Update 2/18/19: We continued our research and added 8 new WordPress marketplaces where you can sell your own themes. As usual, we have included information about commissions and exclusivity whenever that information was readily available. Please let us know in the comments below if you a) know of another WordPress directory we could add to this list, or b) want to write a review about any of these 15 directories in order to help your fellow developers. For example, what do you think about Mojo Themes vs Themeforest? Share your experiences!
There is no doubt in the fact that WordPress is the most popular platform for blogging websites. But in the past decade, it has become so much more than that. Every developer that you come across today would love to dive into WordPress for all the right reasons. The unprecedented popularity of this crafty CMS is quite apparent, as WordPress accounts for more than 18.9% of all websites on the Internet.
It’s no secret that developing and designing themes for WordPress has been a booming sector for a long time. But do you know how to sell WordPress themes once you develop them? Many marketplaces have emerged that give you the opportunity to get your themes noticed and sold to millions of people all over the world. While the 30% – 50% commission that these websites ask for may be off-putting, you can make some solid dough with your themes and plugins in no time.
Here are 15 places to sell your WordPress themes online right away. Be sure to scroll down for a comparison chart!
1. Themeforest
Themeforest is probably the one WordPress theme marketplace that you already know about. Nonetheless, it’s unprecedented popularity demands that it should be at the top of the list. Developed by Evanto Marketplace, Themeforest is the marketplace to buy and sell themes for all CMS products such as WordPress, Drupal and Joomla with prices that fall between $5 to $63.
This is an extremely high traffic marketplace, which increases your odds of selling your WP themes, if you can get your theme approved (they set a high bar of standards). You can keep 50% of your sales as a new author, and can increase your commission up to 70% as you sell more, which means your Themeforest revenue will grow even more as you sell more themes.
2. Mojo Themes
Mojo Themes may not be as elaborate as the bigger WordPress marketplaces, but it definitely is on its way. With almost 2,000 marketplace items for customers to browse through, Mojo Themes is a serious platform for contenders to display their top notch WordPress themes.
Although some buyers may browse Mojo Themes for free products, and you can certainly offer them for free, the marketplace offers a sophisticated method to help you sell your themes. You can sell them as soon as you are verified and approved. Similar to ThemeForest, Mojo Themes provides you with 50% commission on the sales as an exclusive author, and as you sell more, you are allowed to keep 70% of the sales commission.
3. WP Eden
WP Eden is more than just one of the best places to get WordPress themes. It has been developed to help professional webmasters as well as WordPress beginners. WP Eden is a resource collection website which provides an array of WordPress themes, plugins, tutorials and tips. This helps newcomers learn how to make and sell WordPress themes all at the same time. *As of February 2019, it is unclear if WP Eden still offers a third party seller platform. We’re investigating!
Along with the resource collection capabilities of WP Eden, it performs as a decent marketplace for developers to sell their work. While WP Eden may not be as scaled as other WP marketplaces, it can provide you a good opportunity to create a revenue stream by uploading your themes, plugins and even WordPress tutorials. You get a commission of 50% on the sales of your themes.
4. Creative Market
Creative Market is yet another WordPress marketplace and theme mecca where you can sell your developed themes, templates and various forms of graphic designs. What makes Creative Market stand out is that there is no review process involved to have your themes approved for upload.
If you’re not sure how or what to sell on Creative Market, you just need to upload your WP themes as the website guarantees that your theme will appear on their portal. You can set your own prices and earn 70% commission on each of the sales.
5. ThemeSnap
ThemeSnap is a marketplace to buy and sell WordPress themes, Drupal themes and HTML templates. Since three development worlds collide in this marketplace, there is much more traffic, which increasing your chances of selling.
Even if you are looking for a WordPress exclusive marketplace, publishing your theme on ThemeSnap will pay off. Moreover, this marketplace offers the highest commissions of 75%, which is always an enticing factor.
Staying exclusive and keeping your exquisite WordPress theme out of these frequented WordPress marketplaces is no longer a working strategy. These marketplaces have helped many WordPress designers and developers go from zero to thousands in just a few days. So if you have been having trouble getting your exclusive WordPress templates out in the world, these WordPress marketplaces are just what you need.
6. Popular FX
PopularFX.com is a bit different than the rest. They have made inroads with several hosting companies so that customers can pick themes from their marketplace when first installing their WP instances from cPanel. Therefore, having your theme in PopularFX can hugely help your theme business. Our own theme, Pixel Linear has been downloaded nearly 250,000 times through popularFX so we know first hand just how powerful this marketplace is.
7. PressCastle
PressCastle.com is a lesser known marketplace, though interestingly enough, it is arguably the biggest. Having pulled together themes from all around the web, PressCastle boasts 15,000+ themes in its directory from over 300 websites and over 1400 authors. You can add your theme to their directory for sale as well. Just create an account, and once it is approved, you can start selling.
