wordpress thesis skins

The Art of WordPress Theme Design

S ince 2006, I’ve been on a mission to improve and perfect the WordPress theming process. This journey continues today with my two flagship projects— Thesis , which is a WordPress Theme engine, and Focus , which is a Thesis Skin.

What’s a Thesis Skin, you ask? Well…

With traditional WordPress Themes, the designer must consider far too many technical things like standardized HTML markup, SEO concerns, and WordPress and Plugin compatibilities.

Thesis Skins eliminate the need for website owners, designers, and developers to consider hardcore technical stuff.

Even better, they open the door to amazing new possibilities thanks to a deep WordPress integration and a powerful API that makes it easy to do anything with your website.

Below you’ll find the original introductory articles to my WordPress Themes. For current information on Thesis and Focus , please check out my business website, DIYthemes .

• 📖 Cutline and PressRow Removed from WordPress.com
• 📖 Thesis Theme for WordPress
• 📖 The Neoclassical 3-Column Theme for WordPress
• 📖 Copyblogger Theme for WordPress
• 📖 Cutline Theme for WordPress
• 📖 PressRow Theme for WordPress

© Chris Pearson 2005-2024. All rights reserved.

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• Theme Development

An Introduction to Thesis: Skins & Layout Structure

So far in this series we've covered the building blocks of Thesis and how to manage your site's settings, but now we want to move toward building your website's overall structure and appearance, or "Skin" as it's referred to in the Thesis Framework. To do this, we’re going to be spending most of our time inside the Thesis Skin Editor.

To get started, you will need:

• A code editor of some sort (Notepad, Sublime Text, etc...)
• Basic HTML, CSS, and PHP knowledge

1. Using a Blank Skin

Thesis 2.0 comes stock with two pre-built skins, Thesis Classic and Thesis Blank. Some people prefer to build off of Thesis Classic as it already comes stock with several layout combinations, but for those wanting a more "customized" look might opt to go with Thesis Blank, which is essentially a completely blank skin, void of custom functions, styles, hooks, etc.

For the purpose of this tutorial, we're going to build from the Thesis Blank skin that is included in the Thesis Framework, and create a very basic 2-column home page that includes a query for recent posts and a sidebar. Once you get the hang of building templates and working with the Thesis Query Box you will see how easy it becomes to build more templates to support other pages you might need in the future.

To build with the Blank Skin we first need to select it. To select the Blank Skin,

• Click on Thesis from the WordPress menu on the left
• Select "Skins"
• Find Thesis Blank and click the green "Activate Skin" button to set Thesis Blank as your skin

Once selected, go to the Skin Editor so we can begin development. You can get there by going to Thesis > Skins > Skin Editor. When you first click on the Skin Editor you'll notice that a pop up window containing your website appears, along with the Skin Editor's dashboard. This window is a "preview" screen of your website. You can refresh this screen throughout your development to see how things are taking shape.

Now that we're in the Skin Editor, we need to click on HTML from the top (it should default to the HTML section, but just in case, make sure you're in the right spot).

In the Blank Skin the Body box should be completely empty. This location is where we are going to build our HTML structure. Let's begin by building our home page structure.

2. Creating Boxes for HTML Structure

To build each "container" or "element" on our page we are going to use boxes. In the Skin Editor you will see a few pre-built boxes, as well as a section to "Add Boxes" just below it on the right of your screen. We will be adding boxes to build out our structure.

Thesis comes with nine pre-built options to choose from.

• WP Nav Menu
• Comments Form

For the structure of our website, we'll be focusing mostly on creating "Container" boxes. Our structure will go something like this:

To create each box, follow these steps:

• Find the "Add Boxes" section on the right of the Skin Editor dashboard
• Select "Container" from the drop down list
• Name your box
• Hold "Shift" and drag the created box over to the left, arranging them in the same order as the image above. (To add containers inside of another container, simply drag the box over to the container. When the container you want to dump into is highlighted, release the box.

Once you've got the structure laid out, we need to assign either a class or ID with each element of our structure.

3. Assign CSS Selectors

Assigning a class or id to a box element is done by simply hovering over the box, and clicking on the gear icon that appears (very similar to updating your site settings). When the gear icon is clicked you are prompted to fill out some options:

• HTML Tag You can select what type of box this will be, for our skin these will all be "div" tags, but you can also choose from several others.
• HTML ID For boxes that we will only be needing once, like the wrapper and container boxes
• HTML Class For boxes that we will be using over again

It's important to remember which classes you named each element, because you will need that information when we get ready to style each box.

Below are the following structural CSS selectors used for this particular skin's home page:

• wrapper - #wrapper
• container - #container
• header - #header
• Site Title - #site_title (Thesis generated id)
• Site Tagline - #site_tagline (Thesis generated id)
• navigation - #menu-primary
• main content - .main_content
• left column - .column_1
• right column - .column_2
• sidebar - .sidebar
• widget - .widget
• footer - #footer

4. Creating Additional Templates

Next we need to add a few more "templates" to get everything functioning properly on our skin. We still need to create a page template and a single post template. Because we want to keep the same general layout for each page, we can use the build in Thesis copy template function to copy the elements of the home page and apply them to our other templates.

To create another template for our individual post pages, follow these steps:

• Click on "HTML" from the top for the Skin Editor
• Click on "Home" button to reveal a dropdown menu of choices
• Select "Single" from the Core Template list
• Click on the "Single" button to reveal the same dropdown menu as before
• Select "Home" from the Copy from Template dropdown
• Click "Copy Template"
• A prompt warning will pop up, click "OK"

This process will copy your template information over to a new template. Next we need to swap out our recent posts for the individual post/page information. To do this, follow these steps:

• Expand each box in the page structure until you get to the column containing your "Recent Posts" and shift + drag that box over to the right.
• Create a new box and label it post (or whatever you want)
• Select the post elements you'd like to appear on your individual post page (be sure to provide class selectors where possible so you can customize the style as you see fit).
• Save your template

We will repeat the same process to create our interior page template, however instead of copying the Home template, we will copy the single template considering we only need to retrieve the same type content (i.e. the title, content, etc).

For archive pages, be sure to place your "post" content inside of a WP_Loop box (which can be created the same way all other boxes can be created. This WP_Loop box works the same as the loop on the archive or taxonomy pages.)

So far we've created all of our structural elements contained in our Thesis Skin. Now we need to apply some style to them. In the next article, we will cover how to style your skin using the CSS section for the Skin Editor to create "Packages" for each of the CSS selectors we assigned earlier.

• Skip to primary navigation
• Skip to main content
• Skip to primary sidebar

~ A Technology Blog ~

Thesis 2.1 Skins: Responsive Thesis Skins for Thesis Theme

Published on Dec 10th, 2013 By iShoutnet

Within just few years thesis theme framework has became very famous, probably for its power & flexibility, which allows developers to easily and quickly create wonderful websites. There are several reasons for that its search engine optimized, easy customization without coding, world-class usability, and real live people ready to help when you have questions.

The very latest version of thesis theme allows developers to easily create cool custom skins. But you don’t have to be a developer to create custom skins by using thesis theme skin editor you can create your own desire skin. But it’s not that easy. In that case you have to use ready made skins. There are several ready made latest thesis 2.1 theme skins out there to rock your site! Simply choose one of them from following skins collection and use it in your site to take it to the next level.

Here I’ve compiled only thesis skins which are compatible with thesis 2.1.4. All skins here are responsive you don’t have to worry about that. If you have any doubt about any particular skin, then you may check that particular skin by resizing your browser.

…:::| Thesis Skins by WpThesisSkins |:::…

Blo-Cer: Blog or Internet Marketer

Blo-Car is a minimalis, simple and super clean blog skin for thesis them with focus on readability & very easy to setup. It has a clean design and it comes loaded with lots of features to help you take your website to the next level. This theme is perfect choice for your personal blog, corporate blog, or creative blog and for internet marketers.

Demo & Details

Blog Ad: Blog

Blog Ad is an easy to use blog skin with flexible layout that looks great on any device big or small. Blog Ad skin is suitable for any kind of blog. This elegant skin is easy to use for very beginners, but also for advance users.

Minimalist: Blog, Internet Marketer or Multi-Purpose

Minimalist a very clean, minimal thesis theme skin with modern design. Whether you want to give your dusty old blog a new coat of paint or are drowning in a sea of posts and categories, Minimalist is here to your rescue. Simplify and present your content in a way that is accessible, logical and beautiful.

Magazine Blog Skin: News or Magazine or Blog

A cutting-edge, feature-rich premium wordpress thesis skin. By using its drag & drop builder you can have fun creating a unique homepage & easily make modifications to it; any time you wish. This minimal skin is perfect for blogs, magazine & news sites.

NewsMagazine: Minimalist, News or Magazine

NewsMagazine a brand new responsive thesis skin with minimalist design best suited for news magazine sites. It’s both fun and really easy to work with this skin. It’s fresh and gorgeous look with friendly features will make your site a standout.

Magazine Skin 1: Magazine, Blog or News

MS1 a well designed clean and stylish magazine skin for thesis theme for technology related blogs. . This skin has a attractive look with weird shapes making it a unique look for your blog. Soft color schemes that you can choose from.

Magazine Skin 2: Magazine or News

MG2 is a stylish & responsive premium thesis skin for 2.1 version for News and Magazine websites. It was built with performance-oriented code architecture and clean design to ensure viewer’s focus on the content.

Magazine Skin 3: Blog, Magazine or Internet Marketing

MS3 a clean and fully responsive skin for news & magazines. This theme is powerful with custom widgets, theme options, unlimited colors, custom sidebar, custom background and much more!

Business Skin 1: Business, Corporate or Portfolio

BS1 is a unique, modern, interactive, ultra flexible and fully responsive thesis 2 skin designed for the corporate world. BS1 is ready to assists you in blogging about company activities and portfolios. It can be used to show news, events and services to your visitors.

Business Skin 2: Business or Portfolio

BS2 is a simple, modern and impressive premium skin suitable for various business websites, portfolio presentations websites. Create your world class website with BS2 with its advanced admin panel where you can change color, font, font size, page layout, blog style, portfolio presentation, contact info, third party integration, you can control SEO settings, responsiveness and more…

Business Skin 3: Portfolio or Business

If you’re looking for useful business skin for thesis that can be easily adapted on every type of page you should definitely look into BS3. It’s a powerful and ultra-responsive skin which can perfectly serve any type of business, freelance or interactive creative sphere.

Business Skin 4: Business or Portfolio

BS4 very sleek & minimal style responsive skin for thesis theme specially designed for corporate or business purpose. It included everything that small business website will ever need. It’s an adaptive theme that looks good on Desktop, Tablets & also Mobile phones.

…:::| Thesis Skins by ThemeDy |:::…

Quik: Magazine, Blog or Internet Marketing

IF you need a beautiful, responsive and customizable thesis skin to show off your content? In that case you can use Quik skin. It’s a modern, clean, and fully responsive magazine theme skin for Thesis 2.1 with plenty of options.

