Nowadays, ensuring your website loads quickly is more important than ever. Not only does a slow-loading site frustrate visitors but it also leads to lost of potential customers. Also, Google takes PageSpeed (which is a part of Core Web Vitals) into account when ranking websites for search results. This is why a fast WordPress theme matters. In this article, we’ll look at some of the fastest WordPress themes out there with PageSpeed scores and why these WordPress themes might be faster than others.
Things to Remember Before You Choose a Theme
When choosing a WordPress theme, it is essential to remember these things:
Make Sure to Test the Theme Before Use
Some themes may be faster than others, but trying a theme on your own site is always good practice before going live. Many people just don’t bother testing their sites and then discover later that their new theme is slowing down their site or making it hard to navigate.
Do yourself a favor and ensure that the theme you choose works well with the plugins you have installed and doesn’t cause any issues before putting it live!
Know What the Theme is Built on
This might sound obvious, but not everyone knows this information right away! Knowing what programming language was used when creating your free WordPress theme can be very useful because some languages are faster (or slower) than others.
If you know what programming language was used when building a particular free WordPress template, then at least there won’t be any surprises after installation. This could cause delays down the road during development time due to debugging code issues caused by incompatibility between different programming languages used within the same project file structure.”
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Fastest WordPress Themes for Your Website
Here is a list of the fastest WordPress themes that you can use for your website. Take a look now!
Astra: Fully Responsive WordPress Theme
Astra is a lightweight, fast, and fully responsive WordPress theme that’ll help your website load fast and rank on search engines. The theme comes with a good support forum and an active community that can help you with any issue.
This theme is also fully compatible with WooCommerce and has many customization options. You can use Astra for e-commerce websites and blogs because it has all the essential elements to create both types of sites. Its clean design ensures that your content gets all the attention it deserves without being lost in flashy animations or bloated features.
Pricing: The basic version is free, whereas the premium version costs $49.
PageSpeed Score: 95
Sydney: Best WordPress Theme
Sydney is a modern, responsive, and retina-ready WordPress theme. It has a clean and minimal design that will let you focus on your content. The theme has a responsive design that looks great on all devices. You can customize the blog and front page with quick setting changes in the Theme Customizer.
Pricing: It comes in two versions: free and Pro. Pro Version costs you $69.
PageSpeed Score: It scored a perfect 100 on Google’s PageSpeed Insights and GTMetrix tests.
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OceanWP: WordPress Theme for eCommerce Websites
OceanWP is an all-inclusive free WordPress theme for online retailers and eCommerce websites. It has an excellent responsive layout that can adapt to any screen size, a clean design, and a powerful front-end page builder. This allows you to create any page layout you want. A mobile-first approach has been taken while designing the theme, which helps in loading faster on mobile devices than other themes in this list do!
Pricing: It offers a free version to download. The premium version starts at $43, which basically includes a bundle of extensions with additional sites and ongoing support.
PageSpeed Score: It scores 98 on Google’s PageSpeed test.
Generate Press: Versatile WordPress Theme
GeneratePress is one of the swiftest WordPress themes proven over many tests. It’s a versatile, compact package with integrations for page builders, WooCommerce, and diverse sidebar and widget placements. Its widespread popularity, reflected in ratings and reviews, underscores its excellence.
You can start with the free version or upgrade to premium features. The premium package offers additional modules for typography, demos, and colors. Notably, the theme’s small file size ensures your site stays nimble without burdening servers. With fast speeds, compatibility with numerous plugins, extensive customization options, and advanced blogging features, GeneratePress is a reasonable choice for WordPress users.
Pricing: You can download the free version or purchase the premium theme for $59. Yearly upgrades ensure ongoing support and updates, or you can opt for a one-time lifetime payment.
Page Speed Score: 90
Neve: Optimized WordPress Theme
If you like the look of the Neve theme, then it’s possible that you may also like this next WordPress theme.
A fast-loading site is a great way to show search engines and visitors that your website is trustworthy and professional. We use Moz for our SEO service because it’s one of the most trusted names in online marketing and has been around since 2004.
This free WordPress theme from Elegant Themes comes with a clean design, plenty of customization options, and an easy-to-use administrative panel where you can add content or edit existing pages without coding knowledge!
