With millions of blogs out there it takes lots of work to stand out from the crowd if you’re a writer. Plenty of people make a living as a writer, but it all starts with marketing yourself with a quality WordPress website.
WordPress themes for authors and writers help you showcase your portfolio to sell your freelance services. You can even use these themes to post samples of your new novel or short story. Many writers use WordPress themes to start extensive blogs to outline a single subject like their travels to Europe or thoughts on the economy.
Regardless of what type of writer you are, you need a WordPress theme that features your writings and pulls in readers with beautiful photos and other media. That said, let’s take a look at some of the best WordPress themes for writers.
IMPORTANT!After choosing one of these free wedding themes, you will need a self-hosted WordPress website in order to use it.
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GET 40% OFF HOSTING » - Choose a Domain: Once you're at Bluehost, you'll need to pick a new domain where your blog or website will be visible to the public web. Best of all... at Bluehost your domain is free.
- Install WordPress: At some hosts you have to manually install WordPress. Not at Bluehost. Just log into your dashboard and click the install button and everything is take care of for you.
- Install Your Theme:When you've found the perfect theme for your new website, use this page as guidance on how to proceed with the installation.
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PERSONAL
The Personal WordPress theme is the perfect platform to launch a new blog or writing platform or an ideal theme to convert an existing site that needs a facelift. The design is light and open with all the modern features you have come to expect from top-quality theme developers. It offers 9 frontpage layouts that you have to see to believe and comes with built-in support for audeo, video, text, sliders and many more post-types and formats.
If you’re a video blogger this theme has everything you will need to support your business with 6 beautiful video archive layouts and support for Vimeo, YouTube, and DailyMotion. If you’re a podcaster or audio blogger you’re going to love the array of SoundCloud layouts and tools supporting audio embedding. Last but not least if you’re a writer and are looking for a text based format you’ll love the options for magazine style layouts that will showcase your work the very best light.
SIMPLE STORY THEME
Here’s an option that has served writers well throughout the years. It’s a theme called Simple Story, and it has all the features you need to captivate your readers and show them that you’re an artist when it comes to crafting words. For example, the parallax header provides overlaying text for a brief description of the site, but it also offers a taste of what’s to come in terms of creativity. The one page layout is a nice touch, and the backend customizer minimizes the time you spend on designing, producing more time for your writing. The call to action buttons and headers can be scattered throughout your page, enabling you to share information and links about products such as books. The About Us section is always crucial for bloggers and writers, since visitors won’t stick around unless you show some credibility.
All of the elements on the Simple Story page transform to more user friendly sizes when viewed on mobile devices, and this is helpful for your blog area, since so many people are going to read your content on phones and tablets. Another cool part of the blog is the Latest Articles module, so folks can see your most recent article snippets once landing on your homepage. Along with shortcodes, a contact form and several column layouts, the Simple Story theme is a wise choice for bloggers, writers and journalists who want to ramble on about serious, or fun, topics.
LARA MULTI-PURPOSE THEME
Writers rejoice, because the Lara WordPress theme offers an amazing chance for writers of all types to share their work and make it look beautiful without much design work. When you check out the theme demo, you’ll notice that a beautiful header area is available for you to explain yourself as a writer and talk about the books or articles you’ve written. The Learn More button helps for those who may want to send readers to other places like book sales pages or your full blogs. A photo gallery/portfolio works nicely for those who are completing freelance work, while the testimonials share how past freelance clients have been satisfied with your work. This is a one page theme, so readers don’t have to skip around your website to locate your best content.
We particularly enjoy the blog post preview slider, which highlights a portion of your article and includes a small featured image, prompting people to click through to read. Part of being a writer is focusing on your craft, so the shortcodes enable you to spend more time writing instead of designing elements like columns and buttons. You’ll also find several page templates for multiple columns and full width layouts. The best part for writers is the blog, since it has a huge featured image at the top of each post, and it provides a minimalist style so all attention remains on your written work.