Grind: Business or Portfolio

Grind is a modern, fully responsive skin for thesis wordpress theme that’s perfect for businesses and personal sites. It’s fully customizable and great design sure to impress visitors. You can easily modify stylings, colors, fonts, layouts and other aspects of the theme.

Splash: Blog or Internet Marketer

Splash gives you everything you need to set up an attractive blog in minutes. You can easily setup all of your major social links and subscriber forms from one page with ease and control. Tweak your action color & change the look of your site in one click. Splash boasts beautiful formatting in an easy to read style which is sure to go over well with your subscribers. It also rocks on mobile / tablet devices, including the iphone & ipad!

Readyfolio 2: Portfolio or Business

Readyfolio a clean, modern, flexible & super-responsive premium thesis theme skin to showcase your latest portfolio pieces or anything else you can think of. Included plenty of great options and features, the all new Readyfolio adds what you need to really get the most out of your Thesis 2.1 site. ThemeDy totally broke down and built up their popular portfolio / business theme and made it better then ever.

Blink: Designer, Photographer, Blogger or Hobbyist

Blink is a unique thesis skin that pushes the boundaries of both Genesis and Thesis theme frameworks. With its dynamic layout and creative look, Blink is perfect for any photographer, designer, blogger, or hobbyist.

Derby: Business or Portfolio

A modern responsive classic business skin for thesis. This responsive multipurpose skin can be successfully used for corporate site, blog site, portfolio and many more. Derby has everything you need to make an impact on the web.

Reactiv: Portfolio

Reactiv a great asset to any creative freelancer or agency, everything is flexible and easy to customize. With this stunning skin you can create a single-page layout, but you can always use it as a regular website with separated pages. A image slider is included so that you can create awesome sliders and slideshows.

Clip Cart: eCommerce

A beautifully designed, super flexible eCommerce theme that is suitable for any type of products. It’s designed with a fresh flat style and with a great responsive and retina-ready design. Clip Cart is the only thesis eCommerce skin that fully compatible with WooCommerce and cart66.

Line It Up: Business, Product, Service, or Portfolio

A flexible business theme best suited to showcase a product, service or portfolio. Show off your work with this easy-to-customize and fully featured thesis 2.1 theme skin . It’s smart and hand crafted environment allows you to Build outstanding websites easy and fast.

Stage 2: Photographer

Whether you’re a photographer who needs to organize and showcase photos or a freelancer who needs to put a portfolio online, Stage offers a both elegant and personal solution for everyone. Its powerful customizations options focused on showcasing your work in unique and endless ways.

…:::| Thesis Skins by WpNxThemes |:::…

NXFoscor: Business, Portfolio or Entrepreneur

NXFoscor a clean, highly flexible, feature rich and fully responsive skin for thesis theme. The clean layout and sleek features make cleaner a great option for business, online portfolio, entrepreneur or other professional website. Coded with care in HTML5 & CSS3, NXFoscor is easy to customize and well documented. Best business skin for thesis 2.1.

NXLanding: Portfolio or Business

NXLanding is a beautiful thesis theme skin suitable for portfolio or business sites. NXLanding’s versatility in combination with its minimal design makes it the perfect solution for every portfolio site.

NXTimBlog: Blog

NXTimBlog another fantastic thesis skin perfect for blogging. This skin is specially designed to make your blogging experience as simple and seamless as possible. It has responsive layout and elegant styling so that you can easily reach all your readers wherever they are!

NXEnews: Magazine, News or Blog

NXEnews a unique damn killer responsive thesis skin built with HTML5 and CSS3. This stylish & responsive skin is designed for news or magazine sites. NXEnews can be configured to focus on your work. Have tons of options to manage & modify any aspect of the theme it’s well suited for both beginners with no coding knowledge & developers as well.

NXRibbon: Portfolio or Business

NXRibbon allows you to showcase your work the way you want. Best suited for business, portfolio and blog at a time. It’s fully responsive, retina ready & highly customizable. Included lots of features easy to setup features and universal design make creating your site fun and exciting.

NXAccentbox: Blog, News or Magazine

NXAccentbox, a responsive thesis skin for blog, news, magazine and editorial. This skin comes with many cool features and flexible layout and possibility to manage color schemes.

NXNevia: Blogging

NXNevia is a very simple, clean and ultra-readable thesis skin suitable for blogging. If you need a simple lovely thesis skin which really makes visitors focus on the content, NXNevia is the very right choice for you!

NXHaLong: News, Magazine or Blog

I doubt that how many thesis theme skins out there have as much feature that NXHalong has! It’s a powerful responsive & multipurpose premium thesis skin, perfect for news or magazine, blog website & many more! Its super flexible, clean design & code packed with all the features you need to present yourself with style, passion & professionalism.

NXFearless: Corporate, Business or Portfolio

NXFearless a clean, modern & super-customizable thesis theme skin with a minimalist responsive design. It’s specially created to accommodate the needs of a corporate, business or portfolio site. It’s a design that will make your site stand out of competition.

NXBlog: Blogging or Magazine

NXBlog a stylish blogging skin for thesis theme designed for creative bloggers. It focuses on content and readability. NXBlog gives bloggers of all types an environment which would better display & highlight their content.

…:::| Thesis Skins by ThesisLove |:::…

Vocation: Corporate, Business or Portfolio

Vocation is a clean, modern and powerful professional premium thesis theme skin . It can be awesome to use for corporate website, portfolio, blog and anything you need. It’s attractive clean-wide design, the perfect solution to show off your product or information. Each & ever element in the skin is given high priority. Although you might avoid some factors of your site, they might be playing a very high role in the eyes of search engines and your readers as well.

Expressive: Blogging or Personal

Expressive is a simple, personal blog perfect for your stories to shine. A completely responsive and dazzling skin for Thesis 2.1. It is ready to impress you and grab the attention of all your visitors.

Cinch: Business, Portfolio or Corporate

Cinch is more than a design. It’s a saga. Cinch takes the journey & reveals its ultimate treasure. Definitely it is something that you would be proud to have on your site.

Bloggers Pride: Blog

Have you been waiting for a skin that is specially made for hard-working bloggers? If so, then wait no more because Bloggers Pride is here! A super-duper customizable, very unique, responsive, retina-ready wordpress premium thesis skin that everybody wants.

…:::| Thesis Skins by iCustomizeThesis |:::…

Inspire: Business, Blog or Portfolio

Inspire a pretty mobile responsive thesis 2.1 skin. Included custom home page widgets, custom page templates, featured slider, and plenty of other features which make it suitable for use on all type of sites! Such as business, blog, portfolio and everything else that you can think of.

Myra: Portfolio, Business or Personal

Myra is an advanced, unique and powerful premium multi-purpose responsive thesis skin. Suited for personal sites, business sites & portfolio sites & users who want a very nice portfolio website where they can showcase their work. It comes with Thesis Color Scale, which allows unlimited colors so that you can pick the perfect color scheme for your site.

Studio: Blog or Portfolio

Studio is a clean, simple and minimal thesis skin for building your online presence. It’s fully compatible with latest thesis theme 2.1.4 version. Looks great on all devices. It has a portfolio custom post which is used for slider and showing work. Perfect for any type of blog and portfolio site.

Aroma: Portfolio or Blog

Aroma is pretty similar to previous studio skin! This skin is very easy to use and customize, whether you are a wordpress pro or a beginner suited for blog and portfolio site.

Eleven40: Blog

Eleven40 is a very straightforward responsive blogging skin, especially for people who need a blog. It’s based on the 1140 Grid System. Eleven40 is the only skin featured on WPMU.org, which (WPMU.org) known as one of the popular wordpress community blog.

BizLife Pro: Business or Portfolio

BizLife Pro is treated iCustomizeThesis’s most popular skin! It comes with a lot of features which are perfect for building your portfolio or business site.

…:::| Thesis Skin by Kolakube |:::…

MD3: Blog, Minimalist, Multi-Purpose, Business or Portfolio

MD3 the best thesis theme skins ever! (I personally use & recommend) I don’t know whether any other skins out there that have as much features that MD3 has. This minimal, clean, professional responsive skin is suitable for any type of blog, portfolio or even business. Added 2 screen shots. You gonna love Marketers Delight 3!

• Testimonials
• Documentation

I Decided To Make Thesis Awesome ;-)

I develop Skins for Thesis Theme, so you can build websites that matters!

Why Thesis?

When I first had a chance to test out Thesis 2.0, I quickly realized its power and I understood why it took 2 years between planning and development to be available for the public. I was really impressed! By far; Thesis is the most intelligent WordPress Theme on planet earth!

All Skins require Thesis Theme, you must own a license from DIYThemes.com

The best Skins collection for the Thesis Theme

Beautiful WordPress designs with a drag and drop (thanks to Thesis). Simply pick one of the masterpieces, install it via the Thesis Skin Uploader and you are ready to go. All Skins are shipped with many functions, features and tools to make your life easier. Now you can build awesome websites in absolutely no time!

Built‑in Boxes for New Awesome Functionality!

Thesis Boxes adds new functionality to your site, the good news is most of my Skins are packed with built-in Boxes. For example: The Author Info Box, which allows you to display author details in Single post. Also, the Shortcode Box, which allow you to display shortcode content anywhere you like on your site with ease. You are going to love this!

One Website, Many Devices

Responsive web design is recommended by Google, it allows one website to provide a great user-experience across many devices and screen sizes, and it also makes managing your SEO strategy easier. For these reasons; most of the Skins I develop will be responsive, your site will always look good on every screen and device on the planet, plus it will be much easier to manage.

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35+ Best Free & Premium Thesis Skins For WordPress

Thesis WordPress theme is the eventual tool for building websites. If you are looking for best and reliable skins then there’s no doubt, Thesis is perfect choice.

Thesis is powerful theme framework which is SEO optimized, and highly optimized for loading time. If you power your website with the Thesis Theme Framework , there is powerful but often under used, feature called the Thesis Feature box which is really awesome.

Consider Reading these :

• Most Popular WordPress Theme Frameworks 2015
• How to Install a Perfect WordPress Theme in Just Seconds

More WordPress bloggers use thesis theme which was developed by Chris Pearson by their extra ordinary qualities and features. For end users, customizing thesis theme might not be that easy, so you can always grab available skin from the market.

Without taking your much time, lets take a tour of best Thesis skins for your WordPress Blog or Website.

35+ Top & Best THESIS THEMES/SKINS For WordPress

1. quik thesis skin  (magazine).

Quik is clean, magazine style skins foe thesis loaded with several features which is compatible with every new user. It is perfect for every blog and website. This skin comes with a featured slider, Magazine style layout and it’s full- responsive skin.

The evident features of Quik Magazine Style Thesis skin.