Pricing: It has a free version to download, whereas the premium version starts at $49.
PageSpeed Score: A super performance-optimized theme can deliver a 100 score in the PageSpeed Insights test.
Zakra: Fastest WordPress Themes
Zakra is one of the fastest WordPress themes, with a page speed score of 98. This theme is perfect for businesses and bloggers who want a quick, responsive, modern website. Zakra includes several features that help improve your site’s speed, such as lazy loading images, minifying CSS and JavaScript and using a content delivery network (CDN).
Pricing: The free version is, of course, free, but the premium theme sells for $69 per year.
PageSpeed Score: 98
Customify: Fully-Customizable WordPress Theme
Customify is one of the fastest WordPress themes available in 2024. It is designed to load quickly and efficiently without sacrificing features or functionality. Customify is also one of the most customizable themes available, allowing you to promptly change your site’s look and feel.
Pricing: The core version is free to use. The Pro Upgrade starts at $59 per year.
PageSpeed Score: 98
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Hestia: Popular WordPress Theme
Hestia is one of the fastest WordPress themes, and it’s also one of the most popular. This multipurpose theme can be used for any website, from a personal blog to a corporate site. The theme is fully responsive, so it looks great on any device. Hestia is easy to use, even for beginners. The theme has a powerful page builder, so you can easily create complex layouts. And, if you need any help, the theme comes with excellent documentation and outstanding support.
Pricing: Hestia is a premium theme, and its starting price is $80 per year.
PageSpeed Score: 97
Blocksy: Lightweight and Fast WordPress Theme
If you’re looking for a fast WordPress theme, Blocksy is an excellent option. This theme is designed to be lightweight and fast so that it won’t slow down your website. Plus, it has several features that can speed up your site’s load time, such as lazy loading images and async JavaScript.
Pricing: Free version is available. The premium version starts from $49 per year.
PageSpeed Score: 98
X Theme: Premium WordPress Theme
X Theme by Themeco is one of the fastest themes available for WordPress. It is designed to be lightweight and fast without sacrificing any of the features or functionality you need. The X Theme is built on a robust framework that includes a responsive grid system, flexible layouts, and dynamic templates.
This allows you to create beautiful websites that look great on any device without coding or designing from scratch. The X Theme also includes a built-in drag-and-drop page builder, so you can easily create custom pages and posts without touching a line of code.
Pricing: Available from Themeforest for a single site license of $59.
PageSpeed Score: 97
Responsive: Fully Customizable WordPress Website Theme
Responsive is ideal for quick website launches, featuring responsive layouts, fast loading speeds, and full compatibility with site builders. It is a versatile and fast WordPress theme, offering over 100 free, ready-to-use Elementor and WordPress Block templates for various website types, including blogs, eCommerce, portfolios, podcasts, startups, consultancy, education, and more.
With a user-friendly drag-and-drop interface, it facilitates easy customization for both blog and eCommerce sites. Moreover, it is also compatible with popular plugins like WooCommerce, Elementor and Beaver Builder, and LearnDash.
Pricing: You can download it for free.
PageSpeed Score: 96
Bimber: Viral Magazine Fastest WordPress Theme
Bimber is a magazine theme designed for the swift deployment of a fully functional viral site within 24 hours. With lightbox gallery, it features popular, hot, and trending listings, along with multiple ad locations. The theme is lightweight and user-friendly, offering easy creation of listicles with diverse media formats.
It boasts prominent social share buttons, a sticky share bar, and image sharing. It is also compatible with Google AdSense and various monetization methods, maximizing engagement and revenue potential. Additional features include an AdBlocker Detector, a frontend uploader for user-generated content, and support for quizzes.
Pricing: This fastest WordPress theme is priced at $59. View the demo.
PageSpeed Score: 91
Twenty Twenty: Community WordPress Theme
Twenty Twenty, WordPress’s default theme, is tailored to leverage the block editor’s flexibility. Ideal for organizations and businesses, it enables the creation of dynamic landing pages with versatile layouts using group and column blocks. The theme’s centered content column and refined typography make it equally suitable for traditional blogs.
