The purpose of a theme

Long theory stort: The purpose of a theme is to help you customize the look and feel of the website. But a theme shouldn’t touch the content of the website.

Long theory

So far, we have only worked with WordPress Core Software.

Inside the WordPress ecosystem, the Core Software is responsible for helping you:

1. Create and manage pages (done)
2. Create and manage blog posts (done)
3. Create and manage users
4. Managing the media library
5. Install and manage Themes
6. Install and manage Plugins

But the Core Software is not responsible for the website’s design.

Instead, a theme is responsible for it.

Let me show you what I mean.

Here is the Homepage of the website we have built so far:

This Homepage looks a certain way because of the “Twenty Twenty-Three” theme that is currently active on our website:

But look what happens to the website design when we change to a different theme called “Twenty Twenty-Two”:

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Did you see that?

The entire design of the Homepage got changed.

The colors, the content layout, the header, the footer, etc.

In fact, when we change the theme, the entire website’s design will get changed. Not just the Homepage.

That is what a theme does to your website—changing its design.

Important: A theme doesn’t modify the content of the website

If you observe the above screenshots and videos, the content, such as page/post headlines, images, and post content, remained the same when we switched themes.

Only appearance, such as Font size, colors, layout, etc., changed.

So, I can’t stress this enough.

If it does, it is a theme that follows bad practices, and you should avoid using it at all costs.

Anyway, in the next lesson, we will talk about the website’s Header, Footer, and Sidebar areas.