• Responsive Design
• Multiple Article Sliders
• JQuery Background Slideshow
• Customizable Front Page
• Cross Browser Compatible
• Landing Page template

Live Preview of Quik – Click here

2. Forb Skin  (Magazine)

Forb skin is very awesome skin in various field as you can see in above picture. The features you get in this skin are Business, Latest News, Travel, Sports, Technology, Featured and many more. It is really assured and reliable for the users. Take a full look of this theme by clicking on click here button which is shown below.

Features of Forb Skin

• Passed in Google Page speed
• Browser Compatibility
• 100% HTML 5 Supported
• 1 Year Unlimited updates and support

For Live Preview of Forb Skin- Click here

3. Mash skin  (Magazine)

Mash skin is gorgeous, flexible and responsive thesis skin that will make your blog or website look great. It is perfect choice who are looking for Magazine skins. It comes with admin panel options, home page slider, landing page template and many more.

Features of Mash Skin

• Archives Page Template
• Single Page Template
• 100 % HTML 5 Validation
• Mash Social media Box
• Read more Box

For Live Demo- Click here

4. Thesis Magazine 2 Skin  (Magazine)

Magazine 2 is stylish and responsive premium thesis skin for 2.1 version for news and magazine websites. It was built with performance oriented code architecture and clean design to ensure viewer’s focus on the content.

Features of Thesis Magazine 2 Skin

• Responsive and Stylish
• Page Template
• Oriented Code
• Compatible with every Browser

For Live Demo of Thesis skin Magazine 2 – Click here

5. Newszine Skin  ( Magazine )

Newszine Skin loaded with multi features and cool design. It has built in review system with many color option available, You can take a look by clicking on Click here button.

Features of Newszine Skin

• Opt in Slider
• Newszine Logo box
• Social Media Box

Take a Live Preview – Click here

6. Thesis M-Blog Skin ( Magazine )

Magazine Blog skin feature rich premium WordPress thesis skin. By using its drag and drop builder you can have fun creating a unique homepage & easily make modification to it. This minimal skin is perfect for blogs, magazine and news sites.

Features of Thesis M-Blog Skins

• Perfect in Google Page Speed
• Navigation Box

For Live Preview –  Click here

7. Thesis Magazine 1 Skin  ( Magazine )

Thesis Magazine 1 Skin is well designed clean and stylish magazine skin for thesis theme for technology related blogs. This skin has a attractive look with weird shapes making it unique look for your blog or website.

Features of Magazine 1 Skin

• Designed Well
• Google Search Box
• Thesis Attribution Box

For Live Preview – Click here

8. News Magazine ( Magazine)

News Magazine  a brand new responsive thesis skin with minimalist design best suited for news magazine sites. You can enjoy the friendly features which make this skin extra ordinary.

Awesome Features of News Magazine

• Unlimited Support
• Unlimited Updates
• 100 % CSS Validation

For Live Demo – Click here

9. Thesis Potfo Skin ( Portfolio )

Thesis Potfo Skin is best for the Photographers who want to show their creativity and innovation. It is really nice thesis potfo skin with limited competition.

Features of Thesis Potfo Skin

• Front Page Template
• Related Box
• Skin Search
• Skin Social

Live Preview – Click here

10.  Shoppez Skin ( Woocommerce & Magazine )

The Shoppez Thesis WordPress Theme skin is an option available for the online sellers as it is compatible with WordPress Woo-commerce plugin and hence they can sell their stuff easily and it is one of the Magazine skins. You can change all the font families, colors and sizes of your own by going to Skin Design section and by configuring it.

The advanced features of Shoppez skin 

• CSS Validation Supported
•  100% HTML 5  Supported
• Fully responsive for every media screen
• Social and Welcome Bar
• Slider and Read more option

11. Thesis Kartkop Skin  (WooCommerce)

Thesis Kartkop Skin is a beautiful, responsive and customizable thesis skin for blog or website. If you are thinking for the e-commerce then don’t forget to overlook through this theme.

Features of Thesis Kartkop Skin

• Blog Page Template
• Page Navigation
• Kartkop Slider

Just take a live preview – Click here

12. Thesis Woocommerce Skin ( Woocommerce )

Thesis Woocommerce Skin is very momentous skin for a ecommerce platform with a full CSS validation and passed from Google Speed test.

Features of Thesis Woocommerce Skin

• Three Column Product Box
• Footer Optin Box

 13. Thesis Parallax Skin ( Business )

Thesis Parallax Skin comes with one year unlimited support, updates and downloads. This responsive multipurpose skin can be successfully used for the website like car portals, business portals and many more. As WordPress skins are similar to it.

Features of Thesis Parallax Skin

• Parallax Team Member Box
• Parallax Client Box
• Testimonial Page Box
• Archive Page Template

14. Thesis Medicare Skin ( Business )

Medicare Skin  is like the small medical observe where you can manage everything as same like hospital do. This thesis skin could be the best for hospitals, Private doctors, clinics and many more.

Remarkable Features of Thesis Medicare Skin

• Latest News Box
• Porfolio Page Box
• Doctors Page Box
• Testimonial and Pricing Page Box

Check out the Demo of Medicare Skin – Click here

15. Fitness Skin ( Business )

Fitness Skin  is an option suited for the gym related business blog or website. You can get many multi feature while using this skin.

Features of Fitness Skin 

• Gallery and Page Navigation
• Contact Phone and Clients Box
• Variable Page Template

For Demo – Click here

16. Business 6 Skin ( Business )

Thesis Business 6 Skin is well designed for Business category, comes with many features like admin panel option, landing page, contact page and many more. So, this skin is also nice option.

Outstanding Features of Business 6 Skin

• Welcome Box
• Jquery slider Box

17. Business 5 Skin ( Business )

Business 5 Skin  is flexible business theme suited to showcase a product, service or portfolio. It’s smart and hand crafted environment allows you to build outstanding websites easy and fast.

Features of Business 5 Skin

• Clients Box
• Portfolio Page Box
• Attribution and Social Media Box

18. Business 4 Skin ( Business )

Business 4 skin  is a multipurpose option available for bloggers, it is compatible with all browser and you get a unlimited front page template and blog page template which is a great option for this skin.

Features of Business 4 Skin

• Portfolio Box
• Feature and Welcome Box

19. Business 3 Skin ( Business)

Business 3 skin  is disgraded version of Business skins which is fully optimized and functionality. CSS and HTML 5 are validate for this skin. You can take a look by clicking on Click here button which is below.

Features of Business 3 Skin

• Call us Box
• Footer Social Media Box

20. Business 2 Skin ( Business)

Business 2 skin  is a quality business skin where you can customize it in your way. It has a responsive design and landing page template. Having its own custom widget and very easy to customize.

Features of Business 2 Skin

• Latest Portfolio Box

21. Business 1 Skin ( Business )

Business 1 skin  is another awesome Business Skin where you can manage everything, due to its old upgradation people are shifting to new Business skin 5, 4. This skin is specially designed to make your blogging experience as simple and seamless as possible.

Features of Business 1 Skin

• Copyright Box
• Slider Bottom Box

22. Trible Skin ( Blog )

Trible Skin  has been yet another blog related Thesis WordPress Theme Skin that has the capability to change your website or blog contingent. It also comes with landing page and and category page template.

Features of Trible Skin

• About and Author Box
• Landing and Sidebar Opt in Box
• Social Media Share and Follow Box
• Related Post Box

23. Blo-cer ( Blog )

Blo-cer  is a minimals, simple and super clean blog skin for thesis them with the focus on readability and very easy to setup. It has clean design and it comes loaded with lots of features to help you take your website to the next level. So, this skin is also nice option when you are seeking for the Blog.

Features of Blo-cer

• Blog Search Box
• Blog Related Box
• Blog Tab Box
• Blog Logo Box

24. Sparkez Skin ( Blog )

The Sparkez Skin  thesis skin is a multipurpose option available for bloggers out there. The skin is completely responsive to fit any device, lets have a look of Sparkez skin features.  

Features of Sparkez Skin

• Readmore Box
• Post optin Box

25. PinBlog ( Blog)

PinBlog  WordPress thesis skin is a great choice to choose if you are working on a blog. It includes many templates and boxes to show your content in a unique manner. This skin is really so nice.

Features of PinBlog

• Pin Logo Box
• Pin Popular Box
• Pin Social Media Box
• Pin Readmore Box
• Pin Related Post Box

26. Charm Skin ( Blog)

Charm skin is built for the comfortableness of Thesis framework users, It has many features which can easily be handled and can be gently implemented by users. This skin will help you develop your blog smartly and would definitely make your blog wonderful. This skin is also especially designed to do better with  SEO, Leads & Sales  page. It is newly launched and loaded with multi features.

Features of Charm Skin

• Charm Logo Box
• Charm Optin Box
• Charm Author Box
• Charm Related Box

27. Genuine Skin ( Blog )

Genuine Skin is good thesis skin in the field of blogging, simplify and present your content in a way that is accessible, logical and beautiful. It has loaded with multi features as some are mentioned below.

Features of Genuine Skin

• Page Navigation Box
• Footer Logo Box
• Back to Top Box

28. Clever Skin ( Blog )

The Thesis skin is uncompleted with this Clever skin, its compatibility and reliability makes you to attract toward this skin if you are thinking for blogging. Its minimal skins are really nice and beautiful, well designed and clean.

Features of Clever Skin

• Clever Landing Opt in box
• Clever About box
• Clever Author Box
• Clever Readmore Box
• Clever Related Post Box

29. Splendid Skin ( Blog )

Splendid Ski part of WordPress thesis skin and it is really easy to work with this skin. It’s fresh and gorgeous look with friendly features will make your site a standout. So, this one is also a nice option, if you are looking for blog skin.

Features of Splendid Skin

• Popular Box

For Live Preview- Click here

30. Color skin ( Blog )

Color Skin is a minimal well designed and stylish Blog skin for thesis theme in which you can post anything. This Skin has a attractive look with multi features. You can ready to assist in blogging with this skin.

Features of Color Skin

• Landing opt Box
• Social Media Follow Box

31. Simbl Skin ( Blog )

Simbl skin allows you to showcase your work the way you want. Best suited for Blogs and content delivering software. Their minimal skins, well designed and clean may attract you towards this theme. SO, if you are thinking for Blogging then don’t forget to have a preview of this theme.

Features of Simbl Skin

• Social Media Share Box
• Squeeze Video Option Box

32. Minimalist Skin ( Blog )

Minimalist a very clean, minimal thesis theme skin with modern design. Whether you want to give your dusty old blog a new coat of paint or are drowning in a sea posts and categories, Minimalist is here to your rescue. Simplify and present your content in a way that is accessible, logical and beautiful.

Salient Features of Minimalist Skin

• Post Opt in Box
• Related Posts Box
• Footer Attribution Box

33. Trendy Skin ( Blog )

Trendy Skin is also known as blog software, because of their extra multi ordinary features and presentation and this WordPress Skins make remarkable skin in the field of blogging. If you look through their features of this skin which are really really awesome.

