With 30% market share, WordPress is leading the world of content management system. After choosing WordPress platform, the first thing comes in the mind of admin is to which type of theme is good: Custom WordPress Theme or Premium WordPress Theme.
This is indeed a crucial decision because a theme affects both design and functionality of a website. The first thing you will need to decide is if your requirements can be met by a premium theme or if you need a completely customized theme which is developed just for you. You can ask yourself following questions:
– Do you want anything unique in your web app?
– Do you need a strong call-to-action or want to convert your visitors into customer?
– Do you need only those features in theme that your project needs?
– Do you want to have more control on the functionalities of themes?
If answer of all above questions is yes, then you definitely need custom WordPress theme. However, there are pros and cons of both of these themes, which is what I will explain in this blog post.
CUSTOM WORDPRESS THEME
Pros
There are mainly two big advantages of custom themes. The first benefit with this theme is that you’ll be the only company and/or person sporting that theme. With millions of blogs running on WordPress platform, a premium theme is bound to be used by many other bloggers. So, you will have a big advantage in terms of keeping yourself apart from industry competitors
The second advantage of WordPress theme customization is its custom functionality according to your business needs. A pre-made or premium theme may have a plethora of functionalities but only a few may be useful for your business. On the other hand, a custom theme can have all of the custom elements that you will need to succeed in your niche.
Cons
One of the prime cons for someone considering a custom theme for WordPress is its high cost. A good and feature rich custom WordPress theme can cost you hundreds or thousands of dollars. So according to budget, this reason could be an immediate deal breaker for many people and companies. However, there are many offshore WordPress theme development companies that can offer you the service at the market leading prices. You can outsource your theme development project and get you theme prepared for less cost.
The other thing, you should look into before deciding on a custom WordPress theme is whether or not future bugs fixing, updates, etc. are going to be addressed by the theme developer. If they don’t provide it, it is advised to find another developer that can jump in where they leave off.
PREMIUM WORDPRESS THEME
Pros
There are also some pros to premium WordPress themes and the first is its affordability. While some premium WordPress themes may be more costly than others, they generally stay under $100. So, if you find any premium WordPress theme that meets all your business needs (which is difficult to find), then you can save a lot of money.
The second big advantage for premium themes is its future-proofing. Not all premium themes are made equal, but the best ones come with good support, regular updates, and a large/active community that can help you with troubleshooting, customizations, etc. One thing you should keep in mind that some premium WordPress theme stops providing you support if you have done some customization in the theme.
Cons
The cons of a premium theme largely depend on who you buy from. Is their code W3C compliant? Do they follow the best coding practices? What’s their theme support like? Do they have an active community for troubleshooting? What’s their frequency for the update? And so on.
The another con that’ll always follow you no matter which premium theme you choose is limited or no customizability. In most of the cases, you will have to stay within the boundaries set up by that theme developer and can customize only basics features like theme fonts, colors, and images.
