7 Best free Joomla Templates

The renowned content man­age­ment system Joomla is an active open source community. If you have been working closely with free CMS in the past, you have surely already benefited from various Joomla ex­ten­sions. Aside from plugins and other add-ons extending Joomla’s func­tion­al range, there are also many Joomla templates with the aid of which your website will boast a new design.

Joomla’s users love it for its straight­for­ward­ness. The CSM is very easily operable, and the same goes for Joomla templates. Just like the main client, many templates are also ab­solute­ly free of charge. Although there is a market for com­mer­cial design templates, generally speaking, you would never need to avail of any of them. Now and then, premium templates tend to generate a greater reach and offer more creative freedom. Nev­er­the­less, thanks to the active Joomla community, you do not need to spend anything to be able to use top quality designs. A variety of in­ter­est­ing templates are always made available to all by the community.

Having said that, some portals offer clients fee-based templates based on original themes while ensuring constant access to customer support. Of course, free support is not offered by Joomla templates. However, it must be said that de­vel­op­ers and the community are generally very helpful and even present various tips and solutions on the internet.

However, we must ask ourselves what Joomla templates’ intended scope of use actually entails. After all, the CMS in question fa­cil­i­tates the im­ple­men­ta­tion of changes to website layouts in many different ways even when the websites are in their raw, original state. Joomla templates therefore make your work a lot easier. A good design template can be easily adapted and offers many functions, which would otherwise have to be developed by means of laborious prepa­ra­tions.

But how can we dif­fer­en­ti­ate between good and poorly-executed templates? When it comes to various Joomla templates, we cannot argue about in­di­vid­ual tastes, es­pe­cial­ly when it comes to the specific design of each work. There are nev­er­the­less some criteria, which you should take into con­sid­er­a­tion when choosing the right one for your website:

• Design: Does the design match your ex­pec­ta­tions?
• Func­tion­al scope: Are all the important func­tion­al­i­ties included within the template of your choice? (for example: re­spon­sive design)
• User rating and pop­u­lar­i­ty: Are users generally satisfied with the Joomla template?
• Updates: Is the template still subject to oc­ca­sion­al re-de­vel­op­ments?

These guide­lines should help you with the selection of the right template. We have tailored our advice to your needs. It is then important to assess whether the chosen design cor­re­sponds to your pre­con­ceived vision. Next, it is worth analyzing its special features, some of which are necessary for your project. For instance, if you would like your website to be suited for mobile devices or if you have a specific SEO-friendly design in mind, the func­tion­al scope becomes an in­creas­ing­ly decisive element.

Positive ratings and a high pop­u­lar­i­ty level of a Joomla template do not only prove its solid quality, but also point to its cor­re­spond­ing support options. A template used by many web­mas­ters con­se­quent­ly means that it is ac­com­pa­nied by a large community, which will be there to answer any questions or needs that you may have in relation to the selected template (all templates presented below measure up to this criterion).

The last point to consider when choosing a template is related to the differing update fre­quen­cies. Even if a Joomla template looks good on paper and has an im­pres­sive­ly broad spectrum of functions, it can quickly lose its appeal if re­spec­tive de­vel­op­ment teams do not provide any template updates in the long-run. Joomla, itself, is subject to constant de­vel­op­ments. It is therefore important for the selected template to be covered by regular updates (many of the featured templates have been subject to constant refining over the years).

Below, we present some of the most important free templates, which lend them­selves to a more pro­fes­sion­al look.

Helix is one of the most popular templates among Joomla members. There is, however, a good reason for this, as Helix3 delivers more than just your regular website design. With this Joomla template, you can be sure of receiving the whole framework at your disposal.

With the aid of many ad­just­ment pos­si­bil­i­ties, you can precisely determine how the website will present itself and how the user ex­pe­ri­ence should be designed. Helix itself is very user-friendly. It offers an easily com­pre­hen­si­ble page-building tool with which you can drag and drop the items that you wish to add on your page. Helix also avails of Bootstrap, Font Awesome, and many other font options.

Important features include:

• Re­spon­sive design
• Page-building tools
• Bootstrap
• Font options
• Font “Awesome”

Purity is just as popular as Helix and also fa­cil­i­tates the webpage design by providing page-building options for its users. This is made even easier by means of pre­fab­ri­cat­ed layout styles. Should your page present itself as an online journal, blog, or even a portfolio, Purity has an answer to all styles re­gard­less of the layout design in mind. This Joomla template is, of course, based on re­spon­sive design, supports Bootstrap, and con­stant­ly works with the most important Joomla ex­ten­sions such as JomSocial or Mijoshop. An ad­di­tion­al advantage is that a large selection of language options exist for this template.