Features of Trendy Skin

• About us Box
• Landing and Squeeze Page Option Box

For Live Preview- Click Here

34. Media Skin ( Magazine )

Media Skin also known as Magazine 3  a clean and fully responsive skin for news and magazines. This theme is powerful with custom widgets, theme options, unlimited colors, custom sidebar, custom background and much more. Just Look at the preview of this skin, by clicking on Click here button.

Features of Media Skin

• Jquery Category Posts Slider
• Center Ad Box
• Facebook like Box
• Slidebar Option in Box

For Live Preview – Click Here

35. Magazine 4 ( Magazine )

Magazine 4 is an easy to use blog skin with flexible layout that looks great on any device rather it is big or small. Magazine 4 is suitable for any kind of blog and website, every beginner and new bie can easily understand their outstanding features.

Features of Magazine 4

• Category Box
• Breadcrumb Box

So, at last wrapping up the post. This best 30+ Thesis skins not only make your mood happy but improve your website’s look too. Don’t forget to tell your favourite skin in comment below box.

Happy to Hear From You… :-)

Recommended Reading

• Install a Perfect Theme Within a Seconds Check How ??
• WordPress Based Ecommerce Theme Framework 2015- Click here
• WordPress Theme Framework For Your Website or Blog- Click here

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About the author: rahul gupta.

Related Posts

Wordpress themes for freelancing websites – part 2, best wordpress themes for starting your freelancing services business, best wordpress themes for food/cooking niche, thesis responsive charm skin- an excellent review, social networking themes for wordpress – part 2.

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(Anti) Social Development

June 7, 2011 by Kim Woodbridge

6 Free Thesis Theme Skins for WordPress

Start your WordPress website project now! Contact Me! >>

Dennis Edell @ Direct Sales Marketing says

June 7, 2011 at 8:44 am

Am I missing something? They never seem special like, they always look like every other theme.

Kim Woodbridge says

June 7, 2011 at 9:15 am

Hi Dennis – They are skins for the Thesis theme – sort of like a theme on top of a theme framework. They can be used instead of customizing Thesis.

June 7, 2011 at 9:54 am

Hi Kim – I realize this; it just hits me every time, I expect to see something different, maybe better then other themes, but they look the same…..same as other free ones also.

June 7, 2011 at 5:14 pm

Thesis is an interesting phenomenon ;-)

Elge Premeau, Internet Marketing Consultant says

June 7, 2011 at 11:48 am

Bag the Thesis Skins! I’m way more interested in the that scrumptious looking side dish.

June 7, 2011 at 5:15 pm

Seriously! It looks so good :-)

June 12, 2011 at 9:25 pm

Kim, I couldn’t help but laugh at the above comment, the dish does look delicious. I like the kickstarter theme. They’re all nice though, thanks for sharing :)

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Thesis Laboratory

• Criss Cross Skin Docs
• Promotions Box Docs
• Welcome Bar Box Docs
• Skins & Boxes →

Top Notch Resources for Thesis 2.1+

Welcome to thesis laboratory check out my newest skin » eddiy ».

Thesis Laboratory is a place created to provide skins, boxes, helpful tutorials and support for the WordPress, Thesis community. My new skin, “EDDIY” integrates with Easy Digital Downloads!

Get the EDDIY Skin 15% off for a Limited Time Here » View Skin Demo | EDDIY Features

What is Thesis Laboratory All About?

While still somewhat in the making with only one skin, the focus here is:, thesis skins.

Thesis Laboratory offers premium skins with beautiful design & functionality. Skins include built-in boxes, widgets, templates, icons & more! View All Our Thesis Skins →

Thesis Boxes

If you aren’t looking for a skin, we also offer Thesis boxes. Boxes are built with the latest coding standards and they will work with any Thesis skin. View All Our Thesis Boxes →

Design Tuts

In addition to our downloads, we try to provide a valuable blog with tutorials for Thesis designers & developers. All articles are free to distribute. Check Out the Blog Here →

 Here Are A Few Reasons Why Thesis Laboratory Is A Great Option

Our products are developed for both functionality & aesthetics

Checkout The Pricing Options For Thesis Laboratory

Purchase a single skin, all Thesis Lab skins or just grab the free stuff.

Free Downloads

This section includes any skins or boxes Thesis Laboratory offers free.

• Download All Free Stuff
• Access to Support Forums
• Free Updates For Life

Individual Skins

Purchase any skin individually for $27 – We currently offer the Criss Cross skin.

• Use On Unlimited Websites
• Use On Any Client Projects

Coming Soon

ALL SKINS & BOXES will be available to purchase at a one-time discounted fee!

• Download All Skins & Boxes
• Unlimited Use On Sites/Projects

25+ Free Awesome Thesis Skins That Don’t Suck

The Thesis WordPress Theme is the ultimate tool for building websites.

Earlier HellBound Bloggers was also powered by Thesis theme but, currently using a custom theme.

You can also design and customize Thesis theme by apply different skins. If you can spend some money, you can also try some premium Thesis skins. In this article I provided the best available free Thesis skins for the terrific Thesis WordPress Theme and Framework.

• How To Install Thesis Skins [Tutorial]

1. Thesis Skin Words :

2. Minimal Skin :

3. Simplicity – Minimal Skin :

4. Cappuccino :

5. Thesis Bold :

6. Historic Theme :

7. Network News :

8. Mini Thesis :

9. Exhibit :

10. Affiliate Thesis Skin :

11. Bright Idea :

12. Simple Orange :

13. Ready Pro :

14. Neo classical :

15. Thesis Bare :

16. Fresh Company :

17. Straight Shooter :

18. Simple Life :

19. Thesis Sharp :

20. Bishop Photo Blog :

21. Min – Thesis :

22. Looks Good Naked Thesis :

23. Reputation :

24. Tweetish :

25. Dissertation :

26. By The Sea :

If you don’t own a Thesis Theme, don’t wait! Grab a copy of Thesis theme now!

Do you know any other free Thesis Skin? Please share it here!

39 thoughts on “25+ Free Awesome Thesis Skins That Don’t Suck”

• Pingback: Skins for Thesis designrammeverk for WordPress sparer tid og penger

I wonder who would but this tweetish theme rest are fine with me.

Is thesis themes are better than theme junkie ??? My Blog :- http://www.inets.in ! Theme Junkie has great themes for word press

Both are great. If you are really interested in customizing your theme according to your desire, you can move on to Thesis, else try Theme Junkie. 🙂

Thanks for share. also thanks for the tutorial. keep it up we need this because somany dont share these.

Well have a look at this free thesis skin. A clean and minimal theme. Have a look http://letusbuzz.com/2011/03/free-giveaway-nonzero-blue-skin-for-thesis-theme/

I am looking for a theme that is exact like Blogussion thesis skin…do you know one

Thanks for the useful list

Thanks for sharing the list of thesis skins

All free thesis themes SUCK! I don’t really see why people like thesis so much.

I absolutely agree with you. free thesis themes really suck. the best way to use a thesis is the tweak it ourselves and unleash the hidden power.But u cant disagree that the blogger has put efforts to collect these and compile it from various resources only for the readers! and it is commendable work indeed!

These are really nice free skins and I did not know about these free Thesis skins. I am using Swift theme for my blog.

Thanks for your collection

Hi, i’m using one of skins above, and looks great for my blog, thank you 4 share.

Great thesis skins, simple yet they make a statement. They also look business-y and clean. If you’re into the arts then go and don’t be afraid to use more colors and designs 😉

Wow Again You have come up with a Nice List 🙂

awesome post dude!! like tweetish very much

I’m using simple life for my thesis theme, thank for your useful info

Thanks for thinking Words doesn’t suck. 🙂

Really nice list but why you are back to your custom theme ? I guess you can have same kind of theme in thesis as well. Try your luck.

Had some problem with the license stuff mate. You can know more about that here 😉 :

http://hellboundbloggers.com/2010/06/11/hbb-gets-a-new-makeover/

We were about to change the theme of our site and we got some nice, cool themes from your share mate,thanks 🙂 🙂

I really like Ready Pro Just might use it.

Liked the the skins but they don’t have many elements to work around. However all of them look really neat and remarkable.

I have customized my own thesis them check at http://wiredcubes.com

Gimme your opinion about my theme 🙂

Thanks for the collection. I think the Bishop Photo Blog theme is pretty sweet!

Cool collection of some great looking Thesis skins. I particularly like the Minima theme.

Hey Pradeep,

Nice List bro. I think for paid one blogussion inspired theme is best. Thanks for sharing this great List.

great collection. Thanx

All are Awesome theme, but I am not still using thesis theme.

Thanks for these skins. It provides me much information and new concepts for developing my new web. I haven’t used all of them yet, but the ones which I used are damn helpful.

Are you using any plugin to watermark your images? Do add subscribe to comment plugin so I can check back my comments.

Yeah, I use Watermark Reloaded WP plugin.

http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/watermark-reloaded/

While customizing this new theme, I messed the custom.php file, so having problem with Commentluv and Subscribe to Comments plugin. Sorry mate, working on it. 🙂

Thanks for the link bro. This is good in other way. It means the commentator will come back to check reply again, which means one more visit ;).lol

Yeah.. 😀 Hope I’ll fix it very soon..! 8)

That’s a good resource for free thesis skins. What happened to your thesis theme? Did you remove it Pradeep?

Yeah, Ricky I moved to a custom theme. Had some problem with Thesis License..:)

Nice collections of of Thesis skin for wordpress blog, Neo classical is my favorite, I wise I have content that can fit it. Thanks for sharing it free.

Yup! Thesis is the best theme for excellent SEO for blogs. Its proved. Thnx a lot for the list mate. Im planning to buy one 🙂

Wow i think i missed these 🙂 thesis always rocks

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Thesis WordPress Theme

Thesis WordPress Theme By DIYthemes, Theme Type: Blogging, Minimal, Multi-Purpose , free trial: available The Thesis Theme for WordPress is a high-quality template system that you can use to improve your site immediately.

Thesis boasts the strongest SEO of any theme on the market today thanks to its expertly-coded HTML + CSS + PHP framework. Not only that, Thesis also contains additional options that will allow you to fine-tune each and every page of your site. The days of worrying about your in-site SEO are over—with Thesis , your strategy is “just add killer content.”

Not a coder? Not a problem. The Thesis option panels allow you to command your site with ease, while Thesis does all of the heavy lifting behind the scenes. You’ve never had this much control over your site before, and this is precisely what makes Thesis indispensable to critical webmasters all over the globe.

The difference is in the details. You may not know it, but typography and visual clarity are two of the most important aspects of your site. Properly setting type on the web is an exercise in mathematical precision, and this is not an area where you want to compromise. After all, typography is the primary vehicle for the most important thing on your site—your content!

What about customizations and design changes? Thesis contains a futureproof customization system that allows you to produce unique designs, all while keeping your changes isolated to just two key files! And thanks to a revolutionary layout generator (with 1, 2, and 3-column layout combinations) and pinpoint font controls, testing tons of different layout variants has never been easier!

