Top 10 Best Wordpress Magazine Themes

Thanks to these Wordpress magazine themes - Wordpress can indeed act better than the best CMS out there. The shortcomings of today's difficult to use, code-bloated or overall buggy CMSs have resulted in thousands of webmasters embracing Wordpress - a platform that loads fast, has more practicality than you can shake a stick at - and now, has the ability to look, act and be a true magazine or news themed authority site! Look through this list of the top 10 best Wordpress magazine themes, and discover what your WP site COULD become...

A simple look at the demo of Source Theme will justify that this theme simply kicks so much ass that you can't put it into words. An oversized in-your-face front page banner scrolls through featured content with overlayed captions, followed by four main color-coded featurettes. Recent articles and sub-articles neatly pack the area underneath it all, in what can be defined as the coolest Wordpress theme most of us will ever come across.

Each individual Wordpress page within the theme is beautifully presented in all of its web 2.0 glory, with a structured right-hand double column showcasing recent and popular content, and all of the other great inter-linking elements we all know and love. Nested commenting makes your comments structured and easy to follow. Did I mention how cool this theme looks?!

• Comes with 4 color schemes
• Automatic thumbnail sizing to your requirements!
• Ad management in the backend panel
• Also has an alternate "blog style" version that comes with purchase

See a Demo of The Source

With its paper-like texture, This Is Bold is a magazine or newspaper fashioned Wordpress theme that looks like a serious news site. Showcasing the author (that's you) on each page, your readers will admire the synergy of design and typography in this theme.

It's obvious that this WP theme was made specifically for news-sites only; although, you could undoubtedly edit it to satisfy other needs. The front page features two main articles with sub-articles underneath it, as well as popular and random posts, archives and multiple custom widget areas. It flows neatly into a great looking footer, where you can continue to showcase additional information. Be sure to add widgets for AdSense or other ads, as its not prominent at default.

• Comes with five unique color patterns
• Cross-browser functionality; XHTML & CSS valid
• Table-less design
• Includes custom thumbnails per article out of the box

See a Demo of This Is Bold

For typography lovers, you'll love the layout of Glow Theme: the beautiful mix of white space and alluring design mixed in with top-notch typography & iconography makes this theme a feast for the eyes. Once you look past the design elements -- such as the jQuery scroller, attention-grabbing graphics and orderly post boxes, it's a pretty damn good theme in terms of user navigation, too.

Subtle backdrops create an amazing contrast against Wordpress post body areas, where your content will shine. Integrate Twitter, and even allow visitors to view popular or similar articles to increase their stay time. The comments area is nested and makes the bottom half of each post look professional.

• Cross-browser functionality with ALL major browsers
• Comes complete with 4 color schemes
• Includes an additional "blog-style" format
• Gravatar-ready nested comments
• Custom thumbnail images per page

See a Demo of Glow Theme

This theme wastes no space with expanded headers or scrolling boxes: the articles are front-and-center with no BS to spare! Your featured article rests on the prime spot: the upper left, with an random post scroller to the right, and RSS subscription calls to action underneath. Recent posts are neatly followed thereafter with custom thumbnails, which can be easily inserted in the backend. This is one of the more advertisement-centric magazine themes out there, with plenty of places to include your box and banner ads.

Individual pages utilize valuable white space to draw attention to your articles, with integrated sharing features and a fully widget-ready sidebar. Nested comments make your readers' feedback easy to follow. A neat drop-down menu system takes you through the site, with search result pages that include thumbnails for each article. This magazine theme is all about ease of use, and is strictly intended for serious news editorialists.

See a Demo of Who's Who

Itching to get a website up for that small business of yours, but can't find the right layout? Over Easy may be a viable solution: it was built just for something that needs to be showcased, such as a small business, an individual/freelancer, or even a product.

A big front-page carousel will showcase the posts you desire with smooth transitions that can be controlled with left and right arrows. A separate 'company blog' can be accessed from the main menu for your company's contextual efforts, and there's plenty of room to showcase your services or product features.

