features you’d normally find in professional and expensive themes.

We were particularly impressed with its AI features, which make designing your site a breeze.

In the free version, Kadence comes with tons of custom layout options. You can access them using the WordPress theme customizer.

We also liked that no additional plugins or complex setups are required to start using Kadence. By using Kadence Blocks, you can even eliminate the need for a third-party landing page builder completely.

6. Blocksy

Blocksy is a solid WordPress blog theme. It impressed us with how well it works with the WordPress block editor.

Plus, it’s packed with features for building any kind of site, from blogs to online stores.

It also works perfectly with popular page builder plugins like Elementor and also has full WooCommerce integration.

There’s a built-in lazy loading system to keep your site as fast as possible. Even better, Blocksy will look great on all screen sizes and devices with its retina-ready feature.

7. SiteOrigin Unwind

SiteOrigin Unwind is a minimalist and free WordPress blog theme. If you’re looking for a stylish theme to set up your WordPress blog, you’ll really like this theme.

We also like their built-in SiteOrigin Page Builder plugin, which eliminates the need for a third-party drag-and-drop builder. It comes with multiple page layouts, custom headers, backgrounds, and color support.

SiteOrigin Unwind has full WooCommerce support in the free theme, so you can easily set up an online store. Our team used it for a few projects, and it’s always a solid choice.

8. Hestia

Hestia is a highly flexible and responsive theme for all types of websites.

What we really liked about Hestia is that it is best for building a 1-page site. That means if you’re running a blog and want to customize just the homepage, Hestia will be an ideal fit.

During our testing, we discovered that their easy setup wizard lets you explore the features quickly.

In case you need more options, you can install the free OrbitFox plugin, which seamlessly works with all the Themeisle themes, including Hestia.

It can be used with popular page builder plugins and is ready for WooCommerce out of the box. The homepage can be easily set up using the live theme customizer. You can just add sections and rearrange them with drag and drop.

9. Astra

Astra is a fully customizable and free WordPress blog theme.

It comes with built-in support for WooCommerce to easily add an online store to your blog if needed. It’s also translation-ready and can be used to make blogs in any language.

For more details, see our complete review of the Astra WordPress theme.

Astra is a lightweight theme with tons of color options. It has all Google fonts built in. You can find the theme options, such as logo upload, in the WordPress live customizer.

10. Hueman

Hueman is a popular choice for a reason. It’s one of the best free WordPress blog themes that’s perfect for content-heavy websites.

If you’re running a magazine-style blog or a news site, Hueman gives you plenty of space to showcase your articles. We especially like the multi-column layout options, which make it easy to create a visually appealing homepage.

You have tons of control over the layout. Want a three-column design? No problem. Prefer a full-width layout? Hueman can do that too. Plus, you can customize the headers, colors, and other design elements to match your brand.

And of course, it’s a fully responsive and mobile-friendly theme, so your site will look great on any device. We know for a fact that one of our team members used Hueman for a news website, and it handled their high volume of content beautifully.

11. Poseidon

Poseidon is a free multipurpose theme. It has a spacious layout, a full-width slider, a homepage layout, and multiple page templates.

The homepage layout can be easily set up using widgets. It’s a great theme for blogging and could also work well for a magazine-style website.

12. Maxwell

Maxwell is a minimalistic and elegant WordPress theme. It features a clean magazine-style layout with beautiful typography.

Maxwell also offers various post layouts, the ability to customize colors, and a gorgeous featured posts slideshow.

13. Inspiro

Inspiro is a free theme suitable for personal WordPress websites and adventure and travel blogs. It features a background image at the top with bold welcome text and a call-to-action button.

It also comes with multiple WordPress blog templates and custom widgets, among many other features.

14. Extendable

Extendable is a bit of a hidden gem in the world of free WordPress blog themes. If you’re looking for a blog theme that lets you customize every nook and cranny without writing a single line of code, Extendable might be just what you’re looking for.

The theme lets you change the colors, fonts, layout, and other design elements to perfectly match your brand. And the best part? You don’t need any coding skills to do it.

One thing we particularly appreciate about Extendable is its focus on performance. It’s built to be lightweight and fast-loading, which is crucial for WordPress SEO and user experience. Plus, it’s fully responsive, so your site will look great on any device.

15. Fascinate

Fascinate is a beautiful WordPress blog theme designed specifically for professional writers, freelancers, personal portfolios, lifestyle blogs, and fashion businesses.

It uses beautiful typography, elegant color schemes, and an eye-catching featured slider. It also has custom post types, including video, audio, gallery, and quote formats.

16. Blogier

Blogier is an elegantly crafted WordPress blog theme. It’s designed with readability in mind and puts your content at the center to make it eye-catching. It could be a good option for a magazine-style blog or even a local newspaper website.