In addition to our in-house support staff, there are also tons of amazingly talented users who help newbies and veterans alike in our forums. On top of that, we’re ratcheting up the support with the addition of video tutorials, so now you’ll be able to do more with Thesis than ever before!

Thesis Theme General Features

Theme options, thesis theme other features.

• jQuery Integration
• integrated Advertising Management
• Square Corner
• Widget Ready
• Threaded Comments
• Color: Gray , Yellow , White ,
• Layout: Three Columns , / Right Sidebar , Fixed Layout ,

Thesis Related Themes

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Thesis WordPress Theme Review

Before starting the review I want to make a few things clear. First, I have worked with Thesis many times for client websites and Second, wpexplorer.com is an affiliate of Thesis which means that I make a commission from any Thesis sale generated through my affiliate link. This said, I wanted to let you know that this is not your average bs review that sounds more like an advertisement. Rather I wanted to create an Informative Review of Thesis so you can better understand everything about the theme.

I could sit here for hours and write about how awesome thesis is, however, you probably rather read about the factual in-and-outs of this theme.

There is a lot to read on this Thesis Review…This is why I have provided these nice big headers so you can skip to whatever sounds interesting. Enjoy!

Visit Thesis

What is the Thesis WordPress Theme Framework?

Thesis is a Premium WordPress Theme Framework developed by Chris Pearson and has become one of the most popular and downloaded/purchased Premium themes out there. In fact, I can not go a single day without browsing the web and seeing a site running on thesis. It is unbelievable.

You have probably encountered many blogs or sites that are using thesis and possibly recognized their similar appearances. At the same time, you may have also seeing many sites that were using this framework and you had no idea. The reason for this, is that Thesis is an awesome theme right “out-of-the-box” but it can also be customized really easily too look like “anything”.

But what actually is Thesis? I guess you could call Thesis a WordPress Theme, however, it is much more then that. It is a code and design Framework built around WordPress that delivers a rock-solid SEO website code plus design flexibility that requires no knowledge of HTML or CSS to make customizations to your website’s design.

Thesis Admin Control Panel

The Thesis Admin Panel is what makes this platform truly stand out (in my opinion). Sure many themes out there let you customize your twitter account or upload a logo for your header, but Thesis is different. This powerful platform will allow you to make tons of adjustments from including pages in the navigation bar to selecting a custom CSS style-sheet. You will have the power to customize your site completely, right through your WordPress administration area.

The admin panel makes it really easy for bloggers that do not want to get their hands dirty with any code but still want to do some basic editing to their website design and make customizations to their on-page Search Engine Optimization.

Admin Panel Screenshot

Here is a quick screenshot of one of the admin setting pages so you can see more or less what they look like. The control panel is really clean and makes use of drop down containers so everything is nicely organized and you can find what you need without having to scroll down forever.

Customizing Thesis & Thesis Skins

As mentioned earlier, one of the best things about the DYI Thesis Theme is the ability to customize the look and function of your site via theme control panel which is easy to use and very intuitive. But you can also customize the look of your site via what are called “child themes”, which are themes designed to work with the Thesis Framework and can be uploaded via your theme panel and they will automatically add a new style/design to your site. There are many places where you can find Thesis skins and they are available both for free and for purchase. This ability makes Thesis great for bloggers who don’t want to spend anytime customizing their site or need some extra features that are available via other skins. And it is also a great for web designers who are looking to use the Thesis Framework for all their clients.

Is Thesis Really That Awesome for SEO?

While any theme or site can be edited for Search Engine Optimization many are not optimized to start with. This can be a real hassle for amateur/inter-mediate bloggers which is why the Thesis Framework has been designed to be search engine friendly right out-of-the-box. In fact, most people download external plugins such as “All In One SEO”. But what if you could have your SEO built into your theme? This would make everything run more smoothly with cleaner code and it will make it much easier for you to make overall SEO changes to your site. Plus, Thesis is already very SEO-Friendly right out-of-the-box, so you can install it and feel comfortable that your site will be indexed.

Some of the key components that makes this framework good for SEO purposes are:

• Title tags and Meta Description fields on pages/posts
• Noindexing options for pages and psots
• Alt text for images
• Clean and simple back-end code
• Simple design – faster loading (google has added speed as a measure of search engine rankings)

You must remember that simply by installing Thesis on your site you will not automatically rank number 1 on Google, rather the framework provides a very good base and clean code to help make your SEO efforts easier and possibly more successful.

Target Advertisement with Thesis & Thesis For Affiliates

Now here is a really neat feature about Thesis you are going to love: “The Multimedia Box”. This is a 300px by 250px (size can be changed) advertisement block that is by default on the top of the sidebar and it will allow you to rotate between different media (images, video, adsense).

So what? A rotating media box. Sure this is true, but what makes the multimedia box of Thesis so unique is that you can edit what appears in that area for every page. This means that you can provide better targeted advertisement based on your page content. So for example on a Thesis Review post you could have an affiliate banner for DIY Themes and on a post about WordPress SEO you may want to have an amazon link to a corresponding SEO book. For posts that you do not have any affiliate links to post you may consider using that spot for adsense.

Ultimately with the media box you will be able to provide relevant advertisement to your visitors and help increase your affiliate sales.

With the latest version of Thesis (1.7) there is a new feature that affiliate marketers will love and it is the ability to easily create 301 redirect links out of your affiliate links. This means that you can transform all your ugly affiliate links into ones that look like they are on your site and with pretty slugs. This way people will not be discourage to click on them and you can help increase your click-through rates.

How Unique is Thesis?

Uniqueness is very important to generate visitor loyalty and help encourage a community on your site. The problem is that many people are using the same WordPress Themes as everyone else, so when you browse the web you find sites that look just like every other site. At least for me, this is a real turn-off.

There are currently thousands of people using Thesis and many people are using thesis with the basic settings applied and nothing customized. The beauty is that this framework is so easy to customize that you can make your site look 100% unique in just minutes. Ultimately it is up to you…You can go for the plain and basic design or you can edit it a bit and no one will even know you are using the Framework.

This is what makes Thesis so great. Unlike many other themes out there you will have to do a lot of CSS and XHTML editing to make your site look unique, but with Thesis you can log into your admin panel the second you activate it and make some changes really quickly and easily. Or you can upload ad use your own custom style-sheet.

Is Thesis The Perfect Theme?

No theme is “Perfect”, as any theme can virtually be improved in one way or another, however, there are probably many users out there that would argue that Thesis is very close to being a perfect theme. Below I highlight some of the advantages and disadvantages of Thesis so you can see what things are awesome and what could be improved.

Thesis WordPress Theme Advantages

• Clean code and minimalistic design
• Search Engine friendly and optimized
• Make easy theme customizations without touching any code
• Streamlines with custom child themes
• Relatively cheap developer license

Thesis WordPress Theme Disadvantages

• Plain and simple default design
• Blogger layout – may not be as good for businesses without a child theme
• CSS knowledge is still highly recommended to be able to make design changes to your site

How Much Does It Cost and Is It A Good Deal?

There are 2 pricing options for Thesis, the Developer option and the Personal option. The developer license costs $164 while the personal one is only $87. And while this may seem expensive, especially in comparison to the price of other themes, it is in fact a very good deal for what you are getting. You could spend over $500 paying someone for a custom designed website or you can buy this theme for $87 and customize it yourself. If you want your site to look and function great as well as rank on search engines, then it may be worth the money.

Below you can see what each of the different plans comes with…As you can see, if you are planning on using this theme on multiple sites, the Developer option is still cheaper then purchasing 2 personal option licenses!

Developer’s Option $164

• Unlimited use of Thesis on sites that you own1
• Access to all-new beta versions of Thesis before final release!2
• Access to Client Site Options, which allow you to deploy Thesis on sites for clients3
• Access to members-only Answers and Forums
• Lifetime Thesis upgrades
• 30-day money back guarantee

Personal Option $87

• Use of Thesis on one live website and one localized development server
• Access to the Developer’s Option Upgrade for only $774

Paying For A WordPress Theme

I remember when I first started with WordPress I was very skeptical and reluctant to buy any template and there are thousands of people out there that currently do not like the idea of paying for a theme when there are thousands if not millions of free themes out there. However, I have changed and hopefully I have somewhat convinced you other wise as well.

When you think about the TONS of extra features you will get by paying a little but for a Premium template. Think about it…If purchasing a premium theme helps your search engine rankings and increases even just a few more conversions from your site’s advertisements or products than it has been totally worth it.

And best of all with Premium Themes you do not need to worry about having to keep any footer links, spam that could have been added to a free theme, and most importantly you will be able to edit your site much more easily so you can avoid tons of hardship when trying to customize your site.

Should I Buy Thesis?

Of course since I am trying to make some affiliate sales here I would say YES click on the link below and buy this wicked-awesome theme. However, instead I want to give you a list of some things you can think about and possibly write down your answers so you can see if it really is worth it for your. And if you do consider purchasing this theme, you can do so through my links and I will get my respective commission. Thanks!

Things To Think About Before Purchase

• $87 for a theme you can easily customize and make it look like anything, is that a good deal?
• If you are a developer could Thesis make your life easier by providing you with a faster way to create client sites?
• Thesis has some great SEO features and comes with a nice clean code. Is SEO a concern for you?
• Would editing one theme over and over again be more efficient that buying or finding a new free theme for every new site or whenever you want to change the look of one.
• Will Thesis make your life easier? (it has for many)
• “22,100 savy webmasters rely on this framework” would you care to join?
• If you buy it and it wasn’t as cool as you thought it would be, was $80 worth the try? (there is a 30-day money back guarantee)

Thesis Now With A Split License

For those of you concerned about the GPL license of WordPress, DYI Thesis announced just a couple weeks ago that they have added a split license to their theme making everything to do with WordPress GPL and all the Thesis Framework code to be the property of DYI Themes.

Visit Thesis To Learn More & Purchase Today

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When I first uncovered Thesis about 10 years ago, it really was the best. Mostly it was easy to use. But now, Thesis is extremely user-UNfriendly. For reasons I cannot imagine, Thesis has been redesigned to make the easiest things impossible to accomplish. I found myself Googling for how to do things that were so simple in earlier versions. For example, what did happen to the “Admin Panel Screenshot” where a user could define columns and widgets and search bars and colors, etc.? Everything was nicely in one place. Now, a user must go back and forth all over the Theme for perhaps hours trying to accomplish what once was done in 10 minutes. It looks like an intentional effort to make the Theme complicated. But why? After several hours of looking, I was never able to find how to remove the widgets from the sidebar, despite the fact that my site was one column. How can there be widgets in the sidebar when I should not have a sidebar? I had no choice but to use another theme. So extremely disappointed.

