Why Use Paid Themes?

A quick search in the “Install Themes” section of the WordPress Dashboard reveals 1,358 free themes ready to instantly be downloaded and displayed on your website. That’s right. Free.

Why, then, would I urge you to shell out hard-earned cash for a theme for anything except a personal blog?

Quality: there are some beautiful free themes out there. However, the disadvantage with anyone being able to add a theme is… anyone can add a theme. Some look bad. Some may look ok to one person, but may seem unprofessional when viewed by your customers. And of course, that’s just the appearance. Did the designer code the theme well? Did they test it in a wide variety of web browsers and mobile devices? Probably not.

Attribution: typically, a free theme will tell you that to use it, you must leave credit (usually in the footer of the site) to the person or company that made the theme. While that is certainly a very small price to pay for a free, attractive theme, it doesn’t look professional (for the same reason, I do believe your web designer should not have credit in your footer!).

Support: when it comes to professional tools, support can be more important than the original cost of the tool. Is it worth saving a few dollars on some tool if it has more problems and you have no help to get it running again? If you are getting valuable business through your website and something breaks, you want to be able to go to someone who can and will fix it. (Of course, not all paid themes come with professional support, so make sure to look for that.)

Time: in general, a paid theme requires less testing, less alteration and less bugfixing than a free theme. Hours of extra work versus a few bucks for a paid theme? The choice is easy.

I personally use ElegantThemes (disclosure: I am an affiliate), but no matter what themes you decide to go with, make sure they provide the quality and support you need, for a fair price.