TYPIST
The Typist theme is one of my favorites for writers, because the minimalist design is exactly what every writer needs. There’s no reason for all the bells and whistles when you can choose a WordPress theme that provides the space, functionality and cleanliness that this theme offers.
Typist is a responsive theme that fluidly moves around when people flick through to other pages. The customization is straightforward so you don’t have to be an advanced website developer to know exactly how to get your website up and running. The sidebar allows widgets, and you can always change around the post formats depending on what you plan on sharing with your readers.
WINTERSONG PRO THEME
The Wintersong Pro Theme is a great solution for writers, and it comes from the folks at StudioPress. This is a child theme for the Genesis framework, meaning it provides just about all the customization options out there, and when you makes a change to your child theme, none of the customization modifications will be lost, since it all gets saved with the framework. This is one of the simplest of the writing themes, with beautiful white space and crisp modules. The goal with the theme is the avoid clutter, and it achieves that rather well.
Wintersong Pro comes with a custom header for giving an introduction to what your writing is all about, along with a custom menu for sending people to the right content on your site. The fixed width layout is perfect for keeping eyes towards the middle of the page, where most of your writing will reside. The theme includes a landing page, which is ideal for getting people to buy your books or any other writings you may come up with. Not to mention, the theme is completely responsive, meaning that users can view your content on a phone or tablet without any problems. Finally, the theme options are some of the best you can find, allowing for both advanced users and beginners to have an easy time.
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READOLOG
With Readolog you can share your creations with all readers no matter what it is you write about. The minimalist theme works well for sharing your resume and portfolio, and you can also think about just including a blogroll if you’re more interested in publishing a constant flow of your adventures.
The shortcode manager is essential for just about any type of writer who wants to remain productive and efficient. The theme comes with seven different post formats to add some variety to your writing, and the theme is completely responsive for looking at the website on any platform you desire. I particularly enjoy the simplicity and elegance of this theme, so you can always share your stories without distracting your readers.
THE HIPSTER
The Hipster is a responsive theme designed particularly for blogging. It works well with widgets, and you can upload your logo within a few seconds if you plan on using it as a freelance writing platform. I like that the theme has a flat design and lets you move around components on the homepage pretty easily.
The theme is actually a long blogroll, nicely styled and intertwined with other components like widgets and tabs. You can even put quotes and testimonials right in the middle of your blog roll to show off what your past clients thought about you.
DIVI
The Divi theme is one of the most popular themes on the market right now, and it’s mainly because you can modify the theme to make it look completely unique to your own brand. I like the theme for writers because you can quickly put together a stunning portfolio without having to learn anything about website design.
It’s a smart and flexible theme that works for the smallest of writing business operations. The Divi Builder is a striking drag and drop editor, so you no longer have to play around with the website files to make small and even large changes. The theme is completely responsive and you can choose from one of the many premade layouts if you’d rather not start from scratch.
THE THINKER
Every writer likes to believe they are an intellectual person, so The Thinker theme is a nice way to blow up your ego. All jokes aside , this theme is one of the nicer options in terms of the WordPress themes for authors. The theme incorporates the Soliloquy Slider for stunning graphics that slide around on your homepage. You can also use different page templates to present your content in various formats. This feature is wonderful to ensure that your presentation never gets old.
The color options and theme customization features work well for anyone who doesn’t want to fiddle around with code for hours. I really enjoy the elegance and simplicity of this theme, since you can use it for your freelance business or to simply show off your recent ramblings.
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PARALLAX PRO
The Parallax Pro theme is another option that works well for writing portfolios, since it works off of the Genesis framework for the ultimate customization. The theme comes with a Parallax slider, so the slider images move a little slower than the actual page when someone scrolls down. You can also choose from five colors styles to brand your website, and the landing pages are wonderful for selling your books or writing guides.
It’s a mobile responsive theme, but the true power comes into play with the custom headers and backgrounds. You can basically drop in high resolution photos to spice up your writings and improve the visualizations for your readers.
