Whether you’re starting a brand new WordPress website or just feel unsatisfied with your current one’s design, you might find yourself routinely wondering what themes other sites are using. If you find out, you can create similar effects on your own platform. However, most sites don’t broadcast this information.
Fortunately, you don’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to solve this mystery. There are plenty of WordPress theme detectors you can use to find out exactly what template a website is using. In most cases, all you have to do is enter an URL and sit back while the information you need comes to you.
In this article, we’ll introduce you to six tools that can help you answer the question “What WordPress theme is that”? First, we’ll recap what themes are and why you might want to check for them on others’ sites. Let’s get right to it!
In This Article 🔭
What Is a WordPress Theme? 🤔
You’re probably familiar with the concept of themes, but here’s a quick review. There are three primary components that make up WordPress. The platform’s main files, also known as ‘core’, are what you download from WordPress.org.
Plugins extend your website’s functionality. Themes, on the other hand, are essentially a template that you can install on your website. They enable you to use custom styles for your pages and their components, such as widgets, headers, footers, and layouts.
Considering WordPress’ staggering popularity, it shouldn’t come as a surprise there are tens of thousands of themes to choose from. That selection includes several free options, which you can primarily find in the WordPress Theme Directory:
You also have access to premium themes, which come in as many flavors as you can imagine. Some are worlds unto themselves and include full-blown page builders, custom sections, specialized functionality, and more. You can find them in online marketplaces or buy them directly from their developers.
What theme you should use will depend on what type of WordPress website you want to build as well as its branding and ‘personality’. Ideally, you’ll find one that matches the tone and subject matter of your content and makes your site easy for visitors to navigate.
What Theme Does This Site Use? Why You Might Want to Know ☝️
As we already mentioned, there are tens of thousands of WordPress themes available, and they’re distributed by a variety of sources. Narrowing down the perfect one for your site is no small task.
Choosing a theme is especially tricky because it’s not always easy to change it once your site is up and running. From a technical standpoint, you simply have to navigate to Appearances > Themes in your WordPress dashboard and install and activate the one you want.
However, switching themes after your site has been active for some time could have repercussions. Content that fits nicely into layouts for your old theme might not mesh well with your new one. You may lose certain widgets or header and footer elements.
Plus, you might have to carry out a full-fledged rebranding process to make sure your new theme meshes well with your logo, social media accounts, and other assets. Picking a theme that’s going to work for you for a long time will save you from having to do all this work on a recurring basis.
So, if you’re browsing the web and find a site with a design that resonates with you, it’s worth looking into whether you can apply it to your own WordPress installation. The perfect theme doesn’t come around every day. You don’t want to pass it up if you happen to stumble upon it.
6 WordPress Theme Detectors and Checkers of 2021 💡
Before we begin, it’s important to understand that not all WordPress theme checkers will return the same results. Some tools use different databases and not all of them will be able to identify every theme.
If you want to ensure that you get the most accurate results possible, we recommend that you use multiple website theme checkers. If several of them return the same results, then you can be sure you’re on the mark as to what theme a specific website is using. With that in mind, let’s take it from the top.
1. WordPress Theme Detector by Satori
WordPress Theme Detector was created by the folks at Satori Studio. It’s capable of taking a URL and giving you a simple report that includes all relevant theme information, including its name, author, description, version, and a link to its official homepage.
One upside of using WordPress Theme Detector is that the tool is capable of identifying themes even if the website minimizes its code, which tends to remove a lot of identifying information from the source. The team behind WordPress Theme Detector also constantly updates its database so it’s able to output accurate results (even for new themes).
In case a website uses a highly customized theme, cannot be accessed, or does not use WordPress at all, WordPress Theme Detector will output a message notifying you about the specific issue.
We took WordPress Theme Detector for a test run and found it to be quite accurate:
It was able to detect our customized theme with no problems.
2. WordPress Theme Detector and Plugins Detector
The WordPress Theme Detector and Plugins Detector Chrome extensions are remarkably easy to use and an excellent solution if you use Google Chrome as your default browser. It doesn’t require you to visit a third-party site or input an URL to find out what theme a website is using. All you have to do is click on a button.
The results will appear right in your browser:
Once you’ve noted the theme’s name, developer, and version, you can carry on with whatever you were doing before. If you anticipate looking up what theme a website is using quite often, this is likely the best solution for you.