With complete editor styles, users can preview content appearance before publishing. The Customizer allows personalization of background and accent colors, with automatic calculation of element colors for high accessibility and contrast.
Pricing: Free to download
PageSpeed Score: 92
Twenty Twenty-One: Minimalist Community Theme
Twenty Twenty-One, a default WordPress theme introduced with WordPress 5.6, inherits its predecessor’s (Twenty Twenty) minimalist essence, serving as a highly customizable blank canvas. Laden, with features like automatic feed links, responsive embeds, and customizable backgrounds, it offers versatility to users.
Notable for its support for the block editor, the theme facilitates the easy creation of impactful layouts with new block patterns. It seamlessly integrates full-block editor support and allows customization of background colors from a selection conforming to AAA standards. Additionally, Twenty Twenty-One supports dark mode, enables widget placement in the footer, and simplifies content addition to the homepage via the block editor, which is all accessible from the site’s backend.
Pricing: Twenty Twenty-One is a complimentary WordPress theme, available free of cost.
Page Speed Score: 100
Twenty Twenty-Two: Lightweight WordPress Theme
Twenty Twenty-Two, introduced with WordPress 5.9, is a lightweight, customizable default theme, ideal for experimenting with WordPress’s latest features like Full Site Editing and Navigation blocks. Inspired by nature, its design reflects the diversity and versatility of birds, showcasing lightweight yet robust typography and a color palette drawn from the natural world. The theme’s layout elements gracefully complement the webpage, offering a seamless user experience. Tailored for Full Site Editing, Twenty Twenty-Two allows extensive customization on every page. With numerous block patterns and additional features, it provides ample opportunities for creative exploration within the WordPress ecosystem.
Pricing: Twenty Twenty-Two can be downloaded for free as a WordPress theme.
Page Speed Score: 86
Wanium: A Elegant Multi-Concept WordPress Theme
Wanium is a sophisticated multi-concept WordPress theme meticulously crafted with a rich set of features. With an emphasis on user-friendliness, it caters to diverse website purposes. The theme boasts a modern design, one-click demo import, full responsiveness, and 30+ custom visual elements.
It supports child themes, offers 12 stunning blog page layouts, and includes 800+ Google Web Fonts with font options for each visual element. Translation-ready with WPML compatibility, it also seamlessly integrates with popular plugins like Contact Form 7 and WooCommerce. Additionally, it supports premium sliders, such as Revolution Slider and Layer Slider, enhancing its versatility for creating beautiful and functional websites.
Pricing: This premium WordPress theme costs $16 and comes with six months of support. Take a look at the preview.
PageSpeed Score: 97
PopularFX: Fastest Commercial WordPress Theme
PopularFX is touted as the fastest commercial WordPress theme, optimized for rapid page loading. Utilizing the power of Pagelayer, it offers a lightweight solution for crafting stunning websites. The theme provides an array of exciting features, including fully customizable widgets with options for font colors, sizing, animation, and spacing.
With a responsive design, live editing capabilities, Google Fonts integration, and a user-friendly drag-and-drop interface, PopularFX also ensures an efficient and visually appealing website-building experience.
Pricing: Available for free.While the premium version starts at $59/per year
PageSpeed Score: 96
Airi: Fastest WordPress Business Theme
Airi stands out as the fastest WordPress theme, catering to the needs of business websites. This free theme combines power and flexibility with numerous customization options. Its seamless integration with the Elementor ensures easy and attractive website creation, even for beginners. Users can leverage pre-designed templates from Elementor’s collection or customize their sites effortlessly.
It also boasts a responsive design, offering a simple and highly intuitive interface. The Live WordPress Customizer facilitates real-time adjustments, and it comes with demo content for quick setup. With support for WooCommerce, Airi is not just business-oriented but also allows for easy online store integration, making it a versatile and user-friendly choice.
Pricing: This theme is available for free. Check out the demo here.
PageSpeed Score: 95
Blank Canvas: Uncluttered WordPress Theme
Blank Canvas, a minimalist theme for single-page websites, is free and built upon Seedlet, another free theme by Automattic. Its unique feature lies in its entirely blank post and page layouts, devoid of headers, menus, or widgets by default. What you design in the WordPress editor mirrors the front end, omitting demos.