Important features include:

• Re­spon­sive design
• Bootstrap & T3 framework
• 8 template designs
• Page-building tools
• Works well with other ex­ten­sions

Zenith II  is yet another Joomla template with a re­spon­sive design. Its second version has es­pe­cial­ly impressed with its new page builder Quix, which works via drag-and-drop and offers over 50 pre­fab­ri­cat­ed website elements – making this Joomla template es­pe­cial­ly in­ter­est­ing for beginners in website design. This, however, does not mean that more advanced users cannot get their money’s worth, as there are many options with the aid of which small details can also be im­ple­ment­ed.

Important features include:

• Re­spon­sive design
• Page-building tools
• Pre­fab­ri­cat­ed elements
• Settings for experts also available
• Bootstrap & T3 framework

Crafty is a Joomla template, which suits online shop designs for cre­ative­ly-minded people. It is par­tic­u­lar­ly suitable for crafts­peo­ple of all sorts, including those making handmade art. J2Store – an extension working in the back­ground of the template – guar­an­tees a smooth shopping ex­pe­ri­ence for customers. When designing your page, you can only avail of two layout forms. These are, however, very clearly arranged and up-to-date with modern trends. The layout contains 20 different positions, in which you can arrange the com­po­nents of your website and customize pre­fab­ri­cat­ed layouts. If you also want to appeal to an in­ter­na­tion­al audience, Crafty offers different language versions. In addition, this Joomla template supports fonts read from right to left (RTL support and lang - right to-left language support). In order to attract as many users as possible to your products, the template also helps to get the most of out your SEO-oriented endeavors.

Important features include:

• Designed to suit e-commerce
• Based on the J2Store extension
• Cell phone-friendly
• Bootstrap & T3 framework
• Two modern layouts
• RTL support

Morph  is also based on the page-building tool Quix. You will therefore find that working with this rather extensive Joomla template is rel­a­tive­ly easy. Morph lets you create homepages with re­spon­sive design, Parallax effects, or similar an­i­ma­tions without the need to devote much effort. Since you can use Morph for many different purposes, its de­vel­op­ers made sure that it is also com­pat­i­ble with the most important Joomla ex­ten­sions. With EasySo­cial, you build a community, EasyArti­cle helps you with the editorial work, and Morph itself enables col­lab­o­ra­tion with J2Store to build websites in the style of a typical e-commerce site. External ap­pli­ca­tions such as Google Maps, Sound­cloud, or Flickr can also be easily in­te­grat­ed into your web presence. This can all be done even if you do not possess extensive knowledge of HTML or CSS. However, those wishing to delve deeper into the world of coding can also avail of the extensive stylesheet language LESS.

Important features include:

• Re­spon­sive design
• Bootstrap
• LESS
• Possible in­te­gra­tion of various an­i­ma­tions
• Works well with other ex­ten­sions
• Page-building tools

Section is yet another free Joomla template de­liv­er­ing design options, which offers a wide scope of ap­pli­ca­tions. The template is es­pe­cial­ly suited for a corporate web presence. With the automatic im­ple­men­ta­tion of re­spon­sive design solutions and cross-browser support, you can be sure that every visitor gets the best ex­pe­ri­ence possible from their visit to your website. You start the design with a blank canvas and dis­trib­ute the necessary website elements in a step-by-step process. Various portfolio- and blog-like websites, as well as an online contact form, are at your disposal right from the start. If you need more functions, you can also activate fee-based solutions such as image galleries.

Important features include:

• Re­spon­sive design
• Bootstrap
• Pre­fab­ri­cat­ed website types
• Possible upgrade to premium, fee-based templates

Do you need a website which is ex­cep­tion­al­ly fast? The Joomla template Af­ter­burn­er2 can help you achieve this. It is built on the Gantry Framework developed by Rock­et­Theme, which prides itself in creating ex­cep­tion­al­ly fast template solutions. At the same time, de­vel­op­ers have made sure that their focus on speed does not put the template’s design and func­tion­al scope at a dis­ad­van­tage, which is why re­spon­sive design is also a default option when using Af­ter­burn­er. With regard to the ap­pear­ance of the website, you can not only place re­spec­tive website elements on up to 34 different positions, but also have a direct influence on the website’s ty­pog­ra­phy and use three default sets that will make the decision on website design for you. Af­ter­burn­er also offers support on languages read from right to left.

Important features include:

• Re­spon­sive design
• Gantry Framework
• LESS
• Ex­cep­tion­al speed
• RTL support