THE NOVELIST
The Novelist is a high quality WordPress theme for writers who, you guessed it, are writing a novel. Basically, the theme looks like a real book, where you can flip pages and only see the content shared. It breaks away from the traditional web layouts, so you can focus on the written content. Forget about tons of little buttons and tabs. This theme provides an elegant solution for all writers out there.
The theme is responsive and comes with some nice logo customization features. I particularly like the WP Theme Customizer and the full screen image backgrounds.
LITERATUM - JUST WRITE
The Literatum – Just Write theme provides one of the more visual ways to document your adventures and travels. To start, you can designate featured images for every category, improving the visual nature of your blog and invoking curiosity in your readers.
The theme also provides interview support, so you can convert any normal post into an interview format, with questions and answers. This works well for those writers who seek out important minds in our world to share their perspective with other people. You also receive beautiful icons, integration with social media, and one of the nicest interfaces I’ve ever seen for writers.
UBERTO
Uberto comes from the people atCSSIgniter, and it works great on any device, pushing your readers to consume your content on tablets, phones and computers. The minimalist design is perfect for writers, putting the focus on what matters most to your readers. The header image features overlaying text and buttons that you can manipulate to push people to your best content.
The varying post formats ensure that your posts standout in their own unique ways, and the custom widgets are nice for placing items for social networking, About page previews and Flickr. The multiple color schemes help with branding, and the translation ready platform works well for reaching out to people all over the world.
BUZZBLOG
The BuzzBlog theme is ideal for writers and authors, because it offers a clean and personal layout for connecting with your readers and placing attention on your writing. The powerful admin panel works wonders for webmasters of all experience levels, and the fully responsive design helps with viewing on all devices. The theme is translatable, and the 10 predefined styles assist in bringing your own design preferences to the forefront. A widget manager helps you create your site in a shorter time, and the shortcode builder is ideal for placing design components all over your site within seconds.
The BuzzBlog WordPress theme comes with over 670 Google fonts, further strengthening your branding possibilities, and the full social media support displays your Facebook and Twitter pages and posts to build your followings. As a bonus, you receive unlimited colors to play around with and find the best shade that represents your writing style.
LARGO THEME
The idea behind the Largo Theme is for allowing writers to craft long form articles and stories, without all the clutter. Build immersive experiences for your readers, and help inspire the world with your own words. The theme comes in a wide format, using up all of the screen space. Not to mention it provides deep integration with Aesop Story Engine, offering the ultimate storytelling experience.
Typekit fonts are included to display a more professional or artistic font on your site. The commenting system is the most unique part of this theme, since they sit on the side of your articles, using inline referencing to keep the conversation going and allowing people to comment on particular sentences or paragraphs in the post. Each article image is full width, bringing a media-rich layout to the user, and the theme is completely responsive for viewing on tablets and other mobile devices.
SIXTEEN NINE
Sixteen Nine serves as a wonderful theme for writers and authors, because the Genesis framework is the quintessential option for customization and cleanliness. The goal of this theme is to provide a simple, yet stunning interface for displaying your visual and verbal personality. The responsive design comes with a custom background for sharing any photos on the entire site, and you get two layout options to help with branding a bit.
The custom header is a nice bonus, and the custom menus allow you to customize where you want to send people when they land on your site. The theme also has landing pages for building that sales page for your next best seller. Not to mention, the navigational menu is arranged to the side of your posts, ensuring nobody gets lost when looking for a new article to read.
SIMPLETON
Sometimes a theme’s name tells the whole story, and the Simpleton theme has one of those names. The super clean and lightweight WordPress theme offers a flexible way to show off your recent writing. The fully responsive theme adjusts to the device that people are viewing it on, and the unlimited color schemes work nicely for when you want to change components to something more suitable for your writing brand.
Enhance the visuals on your site by changing around the background, and use shortcodes to implement items like blockquotes, captions and other elements. The custom widgets minimize the need for lots of plugins, and it turns your homepage building experience into somewhat of a drag and drop work process. The lightbox feature is ideal for showing off your photos, and the Adsense optimization brings up opportunities for making money from your site. Not to mention, the theme is ready for translation to bring in new readers from all around the world.