3. WP Theme Detector
WP Theme Detector (also known as WPTD) enables you to see what plugins and themes a given site is using. If you think a website you admire runs on WordPress, all you have to do is enter its URL and click on the button.
WPTD will analyze the link for you and display what theme and plugins the site is utilizing:
This tool provides more extensive information than most. It was able to detect our site’s child theme as well as its parent theme and shared information on their providers as well. This makes it easy to quickly purchase a theme you’ve detected if you decide it’s the right one for your site.
This should work not only for traditional themes but drag-and-drop WordPress themes as well.
4. ScanWP
Scan WP is a high-quality WordPress theme detector. This tool can detect the majority of plugins and themes being used on specific WordPress sites. Just enter the URL of the one in question and it’ll do the rest.
In our experience, Scan WP provides some of the most thorough theme reports among other similar tools. With each analysis, you’ll see the theme’s name, tags, version, where you can purchase it, and more:
For some themes, Scan WP even includes pricing information. Plus, you can also access a list of some of the plugins the website you want to analyze uses (although this tool only includes their names).
Keep in mind that if you’re using a custom theme, Scan WP might not be able to provide a full report. However, it can usually give you at least some basic information.
5. What WordPress Theme Is That?
What WordPress Theme Is That? (WWPTIT) conveniently answers the question its name poses. It’s free to use and can even pick up on child and parent themes. To take things one step further, it will also detect what WordPress plugins are being used on the target site.
Out of all the tools we tested, WWPTIT is one of the fastest. This detector will tell you the name of the theme any WordPress website is using, and share a link to its download page in addition to its description, author, version information, and more:
In our test run, it was able to find our site’s parent theme, Hello Elementor (although it didn’t pick up on our child theme).
6. SoftwareFindr
SoftwareFindr theme detector is a free online tool that enables you to quickly identify if a website is powered by WordPress or not. On top of this information, it will also let you see the name of the site’s theme, as well as its author, description, version, tags, and license:
All the key information is linked to help you find the theme where it’s available for purchase and/or download. Although its results aren’t as extensive as some of the other tools on this list, SoftwareFindr is a quick and easy solution.
How to Find Out What Theme a WordPress Site Is Using Manually 🎨
In the event that none of the WordPress theme detectors we’ve listed can identify the one you’re interested in, there are a few other tricks you can try. First, some themes include a credit in the footer by default:
You can scroll down to the bottom of the site you’re looking at and see if it states what theme it’s using. However, this strategy isn’t very reliable as many site owners choose to remove the credit from their footers.
Another option to detect a WordPress theme is to try to figure out the site’s active theme by looking at its source code. To do this, navigate to the website in question. Right-click anywhere on the page and select Inspect:
Next, you’ll want to search for the site’s stylesheet, which is a file named style.css. The path for this file will include the theme’s directory, and therefore its name:
If you want more information, you can actually follow the link containing the theme’s name to see the stylesheet itself. It will include the theme’s author, description, version number, tags, license, and more.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) 📝
Any of the WordPress theme detection tools we listed in this post will be able to tell you whether or not the site you’re looking at uses WordPress. If you’re particularly interested in what CMS a site runs on, we recommend testing it using Built With to find the answer.
Alternatively, you can try accessing a site’s WordPress login page by navigating to website.com/wp-admin. If that doesn’t work, you can also use your browser’s developer tools (right click > Inspect) and search for the site’s wp-content directory.
Many of the WordPress theme detectors we reviewed above can also tell you what plugins a site is using. For a list of tools to help you accomplish this task, see our post on WordPress Plugin Detectors.
Wrapping Up 🎀
Most of the theme detectors in this list work almost instantly. All you need to do is enter a URL (or click a button) and you can find out in seconds what theme a website is using. The next time you run into a gorgeous design you’d like to consider for your own online property, you can quickly pinpoint who created it and where you can download it yourself.
In our opinion, WP Theme Detector (WPTD) is the most accurate and thorough tool for the job. If you’re on the hunt for a new theme, you may also want to check out our list of the 35 fastest options for WordPress websites, or our roundup of minimalist themes.
Once your new theme is set up, we can help you support it with our premium WordPress Care Plans. With WP Buffs, you won’t need to worry about updates or backups. Our highly skilled team will take care of these tasks and more for you!
Want to give your feedback or join the conversation? Add your comments 🐦 on Twitter.
Image Credit: Unsplash.