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WordPress Book

By mid-2010, one theme was still a GPL holdout: Thesis, from DIYThemes. Created by theme designer Chris Pearson and blogger Brian Clark, Thesis was popular as a feature-heavy framework — it gave users many more options than most WordPress themes. Users can customize every element of their website via the user interface. On the original about page, Chris states Thesis’ aim : “I wanted a framework that had it all — killer typography, a dynamically resizable layout, intelligent code, airtight optimization, and tons of flexibility.” Tech blogs featured Thesis and high profile bloggers, including Matt Cutts , Chris Brogan , and Darren Rowse adopted it.

Chris Pearson was well-respected in the community; he’d already developed Cutline and PressRow before moving into the premium theme market with Thesis. A mid-2009 ThemeShaper post recalls Thesis’ influence as “The Pearson Principle”: “Bloggers want powerfully simple design on an equally robust framework.” With themes such as Revolution and Premium News, theme developers were already creating feature-rich themes, and Thesis cemented that approach, ushering in the era of the theme framework [footnote]The term “theme framework” is often used to refer to different things. In some instances, a theme framework is a base, or “starter” theme that a developer can build from. In other cases, it’s a drop-in code library that facilitates development. But it’s also used in marketing to users, when a theme framework is a feature-heavy theme with multiple options.[/footnote]. Chris called this approach “ubiquitous design.” A theme wasn’t simply a website skin, it was a tool to build your website. It took another four years before theme developers stopped packing themes with options and started moving features into plugins.

While theme vendors adopted the GPL, Thesis held out. Discussions between DIYThemes and Automattic went nowhere and relationships fractured. In June 2009, Brian and Toni were in discussions when a blogger’s comment thread was hijacked . A long debate about Thesis and the GPL ensued. Matt urged people to move away from Thesis, saying “if you care about the philosophical underpinnings of WordPress please consider putting your support behind something that isn’t hostile to WordPress’ core freedoms and GPL license.”

In July 2010, the WordPress/Thesis debate reignited after Chris Pearson’s interview on Mixergy . In it, Chris shares Thesis’ revenue figures, putting a conservative estimate at 1.2 million dollars within 16 to 18 months.

Just over a week later, Matt and Chris took to Twitter . Matt was unhappy about Chris flaunting revenue and the GPL — violating WordPress’ license. Cutting remarks ensued until Andrew Warner from Mixergy set up an impromptu, live debate to discuss the issues . The hour-long discussion airs both sides of the argument. Matt argues that Thesis is built on GPL software — WordPress — and must honor the license. Matt suggests that Chris is disrespectful of all WordPress authors and that he’s breaking the law. Chris said adopting the GPL meant giving up his rights and losing piracy protection. He argues that “what I’ve done stands alone outside of WordPress completely,” and that Thesis “does not inherit anything from WordPress.” The argument descends into a rambling discussion of economics, and the conversation ends when Matt threatens to sue Chris if he refuses to comply with the GPL.

Matt, Automattic, and WordPress took public action against Thesis following the interview. Matt offered to buy Thesis users an alternative premium theme , consultants using Thesis were removed from the Code Poet directory of WordPress consultants , and Chris Pearson’s other themes — Cutline and PressRow — were removed from WordPress.com .

Matt wasn’t the only one in the WordPress community to come out swinging against Thesis. Other lead and core developers wrote about their GPL / Thesis stance. Ryan Boren wrote , “where do I stand as one of the primary copyright holders of WordPress? I’d like to see the PHP parts of themes retain the GPL. Aside from preserving the spirit of WordPress, respecting the open source ecosystem in which it thrives, and avoiding questionable legal ground, retaining the GPL is practical.” Mark Jaquith noted that WordPress themes don’t sit on top of, they’re interdependent on WordPress :

…in multiple different places, with multiple interdependencies. This forms a web of shared data structures and code all contained within a shared memory space. If you followed the code execution for Thesis as it jumped between WordPress core code and Thesis-specific code, you’d get a headache, because you’d be jumping back and forth literally hundreds of times.

Even developers who believed themes aren’t derivative of WordPress declared Thesis derivative. Developer Drew Blas wrote a script comparing every line of WordPress and Thesis . His script revealed several instances of Thesis code taken from WordPress. Core developer Andrew Nacin pointed out that Thesis’ own inline documentation declared: “This function is mostly copy pasta from WP ( wp-includes/media.php ), but with minor alteration to play more nicely with our styling.”

A former employee of DIYThemes left a comment on Matt’s blog :

check out Thesis’ handling of comments ( thesis/lib/classes/comments.php ). Large chunks of it are ripped right from WordPress. I know they are… because I’m the one who did the ripping. Whether I informed Chris of that or not doesn’t matter because I no longer have any of our old chat logs to prove one way or another, but suffice it to say the latest public release of Thesis (and numerous versions before hand) contain obviously GPL code. Whether those portions get rewritten in the impending 3.0 release, I don’t know… but for Chris to claim that he was responsible for and devised all of Thesis at 13:33 or so in the debate… Well, he was lying to you, either intentionally or not.

On July 22, — not even a week after the initial Mixergy interview — Chris Pearson announced that Thesis would be released under a split license. The public furor, compounded by pressure from inside DIYThemes, forced Chris to capitulate. Brian Clark drafted the license , shortly before leaving DIYThemes, citing “completely different opinions about the direction of the development of Thesis, the running of the company, and our relationship with the WordPress community.” When Thesis 2 launched in 2012, it had a new, proprietary license.

The debate around Thesis and the GPL had far-reaching implications for everyone involved. Prominent blogs moved away from Thesis . Brian Gardner’s Genesis theme became a popular choice. Thesis and Chris Pearson became less prominent in the community, focusing instead on cultivating and building a large customer base. The debacle also proved that WordPress will go to court to defend flagrant license abuse. There was, for a while, a relative calm in the community around the GPL. WordPress.org supported commercial theme sellers whose themes were 100% GPL and tolerated those that packaged their themes with two licenses. It would be another four years before the community found itself in another GPL argument on the four freedoms, this time between WordPress and Envato.

Theme Lists

20+ thesis 2.1 skins for bloggers, e-commerce, and news sites.

Thesis has come a long way since its early days. It is true that not everyone is a fan of Thesis 2.x but there is no question the framework has a lot of useful features. If you know coding, you could always make your own killer Thesis 2.x child theme. Don’t want to do the work from scratch. These 20+ Thesis 2.1 skins can help:

• Thesis 2.1 skins for bloggers
• Thesis 2 skins for businesses
• Thesis 2.x themes for e-commerce
• Thesis Portfolio skins

Thesis 2 skins for Bloggers & Marketers

These Thesis skins are quite useful for those of you who would like to run your blog using the power of Thesis 2.x:

Splash : use this skin for blogging or lead generation. It is compatible with Genesis and Thesis 2. A responsive landing page is included.

Quik : this Thesis 2 theme is designed for magazine sites but could be used for regular blogs. It is responsive and has built-in design tools, a landing page template, and 6 schemes.

Expressive : a clean and responsive Thesis 2.x skin for bloggers. It has its own custom widgets and is easy to customize.

Marketers Delight : a tool for bloggers, marketers, and folks who want to build landing pages using this framework. It is optimized for conversion.

Quizz : this Thesis 2.1 skin is designed for news sites, blogs, and magazines. It has 11 custom widgets and 6 custom templates. 15 shortcodes are available.

Responsive Magazine 2 : we have seen similar designs for non-Thesis child themes. This one works fine for sites with tons of images. It has 6 templates and plenty of other goodies.

Responsive Magazine Skin : as the name suggests, this theme is for magazine sites. It has multiple page templates and opt-in boxes. Comes ready to be monetized.

Bloggers Pride : a classic Thesis theme for bloggers. It has plenty of boxes to get you started. The design is very clean and responsive.

Magazine Skin : a responsive magazine skin for Thesis. It has 6 templates, 3 opt-in boxes, and a highly customizable homepage.

NXTimBlog : has 2 templates, 5+ boxes, and 10 widgets. Shortcodes are included to make your life easier.

NXAccentbox : another quality Thesis 2 skin for bloggers. It has 12 shortcodes, 6 boxes, 12 widgets, and 3 custom templates.

NXEnews : designed for news sites. It has a built-in review system with 14 color options, 14+ Thesis 2.x boxes, and 12 widgets. 11 shortcodes are included.

NXHalong : another theme with unlimited color options, built-in review system, plenty of background images, custom templates, boxes, and widgets.

Thesis 2.1 skins for E-commerce sites

Clip Cart : most people use a framework such as Thesis to start their own blog. But you could use Clip Cart to give your e-commerce site a makeover. Clip Cart is compatible with Cart66 and WooCommerce.

Thesis 2.1 skins for businesses

These child themes allow you to run your business site and promote your products using Thesis 2.x:

Grind : useful for businesses and personal bloggers. It has a fully responsive design with a customizable slider. It offers 7 different color schemes.

Business Skin III : fully customizable with built-in opt-in boxes for lead generation. 11 page templates are included.

Business Skin 4 : this template could work for corporate sites, hotels, and anything in between. It has 11 page templates with useful boxes and support for top e-mail service providers.

Vocation : a responsive and clean Thesis 2.x skin with plenty of opt-in forms, advanced customization options, and business-friendly features (e.g. Testimonials boxes).

Ribbon : this responsive template is built with bootstrap and has 9 templates, 16 color options, 20 background images, 17 boxes, 11 widgets, and 11 shortcodes. It is fairly easy to customize.

Portfolio skins for Thesis 2.1

When we think of portfolio themes, Thesis is not the first framework that comes to mind. But you could build attractive portfolios with it. Here are 4 Thesis portfolio templates that can help:

Readyfolio : has everything you need to showcase your latest works online. It is Genesis 2 and Thesis 2 friendly.

Derby : a quality business theme for Thesis and Genesis. It has a responsive design and a landing page template. The portfolio functionality is built-in.

NXFoscor : use this to bring your business online or promote your past work. It is built with bootstrap. You get 12 boxes, 13 shortcodes, and 10 widgets.

Thesis and Genesis are both great frameworks. We have covered plenty of attractive Genesis themes here in the past. If Thesis is your favorite framework, you may want to give the above Thesis 2.1 skins a look.

More WP Tips:

• 3 Magazine Child Themes for Thesis 2
• 5 Thesis Child Themes for News Sites
• 7 Attractive WordPress Business Themes for Thesis
• 5 Must See Thesis Theme Skin Shops

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Thesis WordPress Theme Review – Why We Use It

Almost every blog I comment on that belongs to my favorite bloggers uses Thesis. It is the first theme I recommend to small businesses and clients and there is only one other theme I even suggest they consider: the Genesis Framework.

IS THESIS BETTER THAN GENESIS?

Thesis and Genesis are different.  I prefer Thesis for my blogs and believe you might want to consider Genesis for a more product oriented blog.

We Recommend Serious Bloggers and Businesses Use ONLY Either Thesis Or  StudioPress Genesis for their blogs.