It comes with an author box on the homepage, and the posts appear in listicle format with featured images. There’s a 2-column layout that shows your content beautifully.

17. Go

Go is a blog theme with a minimalist approach to design. It’s a simple WordPress blog theme with a welcome message and call-to-action buttons in the header.

Go is designed to improve readability and offer a great user experience. It uses clean typography and handles featured images really well. Also, you can easily add a contact form using any popular contact form plugin.

18. Baskerville

Baskerville is a modern and stylish WordPress blog theme. It features a large full-width header image followed by your posts presented as a grid on the front page.

Baskerville comes with gorgeous templates for single posts and pages. It has different page templates and works seamlessly with the WordPress block editor.

19. Kubio

Kubio is a great WordPress portfolio theme with a full-screen header background. The theme layout is simple and minimal, designed for small businesses, startups, and personal websites. Plus, it comes withthe Kubio page builder that adds more styling options and features to the block editor.

The theme supports popular WordPress plugins that you need to maximize the functionality of your blog. It’s fully optimized for good WordPress SEO.

Tip: Looking for a business phone service for your blog? Check out Nextiva for a smart internet phone system. That’s what we use for our blog.

20. Ashe

Ashe is a beautiful free blog theme for WordPress. It has a magazine-style layout with a large header image and a featured content slider.

It integrates with popular page builders like Beaver Builder, Elementor, and more for easy customization.

21. Blogus

Blogus is a free WordPress blog theme. It uses a simple grey background that makes your content stand out.

It features a 2-column layout and has a clear navigation menu on top. Additionally, the homepage displays your latest posts with excerpts and featured images.

22. Tracks

Tracks is a thoughtfully designed WordPress blog theme for personal, magazine, and photography websites. It includes a logo uploader, social media icons, a search bar, widget-ready areas, and crisp typography.

The homepage features a grid layout of your posts with featured images. Your readers won’t have to do lots of scrolling to find posts they want to read.

23. Mesmerize

Mesmerize is a colorful WordPress blog theme. It is highly flexible and uses different content sections to showcase your blog content.

It supports video backgrounds, slideshow backgrounds, header content types, and a gradient overlay on the homepage. It’s also WooCommerce-ready and works well with WooCommerce plugins.

24. Colibri WP

Colibri WP is a free WordPress blog theme featuring a beautiful look. It comes with different layout options for the homepage, archives, single pages, bbPress, and BuddyPress.

It also includes a responsive, customizable fullscreen background image and multiple color schemes.

25. Phlox

Phlox is a highly customizable free WordPress blog theme. It has a beautiful homepage layout with a fullscreen header background image on top and featured content below.

It comes with multiple widget-ready areas, page templates, custom headers, backgrounds, social icons, and color schemes. Plus, it makes it easy for you to comply with GDPR.

26. Zakra

Zakra is a multipurpose WordPress theme suitable for business, personal, and magazine websites.

It is built on a powerful theme framework and features a custom background. The theme has a full-width layout and color selection, making it ideal for personal blogs.

27. Raft

Raft is a simple and clean WordPress blog theme. It features a block layout suitable for a classic personal blog.

It has a fullscreen header background with a custom logo, a navigation menu, a welcome text, and a call-to-action button to redirect users to a landing page on your site.

28. Blog Diary

Blog Diary is a multipurpose WordPress blog theme featuring a beautiful black-and-white layout. It has unlimited color choices, crisp typography, and custom widgets.

The theme fully supports the Gutenberg block editor out of the box.

29. Author

Author is a beautiful WordPress blog theme for authors and writers. It features a simple 2-column layout with a sidebar and navigation menu in the left column and content on the right.

It supports custom colors, backgrounds, and multiple post formats. It is optimized for accessibility, speed, and performance.

30. Blogvi

Blogvi is a modern WordPress blogging theme that can be easily used as a business website as well. It features clean, crisp typography with a bright, breezy layout.

It gives you lots of customization options. You can change your header, logo, colors, background, and much more. You can also easily add social media links.

31. BlogArise

BlogArise is a modern and stylish WordPress theme suitable for magazines, business, personal, and portfolio websites. It features a 2-column layout with custom ad space on the homepage.

It includes features like sticky headers, author bio boxes, multiple widget areas, and page templates. The theme options can be easily set up using drag and drop in the live customizer.

32. Spectra One

Spectra One is a simple WordPress blogging theme. It uses large featured images and supports custom headers and backgrounds.

It comes with single-column and multi-column layouts and easy customization options. You can make a fully functional website and a separate blog page.

33. Responsive

Responsive is a beautiful WordPress theme designed for flexibility. It is suitable for authors, personal websites, photography, and even business websites.