8. Template Monster
Template Monster has a large marketplace where you can sell 31 different types of digital products. At the time of publication, they have about about 2,100 WordPress templates for sale in their directory. As a vendor, you can earn up to 70% from each sale if you sell exclusively through Template Monster. If you offer your theme for sale elsewhere, you can only earn up to 40% if it ends up selling on Template Monster.
Wondering how to sell WordPress sites in full? Some marketplaces, like Template Monster, also let you sell WordPress sites as turnkey offerings.
9. Codester
Codester offers a marketplace with no exclusivity requirement and no minimum number of sales. You’ll receive 70% of what you sell on Codester and can be paid through PayPal. All you have to do is sign up and upload your WordPress themes. It takes about 1-2 business days for the Codester team to review your themes and list them on the site.
10. Etsy
Etsy may bring to mind vintage jewelry and clothing, but you can sell much more on this unique marketplace. Etsy’s guidelines stipulate that anything sold must be either vintage, handmade, or craft supplies, and WordPress themes certainly fall under the category of handmade. You can sell themes here with a $0.20 listing fee and an approximately 8% commission for payment processing and transactions. However, because your target audience might not think to look on Etsy in the first place, be sure to have a robust marketing plan to advertise your store.
11. Dev Items
Dev Items offers a 75% commission for anything you sell, and it’s free to upload your themes. However, you need to make at least $50 before you’ll be paid through your choice of PayPal, Skrill, Payoneer or direct deposit. WordPress themes are listed by category, which makes it easy to see where the competition is low on Dev Items.
12. Code Grape
Code Grape has a relatively low commission at 60%, but unlike some other WordPress theme markets, you get to set your own price. A review team does not make that decision for you, which means you can adjust the price according to that commission. Code Grape has no exclusivity policy and offers useful selling tools on their platform.
13. Template Toaster
Template Toaster offers a growing marketplace for WordPress themes. They do have an exclusivity policy, and you can only sell themes made by the Template Toaster software.
14. Gridgum
Gridgum offers a place for you to sell your WordPress themes with a fixed commission, regardless of how many sales you make. For exclusive themes, you earn 65%. For non-exclusive themes, the commission lowers to 45%. They also offer an affiliate referral program and let you add an installation service to your theme so that you can earn a little more. Gridgum only has responsive themes for sale, but they aren’t picky about the responsive framework used to develop the theme.
15. Purchase Theme
Purchase Theme starts sellers out with a 70% commission, but you can earn up to an 80% commission if you help to promote the site. You retain full control over the price of your products. In addition to selling WordPress themes, you can also sell plugins and extensions on Purchase Theme.
And that concludes our list of marketplaces where you can sell your WordPress themes.
Of course, you could also go the route of getting your theme listed on plenty of other sites in mash-ups or in free directories, and then offer upsells inside of your theme for the paid version, but these marketplaces represent just that: marketplaces.
Which WordPress Theme Marketplace Is Right for You?
Now that you know you have 15 options to choose from in order to sell your WordPress themes … which one should you pick? The good news is that, in some cases, you don’t have to pick just one.
Exclusivity Versus Traffic
Some of the WordPress theme marketplaces that have exclusivity policies also have a high volume of buyers searching the site every day. Although you can only sell your WordPress theme on their site, the chances of it selling at all may be higher due to the increased traffic.
On the other hand, you could also make sure your theme gets in front of a large number of people by selling it on more than one directory, as long as each of those directories has non-exclusive policies.
Perhaps the best way to figure out which selling platform is right for you is to try several. If you have more than one WordPress theme ready to go, put one on a high-traffic but exclusive site, and put another on several smaller but non-exclusive sites. See which one sells faster and gives you a better profit.
Commissions and Price Control
The other important factor to consider is how much money you’ll make when your theme does sell. As you can see in the list above, all of the marketplaces take a percentage of each sale in order to keep the platform up and running. Some also set the price for you, whereas others give you complete control over the price of your theme. Are you willing to sacrifice some profit in order to get your theme in front of a lot of potential buyers?
Only you can decide how much money you need to make off of your theme. You know how many hours you spent on it and how much your time is worth. Carefully incorporate the commissions into your calculations so that you don’t end up disappointed when your theme sells.
Here’s a nifty chart we made to help you quickly compare and contrast the exclusive rates, non-exclusive rates, price control and traffic data. Remember to take the traffic data with a grain of salt, because many of these sites have more than just WordPress themes for sale.
Buyer and Seller Support
You also need to think about what makes certain marketplaces attractive to buyers. Do they offer buyer support and installation services? If you sell on a platform that does not have great customer support, you might make your themes more attractive by offering installation and support services … as long as the marketplace allows that.
On the other hand, can you as a seller get plenty of support if something goes wrong during the selling process? What happens if your buyer is unhappy? A good marketplace will have your back and help mediate disputes, but remember that you end up paying for this service when the platform takes a higher percentage of your earnings, versus a lower percentage taken by more hands-off platforms.
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