If you want to know more about Genesis or to compare the Genesis Framework to Thesis use these links:

• WordPress: StudioPress Genesis Framework
• See Ron Cripps’ @AffiliateXFiles WP Genesis Review
• See Kristi Hines @Kikolani Thesis vs Genesis – Comparing Premium WordPress Themes

Both of these themes are on my AAA Recommended Brands list that is linked from the top of the center column on every page of this blog and they are the only two I would seriously recommend anyone consider.

Why I NEVER Recommend Using Free WordPress Themes:

I’ll let these other experts explain the myriad reasons (that means too many to count!) for avoiding free WordPress Themes:

• ReadWriteWeb: The Hidden Dangers of Free WordPress Themes by Audrey Waters
• WPMU.org: Why You Should Never Search For Free WordPress Themes in Google or Anywhere Else By Siobhan McKeown

WHY USE THESIS THEME on WordPress?

Less down time (and tech support can be really expensive).

Whenever WordPress or a plugin gets updated there is a risk that the new version will not be compatible with WordPress,  your theme, or one of the plugins you’re using.

The more plugins you run and the more advanced your skills the higher the risk of conflicts.

There is an entire team behind Thesis that makes sure commonly used plugins are compatible and continue to be compatible BEFORE they roll out a new version.

They know when WordPress is going to be updated and they ensure that Thesis and common plugins are still going to work as expected. That means our blogs running Thesis will keep running.

Use a free theme and the next WordPress update may take you down – or worse – take the entire server you are on down – along with dozens of other sites.

Your hosting company will be VERY UNHAPPY and the first thing they will do is delete all your plugins. Hostgator has been known to flat out tell bloggers they can’t reinstall CommentLuv because they blamed it for a problem.

Hosting companies don’t want to diagnose the problem – they just want to make it go away. They are far more likely to tell you not to run your favorite plugins than to assist you in figuring out where the conflict is or even let you do it yourself because they don’t want to risk your blog taking down the server. They may want to charge you for tech support which could run into $100s or $1000s.

Running the Thesis Theme on your WordPress install = priceless peace of mind, tons of hours and aggravation saved, and a blog that stays online.

I have NEVER in ANY blog had a Thesis update cause a problem. I am NOT saying that could never happen because anything humans do is not infallable – but the team behind Thesis is super-sharp and they test thoroughly BEFORE our blogs are exposed to potential conflicts. That is priceless.

Free Themes Can Be Used for Nefarious Purposes Such as Including Security Exploits, replacing YOUR links with someone else’s affiliate links or linking your blog to bad neighborhoods and getting you banned.

PROFESSIONAL THEMES MANAGE INFRASTRUCTURE:

Advanced themes like Thesis manage much of what goes on behind the scenes in a blog such as no-following unimportant links, how comments are displayed and how the blog operates and is laid out.

AUTOMATIC FORMATTING

Thesis automatically formats your blog for different devices, monitor sizes and browsers. You need your blog (or what looks like a static site but is actually running on WordPress using Thesis) to display perfectly on EVERY visitors screen.

If you don’t use Thesis someone should be testing every resolution, browser, monitor size, device – that is a nightmare I don’t even want to think about – and because the Thesis Team does this so well I don’t have to worry about it!

MOBILE READY

Thesis automatically formats your blog for every device so you don’t have to use something else to make that happen.

I know Thesis does this well because when I’m in direct contact with someone I ask them what they are using and how well this blog displays and navigates on THEIR device. In every case they say the formatting is fine, they can navigate the site, and read and leave comments.

BUILT IN SEO

Thesis has built in SEO fields that allow you to optimize every page and post individually. This eliminates the need for plugins like All-in-one-SEO, Platimum SEO, etc. that are really necessary if you use a less advanced theme and want as much organic traffic as possible.

THESIS TECH SUPPORT

Thesis has exceptional people who provide tech support, a strong community who helps each other in their forum, and with almost all of our favorite collaborators using Thesis if you run into trouble we can help you get it fixed -fast!

I have asked for assistance for a blogger who accidentally broke something or got hacked or couldn’t get into their WP install and tagged a few people on Twitter and had 3-4 bloggers IMMEDIATELY offer to drop everything and assist!

I can’t guarantee that will always happen because even we have to eat and sleep sometime, but the odds are good other bloggers will come to your aid and if you’re running Thesis they will more easily be able to assist you.

If you are considering upgrading your theme we highly recommend Thesis .

THEME DESIGN

Thesis allows you to use ONE theme but make every site totally unique.  This blog, our golf store blog , our gift store blog , and thousands of other blogs use Thesis and no two look alike.

If you aren’t a designer or don’t have the time or desire to learn to customize Thesis do what we do – get a talented Thesis savvy blogger to do it for you! 

We know many bloggers who can do basic Thesis customization and if you need a real designer for a fancy custom graphic like the one in the image below, click that image to see what the best all-around WordPress expert we know and Thesis Skins provider Derek Semmler   can do for you.

Since we’re on the subject you might be interested in checking out all the cool blogs that are based on Thesis. Here are two galleries you can visit to see more customized Thesis themes:

• Thesis WordPress Theme Showcase Gallery – Almost 200 sites – all very different – based on Thesis
• Thesis Gallery Showcase – Here are 46 featured sites (some are on both lists).
• Official Thesis Web Site – Disclaimer: This link contains OUR affiliate link as does the yellow ad in the left column of our blog.

POWER BLOGGERS WHO USE THESIS:

Most of the major blogs about blogging that we frequent have selected it as “ THE ” Theme to use including these:

• Kristi Hines – @KristiHines 12 12 12 / @Kikolani 52 52 52 – Kristi knows and uses both Thesis and Genesis and has Thesis running on Kikolani.com – see her posts on Getting Started with Thesis (which covers how to actually hand code AND use Thesis), her three part series on WordPress Thesis Theme Customization , and her Thesis versus Genesis comparison .
• Kimberly Castleberry @AskKim WordPress Thesis 2.0 Release 
• Michael Gray – @GrayWolf – GrayWolf’s Wolf-Howl SEO Blog – His Take on the Benefits of Thesis

INTERVIEW WITH THESIS THEME DESIGNER CHRIS PEARSON:

• ProBlogger interview with Chris Pearson about Thesis

NEGATIVE REVIEWS OF THESIS:

The ONLY bloggers I have ever run across who do NOT like Thesis are those who are programmers and like to write their own code to control every aspect of their blogs. If that isn’t you, you can skip this section.

• WassupBlog – My First Impression of the Thesis Theme + Thesis Theme is Just Not Flexible Enough

MORE THESIS REVIEWS:

• SugarRae – @SugarRae 49 49 49 49 49 – Review of the Thesis WordPress Theme
• PremiumThemesReview – Thesis WordPress Theme Review
• Binary Turf @BinaryTurf 11 11 11 11 11 – Thesis WordPress Theme – A Critical Take
• Logos for WebSites – Recommends Thesis WordPress Template
• I’m sure I’ve forgotten some in my niche so if I forgot you don’t stress – just let me know and I’ll add your link

CUSTOMIZING THESIS WORDPRESS THEMES:

• 4 Great Ways to Customize a Thesis Theme

WHICH THESIS LICENSE TO CHOOSE:

If you have or plan to build many blogs get the developer’s license. If you only need it for one blog now, buy the personal license. You can always upgrade later.

If you plan to have someone else install your blog for you, obtain your license to use Thesis through them. You pay them and they pay DIYThemes for an additional blog under their developer’s license.

WHERE TO GET THESIS WORDPRESS LICENSES:

[DISCLAIMER: The links to Thesis in this post are affiliate links. Any blogger using Thesis probably has an affiliate link to Thesis so if decide to buy it you can support your favorite blogger by clicking on the link in their blog just before you buy. It does not cost you any more money to do this and bloggers are using it because it is that good – not because they might receive a commission.  ]

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Gail Gardner

Founder of GrowMap, Small Business Marketing Strategist, freelance writer and BizSugar Mastermind Community Manager. View all posts by Gail Gardner

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Thesis Theme Skins

Thesis theme for wordpress.

Check out this Thesis Theme for WordPress …

Free Thesis Theme Skins

Thesis Theme Skins are available at SiteSmarty.com . Head over and see what they have going on at their site.

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Free guide: 👀 The internet has changed— has your site changed with it?

About Thesis , the world’s first million-dollar WordPress Theme

F rom March 29, 2008, through October 1, 2012, Thesis ruled the world—it was used by celebrities, influencers, and everyone else in between.

In addition to becoming the first million-dollar WordPress Theme , Thesis introduced transformative concepts to the WordPress ecosystem:

• Custom PHP functions (2008)
• Design options (2008)
• Golden Ratio Typography (2011)

But on October 2, 2012, Thesis creator Chris Pearson did something nobody could have predicted…

He took the world’s favorite WordPress Theme and turned it into a platform that could power any Theme with the same functionality and flexibility that made Thesis so famous. 🤯

What is the modern version of Thesis ?

Thesis is a modular template and design system for WordPress. It’s what would happen if WordPress suddenly decided to replace its core template “system” 1 with something more robust that would enable you to:

• Build Themes with a visual interface instead of being forced to deal with clunky hybrid PHP + HTML files
• Turn code in template files into living HTML objects that can be edited, moved around, and extended for additional functionality
• Create dynamic CSS that adapts to user input
• Backup , restore , import , and export Theme data (templates, CSS, and associated options)

Thesis enhances your WordPress installation with this awesome functionality, but it does a hell of a lot more, too.

In the following sections, we’ll take a tour of what Thesis can do , and then we’ll examine how all this stuff fits together to become the ultimate enhancement for any WordPress website:

• Options — The foundation for any dynamic web app
• Boxes — Turn HTML into living objects with mutable properties!
• Skins — WordPress Themes comprised of Thesis Boxes

Note: We no longer sell Thesis directly, but you’ll be happy to know that Thesis technology is included in the Focus WordPress Theme .

The Basics: Adding Options to WordPress

Adding options is one of the most fundamental things Theme and Plugin developers must do if they wish to convey dynamic functionality to users. Here’s how the basic process works:

• Convey a <form> with options in an interface
• Process the options when the <form> is submitted
• Save options to the database
• Retrieve options from the database as needed

While this process is bad enough on its own, WordPress actually makes it worse by having an inconsistent and disorganized approach to options that appear in different locations.

For example, there are 4 major locations within WordPress where a developer might want to add options:

• admin pages — Theme and Plugin settings pages
• post meta — options inside the WordPress post editor
• terms — options for categories, tags, and taxonomies
• theme customizer — specialty design options

In what can only be described as pure madness, WordPress accepts options in a wildly different format for each location.

This makes absolutely no sense. The HTML specification consists of a finite number of input elements, and you only need a few of these elements to do practically anything:

• <input type="text" /> — basic text input
• <textarea> — expanded text input
• <input type="checkbox" /> — checkbox
• <input type="radio" /> — radio selector (either/or)
• <select> — dropdown selector

There are very clear patterns in play here. No matter where you’d like to convey options, you are going to be working with these basic input types.