Notable for its simplicity, Blank Canvas is the perfect starting point for customizations from scratch. It eschews unnecessary elements, offering a clean slate for your creative vision. With default styles featuring simple sans-serif fonts and subtle blue highlights, Blank Canvas empowers users to craft tailored digital experiences effortlessly.
Pricing: Blank Canvas, provided by Automattic, is a complimentary theme suitable for personal and professional websites. It offers unrestricted usage without licensing fees.
Page Speed Score: 100
Go: Gutenberg-first WordPress Theme
Go by GoDaddy presents itself as an innovative, Gutenberg-first WordPress theme, catering primarily to users crafting simple business websites using Gutenberg blocks. Its standout feature is the blocks-based CoBlocks page builder plugin, offering 37 blocks for diverse needs like Author Profiles, Galleries, Services, and more.
You can swiftly set up your site using one of its demos. Ideal for those leveraging the WordPress block editor as a page builder, Go offers ample customizer options for added flexibility. Serving as a showcase for CoBlocks, Go minimizes JavaScript and PHP, prioritizing HTML and CSS for faster page loading speeds.
Pricing: Go is available as a free theme download, allowing you to use it completely free of charge.
Page Speed Score: 99
Hello Elementor: SEO Enhanced Elementor WP Theme
Hello Elementor, designed solely for the Elementor page builder, boasts rapid loading times and a compact page size of 300kb. While it lacks page customization options, requiring installation of Elementor for design creation, it remains compatible with all Elementor versions and WooCommerce sites. This SEO enhanced theme ensures swift loading across devices. Utilizing the Elementor plugin, users can personalize their designs, although the theme itself and its settings page offer no design options. Furthermore, its seamless integration with translation plugins facilitates effortless creation of RTL and multilingual sites, enhancing its appeal for diverse audiences seeking efficient website building solutions.
Pricing: It is a free theme but offers additional paid commercial upgrades or support.
Page Speed Score: 95
Taza: Simple and Clean WordPress Theme
Taza, launched in 2023, emerges as a remarkably swift WordPress theme, finely tuned for Google Core Web Vitals and Search Engines. While it offers limited Customizer options, Taza truly shines when styled through the Site Editor. With a loading speed of 2.031 secs and a weight of 170 kb, it delivers a nimble performance. Despite a slightly higher LCP timing, Taza remains lightweight and versatile, featuring built-in patterns and page templates for easy customization. Notably, Taza’s single post loads even faster, securing a commendable third place in testing, making it an ideal choice for speedy website creation.
Pricing: It is a free theme but offers additional paid commercial upgrades or support.
Page Speed Score: 99
We’re excited to see more of these themes, and we hope this list has helped you find the best theme for your site.
Fastest WordPress Themes FAQs
What is the fastest theme in WordPress?
Determining the absolute fastest WordPress theme can be subjective and depends on various factors such as server configuration, content optimization, and more. However, some popular themes known for their speed include Astra, GeneratePress, and OceanWP. These themes are lightweight and designed for optimal performance.
Which is the lightest theme for WordPress?
Astra is often recognized as one of the lightest themes for WordPress. It is minimalistic, efficient, and built with speed in mind. GeneratePress and Schema are also lightweight options. Choosing a light theme is crucial for faster loading times, especially for websites focusing on performance.
Which Elementor theme is best for speed?
When using Elementor, the theme is not the only factor influencing speed; how you design and optimize your content also plays a significant role. However, themes like Astra and GeneratePress are known for their compatibility with Elementor and are optimized for speed. Astra, in particular, has a dedicated “Astra Starter Sites” feature that integrates seamlessly with Elementor for quick and efficient website building.
What is the easiest WordPress theme to use?
A user-friendly theme is essential, especially for beginners. Themes like Astra, OceanWP, and Neve are known for their ease of use. They come with intuitive customization options in the WordPress Customizer, making it simple for users to modify their websites without extensive technical knowledge.
Additionally, themes that work well with page builders like Elementor or Beaver Builder can offer a more user-friendly experience, allowing for easy drag-and-drop customization.