• Front-page headline stripe lets you define what the company is about
• Smooth scrolling area showcases featured posts
• Includes a blog area apart from the main content
• Multiple page templates with 7 standard and 5 custom widgets
• Includes 10 different color schemes!

See a Demo of Over Easy

My Weblog is the cross between blogging and magazine theme paradise: if you've got obsessive-compulsive disorder over neat and orderly design, this one will be sure to please. Everything fits just right on the screen...and even the categories are color-coded with headline bands across the top!

Dropdown boxes adorn the header area, and custom thumbnails can easily be assigned to each post through the Wordpress theme's administration panel. Nested comments make your individual pages look organized, and it's easy to toss in your Twitter and Flickr feeds within the fully widgetized sidebar, including a lifestream (if you don't know, it's a collaboration of all of your social networking account RSS feeds into one big list!). This theme comes ready with 5 color schemes, all included.

• Orderly and structured with color-coded categories
• Includes a built-in "lifestream"
• Category pages show article results in neat little boxes
• Has "sticky post" functionality for stuff you want at the top

See a Demo of My Weblog

Simple yet elegant, Workplace Theme's home page displays a smooth carousel scroller of your chosen featured articles in thumbnail form (just hover over them to get an expanded info box that materializes instantly while following your cursor). Three featured contextual articles get their place in the home page body area, followed by a featured post and six thumbnail previews of your choosing.

Individual Wordpress posts are as text-heavy as you desire; this is a great place to include the content-rich material that search engines love so much. Combine it with top plugins such as All-In-One SEO, a Twitter feed and Related Posts, and you've got yourself a content powerhouse. Even featured content thumbnails and previews can appear on pages' sidebars.

• 100% compatible XHTML & CSS; cross-browser compatible
• Image "carousel" easily editable through the admin menu
• Post thumbnail capability lets you assign images to all posts
• Widgetized sidebar with exclusive widgets just for this theme

See a Demo of Work Place

This flexible layout magazine theme has it all for any aspiring Wordpress magazine webmaster: a jQuery powered headline article, featured articles, post thumbnailing system, author highlighting and lots of other stuff that you can check out in the live demo.

Got Twitter? Integrate it into the header through Headlines' Admin panel - a great way to have 'late breaking news' features for your visitors. Single posts give authors their due credit with an author box, and multiple advertising spaces make AdSense shine. If you're looking for a super-smooth, web 2.0-fashioned magazine theme for Wordpress with all of the bells and whistles, it pretty much doesn't get more advanced than this one!

• jQuery carousel shows your headline articles (easy to edit!)
• Header-integrated Twitter functionality
• Custom social bookmarking & networking integration
• Flexible layout makes for easy sidebar & image formatting
• Comes with 15 color schemes

See a Demo of Headlines

WP Remix is the only theme you'll ever come across that has a visual editor like this! Pick and choose what you want -- and don't want!

Left sidebar, right sidebar, no sidebar... product review grids, magazine layouts, image and video galleries, even complex e-commerce storefront pages...you make the decisions - all of the hard work is done by the theme itself.

The developer even touts that it can create up to 50 different website styles or types, right out of the box. Get configuring: all of those website ideas you've had for years are now possible, thanks to WP Remix!

• Its WYSIWYG Page editor transforms the WP admin panel
• Over 50 page templates included
• Add-on module system enables shopping cart, galleries & more
• Insert custom Javascript & PHP through the WYSIWYG editor
• Smart dropdowns drill users deep into the site with nested menus

See a Demo of WP-Remix

The quintessential magazine style theme for Wordpress: aptly named Magazine Theme, it's a clean-cut web 2.0 style theme that lets you run a polished online news site.

Focusing on both content and context, this SEO-friendly theme makes everything easy to find for your visitors and gives plenty of options for Google AdSense or affiliate banner placement.

A great out-of-box theme for newbie designers, or an elite framework for those who need everything to have that custom look.

• Requires WP 2.8+
• 2 or 3-column layout
• Fixed-width design
• Multiple theme-options available by default
• Threaded commenting structure for Wordpress posts

See A Demo of Magazine Theme