Design
25 Bestselling Premium WordPress Themes in 2012
9Web design projects usually start in one of two ways. Clients will either have a very specific understanding of what they’re looking for (they might even point you towards existing branding materials or templates), or they’ll have no idea at all, save for a few generalities like “clean,” “corporate,” or “clever.” There are occasionally clients that sit somewhere in the middle, but after further exploration, they often begin to lean towards one or the other extreme.
Whether your client is super specific or very vague about the particulars of their design needs, professional templates can often serve as a great starting point to either bring specificity to a formless design idea, or match the particular preferences of a meticulously-planned project. Many of these themes have a surprising amount of features and functions that allow you to help your client make aesthetic decisions and gain a thorough understanding of what they want.
Below are the 25 best-selling WordPress themes of 2012, all of which have been tailored to suit a wide variety of clients and purposes.
Merchant
U-Design
SMPL
LeGourmet
Modernize
Drawar
Karma
Rustik
Sentient
SmartStart WP
Red Fred
Striking
Whitelight
Klix
King Size
Trim
Socialite
MayaShop
Gleam
Digitalis
Core Minimalist Photography Portfolio
Pub & Restaurant
Flare
Exciter
Music
Do you have a favorite (or least favorite) theme from the list above? Do you notice any trends within the year’s most popular themes? Do you prefer starting a design project with a professional theme, or would you rather start entirely from scratch?
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- WordPress Plugins for Graphic Designers and Photographers
- The Inside Secrets of Logo Development: Part 1
Yes, these are all very good themes and have sold well. Thanks for putting this together. I hope to see our theme, Creativio, in this list very soon http://themetrunk.com/creativio
I’ll be glad if slider usage ever drops and I think WordPress themes are a major pusher of them. They are like a newspaper with self-turning pages that couldn’t care less if you’ve finished reading or not. So annoying, especially when there’s no pause feature.
Agreed. Lots of times they just aren’t needed, but clients see them everywhere, so they want one too.
Hi Mike, good point, but don’t most of them pause when you mouse over? I’m sure I’ve seen a few that act this way.
Have to agree I don’t like automated sliders as they cause too much distraction.
I am just starting in the world of wordpress and came across ‘Modernize’ theme above and was surprised to find that customizing it is fully automated — they have some youtube videos showing how it’s done. Is this the way all of the themes shown above easy to customize?
The only thing I didn’t like was that when I did view source it was all minimised which is a shame if you were planning to do more specific customization on the server side php or client side front end.
Some of these themes are reputable.
What is your criteria/decision for listing them as “the 25 best-selling WordPress themes of 2012″.
I agree about sliders and in fact I probably like more a website without them, I visit websites and I don’t really pay attention to only the first slide.
It depends on your theme. Some themes show great sliders while the other don’t. For example, you can take a look at Sharpness Theme from ColorLabs. I think the slider is big and enough to grab your attention immediately
What data was used to make them top 20? I’ve used a few of them so I don’t doubt it.