It comes with page templates, widget areas, template layouts, menu positions, and more. Furthermore, Responsive is WooCommerce-compatible, multilingual-ready, and supports all RTL languages.

34. Virtue

Virtue is a beautiful and free WordPress blog theme. It has a clean layout with navigation menus and a large full-width header image. It supports wide and full-width blocks in the visual editor and works with useful blocks plugins.

All the theme options are easy to change using the live theme customizer. Virtue also comes with multiple post formats, including video, gallery, audio, chat, aside, and quotes.

35. Ignite

Ignite is a stylish free WordPress theme featuring a classic blog look. It comes with a 2-column layout, plus a compact top bar used for navigation menus, the site title, and a description.

It uses medium-sized featured images before post titles and uses crisp typography for a better reading experience on your blog.

36. The Minimal Blogger

The Minimal Blogger is a highly customizable WordPress theme for blogs, personal websites, and small business websites. It would look great for any type of blog, be it a personal blog or a food blog.

The theme features a full-width layout on the homepage and comes with different page templates. It also has support for WooCommerce, multiple widget-ready areas, and several post formats.

37. Blogmate

Blogmate is a modern WordPress blog theme with a 2-column layout. It comes with a simple navigation menu, custom logo, white background, and author profile.

All the theme options are simple to set up using the live WordPress customizer.

38. Avant

Avant is a highly customizable and free WordPress theme suitable for all kinds of websites. It is ready for eCommerce with full WooCommerce support and can be easily used to create content-rich websites as well.

It includes header layouts, blog layouts, footer layouts, unlimited color choices, and lots more settings, all built into the WordPress customizer. It is tested to work with all popular page builders and other essential WordPress plugins.

39. Total

Total is a fully responsive WordPress theme designed with a mobile-first approach. It looks equally great on all mobile devices, computers, and screen sizes. It’s also a good choice for business websites.

This theme features page templates, meaning you can easily create great-looking pages with a responsive layout. There are also widget areas, template layouts, menu positions, plus a call to action button. It’s very easy to use and can be quickly set up.

40. Vogue

Vogue is a stylish WordPress theme designed specifically for fashion, lifestyle, and eCommerce websites. It comes with full WooCommerce support and allows you to set up an online store easily.

It offers multiple header layouts, custom WooCommerce designs, multiple footer layouts, multiple blog layouts, and lots of extra layout customization. It also has unlimited color settings within the WordPress customizer.

☝ Related Post: Best WordPress Themes for Fashion Blogs

41. Magbook

Magbook is a beautifully designed WordPress theme for content-rich websites, including magazines, newspapers, blogs, and more. It features a clean, minimalist design with multiple layout choices and a quick 1-click demo installer.

It comes with ready-to-use templates for contact us, gallery, and magazine pages. Magbook can also be used to create an online store or a multilingual WordPress site. It’s tested with all popular WordPress plugins.

42. Panoramic

Panoramic is another excellent free WordPress theme suitable for all kinds of blogs, websites, and online stores. It comes with flexible customization options and a beautiful homepage slider.

Panoramic is very easy to use, even for absolute beginners. You can find the theme options in the live customizer. It also works seamlessly with WPForms, the most popular contact form plugin.

43. Conica

Conica is a super-flexible WordPress multipurpose theme that can be used to build almost any kind of website. It’s a particularly good option for an eCommerce site or another money-making website.

It includes site layouts, color schemes, header layouts, blog layouts, footer layouts, multiple page templates, and a bunch of theme options to customize your colors and layouts.

44. CityLogic

CityLogic is a premium-like free WordPress theme suitable for all kinds of sites, including small business websites. It features a modern design with a large header on the homepage, a transparent navigation menu, a welcome message, and your most important content.

It also comes with a built-in slider and can be used with other slide plugins as well. It is WooCommerce-ready and can be used to create beautiful online stores.

45. Extendable

Extendable is a clean and minimal free WordPress theme suitable for all kinds of websites. It is super-flexible and comes with simple theme options, allowing you to quickly set it up.

It has several layout designs and styles to match your needs. The theme offers a responsive design and a minimalist layout for small businesses.

46. BlogHash

BlogHash is a lightning-fast WordPress theme with a modern layout. It works out of the box and has very easy-to-use theme options. It’s basically designed for newspapers, bloggers, and magazines.

It lets you display top stories in a ticker that runs just below the main header. You get a section to display an author bio on the right side with other widgets. BlogHash is compatible with popular plugins like WPML for translation.

47. Ascend

Ascend is a beautiful WordPress multipurpose theme. It fully supports the WordPress block editor, plus all popular page builder plugins.