GRATEFUL
The Grateful WordPress theme is an ideal solution for writers who crave a simple, yet elegant blogging platform with media support. The theme includes multiple color variations, which works wonders for branding your site and showing off your creative flair. The responsive layout assists when people are viewing the site on the go, while the WordPress post formats add some variety to your writings. The theme is highly customizable for both advanced users and beginners, and you can utilize shortcodes for quickly implementing anything from buttons to columns, without the need for coding.
A contact form is also included, allowing you to keep in touch with your readers and gain feedback from people who would like to critique your work. Advanced typography options are included, helping you brand your site better, while the custom background image is there for branding and maybe even to provide a picture of yourself. The Grateful theme works with the Facebook open graph, helping you share quickly to Facebook, since it grabs items like a featured image and post description, pushing more people to click on your Facebook posts. Along with translation features and demo content, the Grateful theme is a solid choice for any writer.
FABLE
The Fable WordPress theme is one of the most popular choices for those who are interested in sharing their writing online. Why is this the case? Because writing is all about putting your message at the front and center, and this theme helps you do that. With a responsive layout, everyone who works off of mobile devices can quickly reference what you have to say. You’ll also notice that the large typography is centered in the middle of the page, bringing full attention to what has been written. Branding is a breeze with the help of an unlimited color pallet, and the complete localization of your content means that everyone should be able to understand what you’re saying.
The shortcodes provide beautiful buttons, columns and other designs, all of which can be created without touching a line of code. You also get page templates for making pages for login, archives, blogs and contact forms. As you can see, a full fledged blog is supported through the Fable theme, which means that you can give out free content to your readers and and start boosting your search engine results.
FUN THEME
Check out the Fun Theme if you’d like an elegant, somewhat feminine and clean WordPress theme for your writing. The key to writing successfully is creating a platform that makes you feel good about yourself. This theme comes with WooCommerce integration, which is ideal for selling digital and physical items. Not to mention, you can use a wide selection of widgets and place them in footers and sidebars. The header uploader is all about making it easier for the designer. Not to mention, it helps with showing what your website is all about.
The entire Fun Theme is mobile responsive, meaning that anyone can load up your website on a tablet or smartphone and read the content perfectly. Two color options are built into the theme, allowing for a default or sparkle theme. You can also integrate this with recipes plugins, in case you’re more of a food blogger than anything else. Along with ways to build email lists, and some beautiful designs, you can’t go wrong with the Fun Theme.
PUBLISHER
The Publisher theme rings true to its name, since it brings together all your written content and lets you make it even better with videos, photos and other media. The eclectic theme works similar to a scrapbook where you can move around different components on your homepage and style them however you want. The theme incorporates a feature called Infinite Post loading which speeds up your site by slowly loading page portions as the reader scrolls.
The Publisher theme works great for writers who don’t have a clue when it comes to building websites. It offers a theme customizer for uploading your logo, moderating the site title and changing your background. My favorite part of this theme is that you can take your featured image and turn it into a large gray scale background for your post, turning your writings into a more stylized experience.
EXPRESS
The Express theme is the ultimate portfolio theme if you need to create a website for your freelance writing business. The layout works perfectly since it all remains on a single page. Your visitors can just scroll throughout the single page, which prevents confusion that arises from multiple pages.
You can also upload multiple images to a single portfolio item, so if you completed a few projects for one client, share them all on the website. You can also include links and media for every portfolio item on your website.
BOOK
The Book theme works well for anyone writing a book. I wouldn’t recommend it for someone trying to run a freelance writing business, but for those out there trying to write stories and share them with others. This theme is the ideal, one-column format so no one has to flip around to other pages to see your newest chapters. The custom headers and backgrounds allow you to change the branding depending on what books or stories you are trying to sell.
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When it comes to WordPress themes for writers and authors I tend to focus on the options that are responsive and simple. You want a theme that showcases your work without forcing your reader to do much work on their end.
That’s it! Let us know in the comments section if you have any questions about choosing a WordPress theme as a writer. Can you think of any other themes that are perfect for the scribes out there?
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