How to Update WordPress Site With a New Theme
You have just bought a brand new theme for your WordPress site and you are over the moon. Your site looks more professional and the design is gorgeous. You want to update all the content on your site to match the new theme, but you are not sure where to start. Let’s go through the steps to smoothly update your WordPress site with a new theme.
The Basics
Before you begin changing anything on your site, you need to back it up. This will help you recover it if anything goes wrong. You can choose to use a free tool like WP-Clone to easily back up your entire WordPress site. You will not lose any content when you back up your site. With a new theme comes a complete set of templates that you can use to quickly rebuild your site. Therefore, you do not need to worry about losing any content.
Another thing to consider is to change the domain name of your site to match the new theme. In most cases, you can use the same hosting account as before and all you need to do is to point your domain name to the new WordPress installation. If you are installing the WordPress CMS on a dedicated hosting account, then make sure that the domain name is updated in the hosting account control panel.
Step 1: Disable All Plugins
Before you start changing anything on your site, you need to disable all the plugins. The best way to do this is from the WordPress dashboard. From the dashboard, click on the Plugins link in the left-hand column. You will see a list of all the plugins installed on your site, as shown in the figure below.
From this page, you can click on the Disable link to the right of each plugin to disable it. Once you have disabled all the plugins, you can proceed to Step 2.
Step 2: Install The New Theme
Once you have disabled all the plugins, you can proceed to install the new theme. It is a good idea to do this on a fresh WordPress installation. This will ensure that all the required files and configurations are in place and there are no errors. To install the new theme, navigate to Appearance from the dashboard and click on the Themes link in the left-hand column.
You will see a list of all the themes available for download from the WordPress repository. As shown in the figure below, choose the theme that you bought and click on the Activate button to install it.
This will take you to a new page where you can see a preview of how the new theme looks on your site. Make sure that you check all the boxes under the Theme Options section to get the desired result. If you have any questions about the theme, feel free to head back to the WordPress dashboard and search for FAQs or look for help in the WordPress support forums.
Step 3: Copy and Paste Your Old Post Into The New Installation
Once you have installed the new theme, you can start copying and pasting your old content into the new installation. In most cases, this is a straightforward process and there are no issues. However, if you have a lot of posts, then this could potentially take some time depending on your Internet connection speed.
To start with, you can simply use the Text widget to copy and paste your old posts into the new installation. As you make your way through the process of copying and pasting, you will see a message prompting you to enter a summary of each blog post. You can simply paste the text generated by the summary into your new blog post.
If you use image galleries or if you have multiple featured images per blog post, then it is best to use the Media widget to grab a snapshot of each blog post as you make your way through the process. Alternatively, you can manually grab a picture from your phone or computer and upload it to your site using the Media widget.
Step 4: Update The Posts one By One
Now that you have updated your entire post database with the new theme, you can look into updating the individual posts. To do this, you can either use the old method of editing your content one by one or use a plugin to make the process easier.
If you want to use the old method, you can create a backup of your site before you begin editing. This will be a good idea because as you scroll down the page, you will see a blue bar on the left indicating that content will be presented in a new and improved format. If you click on this bar, you will see your old content in all its glory. Therefore, you can simply use the arrow keys on your keyboard to navigate your way through each post to make changes.
If you use a plugin to create your site’s content, then you can simply activate the plugin and begin making changes to your site. As you edit your content, the plugin will automatically update the styling to match your theme. Once you are done making changes, click on the Update Content button to flush the changes to the database. If you have a lot of posts, then this could take some time depending on how fast your Internet connection is.
Step 5: Test And Tweak Once More
Now that you have updated your WordPress site with the new theme and you have tested it by using the Preview button next to each post to see how the changes look, it’s time to go through one more round of testing and tweaking. There are a few things that you can do to make your site look even better than it already does. For instance, you can change the homepage to feature a lot more content and remove some of the sidebar items.
If you want to remove some of the sidebar items, then you can do this by going to the Settings → Reading tab under the Blog section in your WordPress dashboard. You will see a box labeled Show sidebar on the homepage. Simply uncheck the box to remove the blog posts from the sidebar on your home page.
The above steps will help you update your WordPress site with a new and improved theme. As you can see, changing a theme is not as hard as you think it is. The best part is that you can do all of this without losing any content. If you encounter any issues while updating your site with a new theme, then simply remove the theme and revert back to your original WordPress installation. Now you know the basics and you are ready to begin customizing your site.