Instead of leveraging these natural patterns and accepting a single, intelligible syntax for options, WordPress accepts a different syntax depending on where you’d like to convey your options.

This is perhaps the greatest shortcoming of the WordPress platform. And by extension, the solution to this problem is also one of the most important aspects of Thesis.

The Thesis Options API: A Translator for WordPress

The best way to think about the Thesis Options API is to consider it a translator for WordPress.

As explained above, WordPress requires you to speak at least 4 different languages to convey options wherever you want. This is grossly inefficient and fails to leverage patterns that could make this process easier.

To rectify this, the Thesis Options API establishes a single syntax for options elements called the Thesis Options API Array Format . Here’s how it works:

• You provide an array of options in Thesis Options API Array Format
• The Thesis Options API translates these options into the idiosyncratic syntaxes WordPress can understand

The Thesis Options API Array Format streamlines the process of adding options to WordPress.

And perhaps even better, it removes the need to slog through code and tutorials to figure out how to talk to this or that part of the WordPress Admin.

While the Thesis Options API is massively useful, it only covers part of the process. In practice, you still need to “handle” options—sanitization, saving, and retrieving—after delivering them to an interface.

Similar to basic options delivery, these processes exhibit patterns that can be leveraged for serious efficiency gains.

Unsurprisingly, WordPress offers zero leverage here, but that’s where more sophisticated Thesis components provide a huge boost.

Thesis Boxes: The Ultimate Website Building Blocks

L et’s shift gears and consider WordPress Themes, which are essentially just a combination of templates (HTML) and styles (CSS).

Templates are simply HTML output patterns. If you examine any WordPress Theme in detail, you’ll notice a lot of repetition between various templates and template parts.

Because of this repetition, attempting to change one thing in a Theme often necessitates changes to many different templates.

This is inefficient, and it’s also grossly technical because it requires customizers to manually edit template files.

But as we saw with options, we can use patterns to gain leverage and make template management easier and more powerful.

One way to do this is to turn repetitive HTML into objects that can:

• have unique properties
• be edited and moved around
• be repeated in multiple templates

Within Thesis, these HTML objects are known as Boxes .

It might be useful to think of Boxes as “living HTML.”

HTML that’s manually written in a file is dead. It’s an artifact.

But HTML that exists as a code object that can be manipulated and deployed wherever you want? It’s alive —you can edit it, move it around, and even enhance it over time.

These “living HTML” objects—Boxes—provide serious leverage and serve as the building blocks for Thesis templates.

And as we’ll soon discover, the utility of Boxes isn’t limited to templates and HTML output. In reality, Boxes are the perfect way to deliver any kind of functionality to a WordPress website.

Boxes Provide a Complete Options Solution for WordPress

Earlier, we saw how the Thesis Options API makes it easy to deliver options within WordPress.

But delivery —simply having options appear in an interface—isn’t the full picture. A complete system must also process, save, and retrieve options as needed.

Thesis Boxes achieve this and provide game-changing leverage via valet solutions for options in the following locations:

• Box settings pages
• terms (categories, tags, and taxonomies)

With this leverage in place, Thesis Boxes reduce the total options process to nothing more than the creation of a simple array to describe your options 🤯

Let’s look at a couple of examples to see how this works.

And here is all the code required to convey, process, save, and retrieve this data:

The code above is just a simple array that defines a text input. Notice how there’s no need to write any HTML; there’s no need to process or sanitize <form> data; and there’s no need to save or retrieve anything.

With the Thesis Box architecture, options “just work” when you declare them. Now THAT is easy!

Next, let’s take a look at the Title Tag Box 3 . As you may know, <title> tags are critical for SEO, but WordPress has never provided a way for you to enter <title> tag information in the post editor!

The Thesis Title Tag Box leverages Box architecture to deliver an input field precisely where you need it—in the post meta options of the post editor:

And now let’s look at the code required to deliver this option (and its associated character counter, which is an optional feature for text inputs in Thesis):

Post meta options use the module syntax variation of the Thesis Options API Array Format.

Once again, this is all the code required to cover an impressive amount of technical drudgery:

• Add a post meta module with Title Tag input to the WordPress post editor
• Process and sanitize this data to ensure information security when the form is saved
• Save this option to the database
• Retrieve this option to output it in the document <head>

Bottom line: Thesis Boxes make it easy to deliver options anywhere in WordPress.

Thesis Templates are just arrangements of Thesis Boxes

Templates are HTML output patterns. And as we’ve seen, Boxes are “live HTML objects.”

So what do you get when you put a bunch of Boxes together in a meaningful way? Templates!

But instead of consisting of a bunch of hybrid PHP + HTML files (like antiquated WordPress Themes), Thesis templates consist entirely of data —and this data is mostly just an output order for various Boxes.

You read that right. With Thesis, there are no template files .

This means you won’t need an FTP client to manage your templates. You won’t need to edit code. You won’t need to navigate the expansive and confusing landscape of WordPress template tags.

With Thesis, you can edit your templates in a powerful and intuitive visual interface :

Templates are just an arrangement of Thesis Boxes.

This significantly lowers the barrier to entry for customizations and levels the playing field between end users and developers.

And beyond all that? Building templates with Thesis Boxes is just plain fun!

Thesis Skins: WordPress Themes Built on Thesis

WordPress Themes are really just a combination of structure (HTML templates) and style (CSS).

In Thesis, these combinations of structure and style are called Skins.

We’ve already seen how Boxes and templates are sufficient to build a rock-solid website structure . Now it’s time to explore how to add some style .

With its variable-enhanced SCSS editor , Thesis delivers a dynamic CSS environment that can be leveraged to do incredible things.

The Thesis CSS Editor is enhanced with variables and an SCSS compiler.

For example, the Focus WordPress Theme —which is really a Thesis Skin—uses CSS variables to deliver Golden Ratio Typography :

• The user selects a font and font size in the Design Options
• Focus uses the Thesis GRT object to calculate Golden Ratio Typography values
• Focus updates CSS Variables with new values from Golden Ratio Typography
• Dozens of values get automatically updated in the CSS as a result
• The design is now proportionally optimized for the user’s custom settings

To understand why this is so great, you’ve got to understand the nature of most design customizations:

If you change one thing (like a font size), you probably need to change a lot of other things to maintain proportionality and to ensure everything looks good with the new settings.

This is a painstaking process, and it’s prone to errors because many changes are required in many locations in the CSS.

With the Thesis CSS editor, this process can be 100% automated, resulting in perfect adjustments every time.

The leverage here cannot be overstated. Because of the way the Thesis CSS environment works, it’s possible to create a complete CSS design system that responds dynamically to options and user input.

The biggest shortcoming of CSS has always been that it’s not a true programming language. It doesn’t have real variables, and it’s more of a syntactical language than a functional one.

But the Thesis CSS environment turns this weakness into a strength. Skins can leverage this to deliver infinite design outcomes with a level of precision that simply is not possible any other way.

Check out the Focus WordPress Theme to see an example of a Thesis Skin that features a true design system and the finest CSS output the world has ever seen.

Design and Display Options make Thesis Skins remarkably flexible!

The goal of any WordPress Theme is to serve as the ultimate foundation for whatever kind of website you’d like to build.

Of course, there’s an infinite array of things you might like to do with your website, so this means the foundation must be flexible enough to accommodate your needs.

For WordPress Themes, flexibility is a two-part equation:

• The CSS must change and adapt to a user’s design settings
• The HTML (templates) must be easy to modify—ideally, template elements can be turned on or off as needed

Thesis Skins achieve an unmatched level of flexibility through Design and Display Options.

In the same way that Boxes make it easy to deliver options within WordPress, Skins make it easy to deliver Design and Display Options that yield remarkable functionality.

Design Options are tied into the CSS environment and can modify CSS Variables each time options are saved. This gives Skins infinite design potential.

Next, the Display Options take advantage of a special feature of Thesis Boxes known as display filters . These simple on/off switches provide tremendous template flexibility ; here’s how they work:

• Boxes appear in Skin templates
• Not all sites require all the elements that appear in each template; for example, some sites might be better off without a Tagline in the header
• By turning off the Tagline in the Display Options, you can achieve the desired outcome without needing to modify templates directly

There’s another cool layer to the Display Options, too. Certain Boxes serve editable content , and you can control this content from the Display Options.

To understand how this works, consider a simple Text Box, which is basically just an easy way to include custom content (like opt-ins or ads) wherever you want.

Instead of editing templates or using complicated code to supply your custom content, you can edit the Text Box directly and include whatever you like:

Turn items in your templates on/off with the Display Options, and then use editable content to make the precise tweaks and customizations you want!

Thesis Skins can leverage this intelligent functionality to deliver an unbeatable website foundation.

The Focus WordPress Theme is so flexible because it features the ultimate implementation of Design and Display Options.

Thesis Skin Data Manager : The killer customization feature!

We’ve already seen how Thesis turns HTML and templates into highly efficient data.

We’ve looked at the CSS environment, which turns a static language into a dynamic powerhouse.

And we’ve explored the fantastic options capabilities that make any Thesis Skin the most flexible foundation for your WordPress website.

But we’re not done yet!

Whether we’re talking about templates, CSS, or options, we’re ultimately just talking about data .

Compared to files, data is extremely compact and therefore extremely portable .

The Thesis Skin Data Manager takes advantage of this portability by adding exciting capabilities for Skins:

• Backup: backup Skin data at any point
• Restore: restore Skin data—or even just a portion of the data—from any existing backup!
• Export: export Skin data so it can be installed on a different site
• Import: import Skin data—or even just a portion of the data—from an export file

This is a massive game-changer for customizations!

Now, instead of moving files between development and live sites , you can simply export and import Skin data. (Heck, you won’t even need an FTP client unless you’re also moving more advanced PHP customizations.)

And the backup/restore feature adds peace of mind while enabling greater risk-taking in development.

Want to try out a crazy new CSS feature? No problem—you can always restore a backup if anything goes wrong.

Or how about this—what if you wanted to make your design “pink for October?”

You could backup your current design, change certain colors to pink in the Design Options, and then restore your original backup once October ends.

As you can see, the Skin Data Manager isn’t just useful… it’s also fun!

So what the heck is Thesis ?

If Thesis Skins are analogous to WordPress Themes, then what is Thesis, exactly?

Thesis is potential.

Skins and Boxes are the actualization of this potential.

Thesis is a toolkit that makes it easy and fun to create these critical website assets.

And because every aspect of the platform has been ruthlessly optimized for performance, the Skins you create with Thesis are going to be significantly faster and more efficient than traditional WordPress Themes.

Finally, if you’d like to harness the power of Thesis for your WordPress website , there’s only one way to do it:

Ya gotta get Focus , the world’s fastest WordPress Theme and the only one designed for the way people use the internet in the age of social media.

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