Inside, you will find lots of useful options in the theme customizer. Ascend also includes a transparent header, multiple navigation menus, sidebars, color options, and more.

48. Simple Nova

Simple Nova is a simple WordPress blog theme with a focus on beautiful typography and content. It comes with a custom background, custom colors, a custom header, and sidebar options.

The theme has a single navigation menu on top and a beautiful front page design that shows your posts with custom excerpts and featured images.

49. The Writers Blog

The Writers Blog is a free multipurpose WordPress theme designed specifically for writers, bloggers, journalists, authors, and content-rich blogs. It comes with an image slider that helps your site make a great first impression.

The Writers Blog is easy to set up and allows you to select a color scheme of your choice. It’s a responsive and fully customizable WordPress theme. You could even use it to create an online resume.

50. BlogStart

BlogStart is free to download with a clean and simple layout. It’s a great option if you are new to blogging and want to get started quickly.

BlogStart lets you display featured posts alongside the navigation menu. It’s optimized for website speed and performance.

51. Creativ Blog

Creativ Blog is a modern, free WordPress blog theme. It has a full-width boxed frame layout for the header with an image slider, navigation menu, search bar, and social menu.

This theme features a custom logo in the middle of the header section. It also has blurbs for landing pages on the homepage. Creativ is fully compatible with both the block editor and the classic editor in WordPress.

52. Newsmatic

Newsmatic is a free blog theme for WordPress. It’s a good choice for an online magazine, personal blog, news, or portfolio site. It has latest news and popular news section for you to add content and excerpts in the sidebars.

The theme offers a centralized layout to post your content. Plus, it is fully responsive and translation-ready to create a multilingual website.

53. Queens Magazine

Queens Magazine is a user-friendly, free WordPress blog theme built for bloggers and online magazines. It has a lot of space for your content. With the 4-column layout, you can display multiple featured posts upfront.

It comes with custom settings for your logo and tagline. The Queens Magazine theme offers multiple sidebars and footers, so you have lots of options for your site’s layout.

54. Bloglo

Bloglo is a clean and responsive WordPress blog theme. It has a custom logo with a full-width layout.

The theme has a 2-column layout to display featured posts. You can use any WordPress widget in the sidebar. It is SEO-optimized and supports WPML for translations.

55. Freshblog Newsfeed

Freshblog Newsfeed is a beautiful free blog theme for WordPress. It is fully customizable with lots of options for blog layout and landing pages.

You can add a fullscreen background image and categories on the homepage. The theme has beautiful colors and design features for your entire blog.

56. Vantage

Vantage is a stylish, free WordPress blog theme for personal websites and all types of bloggers. It has stunning typography and a striking design.

It offers a space to add users on the homepage. Vantage is a fully responsive and search engine-friendly theme.

57. Bold Photography

Bold Photography is a modern and free blog theme for photographers, writers, and authors. The homepage has a fullscreen background image slider that you can replace with your most popular or featured photos.

It has custom widgets, color choices, parallax sections, and more. Bold Photography has a fast page load time and lazy load images to keep it as fast as possible. You can also use any popular caching plugin with it to speed up your website further.

58. Headstone Blog

Headstone Blog is a lightweight, free WordPress blog theme. This theme can also be used to create small business websites and online stores.

The theme features custom widgets and a beautiful featured post section. It also has space to put advertising, such as Google AdSense. It is easy to use and optimized for SEO.

59. Memory

Memory is a trendy, free WordPress theme with a youthful vibe. It’s SEO-friendly and lightweight, so it won’t impact your WordPress site’s speed.

Additionally, it’s designed to be easy and straightforward to use, even if you are new to blogging. It also includes a featured image slider.

Best WordPress Blogging Statistics and Facts

Are you curious about the current state of the WordPress blogging world? Check out these informative articles:

• Is Blogging Dead? (Our Expert Opinion)
• Why Blog? Benefits of Blogging
• A History of Blogging (1993 – Present Day Timeline)
• Blogging Statistics, Trends & Data – Ultimate List (UPDATED)
• Best Blogging Niche – That Will Make Money (Easily)
• Proven Ways to Make Money Online Blogging with WordPress

Best WordPress Guides for Bloggers

Looking for more help launching your WordPress blog? Check out our essential beginner’s guides:

• Must Have WordPress Plugins for Business Websites
• How to Start a Video Blog (Vlog) And Make Money
• How to Auto-Schedule Your WordPress Blog Posts
• Best Blog Name Generators to Help You Find Good Blog Name Ideas
• How to Find Royalty Free Images for Your WordPress Blog Posts
• How to Add Simple and Elegant Footnotes in Your WordPress Blog Posts

We hope this article helped you find the best WordPress blog themes for free!

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