Choose and switch themes

Browse the official themes, preview one and make it your site’s design. Your posts, pages and members stay exactly as they are.

Who can do this: Owners and Administrators. Starter sites use the Source theme; Publisher and Business sites can use any official theme, or upload their own.

A theme decides how your site looks to readers: the layout of the homepage, how posts are set, the header and footer. Your writing, members and settings live separately, so you can switch themes as often as you like without losing anything.

Every Blogaly site comes with 32 official themes, already installed and kept up to date for you. New sites start on Source, a clean, general-purpose theme that suits most publications.

1. Open the theme library

In your site’s admin, go to Settings.
Under Site, find Theme. It shows your Active theme and its version.
Select Change theme.

The Theme row in Settings, showing source (v1.7.6) as the active theme, a menu button, and a Change theme link.

The library opens on Official themes. Each card shows a screenshot of the theme with demo content and what it’s designed for.

Made for	Themes
News	Source
Blogs and personal writing	Margin, Linen, Monogram, Salon
Newsletters	Dispatch, Courier, Morrow, Precis, Quire
Magazines	Broadsheet, Folio, Gilt
Photography	Lens, Aperture
Podcasts	Cadence, Studio
Documentation	Primer
Churches	Nave, Basilica, Iconostasis, Chapel, Assembly, Covenant, Fellowship
Restaurants and cafés	Mise, Noir, Bistro, Trattoria, Counter, Orchard, Cafe

2. Preview a theme

Select a theme’s card to see a larger preview. The preview is a picture of the theme with demo content, so it shows the layout and style rather than your own posts. To see your own content in a theme, activate it: you can always switch back.

A full-size preview of the Margin theme, with a Change theme › Margin breadcrumb at the top left and an Activate Margin button at the top right.

Select Change theme in the breadcrumb at the top to go back to the library.

3. Activate it

In the preview, select Activate followed by the theme’s name, for example Activate Margin.
Confirm with Activate theme. Choose Close if you change your mind.

A dialog titled Activate theme asking “Do you want to activate Margin as the theme for your site?” with Close and Activate theme buttons.

The change is live straight away for everyone who visits your site. There’s no draft stage for themes, so if you want to try one quietly, do it at a time when few readers are around, and check your homepage, a post and a page afterwards.

Switch between installed themes

The Installed tab lists every theme on your site: the official ones, marked (built-in), and any you’ve uploaded. The active theme is at the top, marked Active. Source is marked (default).

The Installed tab listing source (default) as Active, followed by aperture, assembly, basilica, bistro and other built-in themes, each with an Activate button and a menu.

Activate switches to that theme in one step, with no preview.
The ⋯ menu has Edit code and Download. Delete appears only for themes you uploaded, and never for the active one. See upload your own theme.

What changes when you switch

Stays the same	Changes
Posts, pages, tags, members, newsletters and comments	Layout, typography and colours that the theme controls
Your brand settings: accent colour, icon, logo, cover image and fonts	The Theme tab in the design editor, which lists the new theme’s own options
Your navigation menus and their links	Where the menus appear, and how many items fit

Theme options (things like header style or whether to show related posts) belong to each theme. If you switch away and come back later, the first theme remembers what you set. After switching, open the design editor to set the new theme’s options.

Themes and your plan

Starter: your site uses Source, the default theme. If you choose another theme, you’ll be asked to upgrade.
Publisher and Business: any official theme, plus themes you upload.
See plans and limits for everything each plan includes.

Good to know

Official themes are updated by Blogaly. You don’t need to install updates, and you can’t delete or overwrite them.
Your menus are managed separately, in Settings › Navigation. See pages and navigation.
Something look wrong after switching? A logo sized for the old theme or a missing cover image are the usual causes. Check Design & branding first.
Only Owners and Administrators can change the theme. Editors, Authors and Contributors don’t see these settings.

Last checked against the product on 7 November 2026.

Logo, colours, fonts and layoutUse the design editor to add your logo and icon, pick an accent colour and fonts, and adjust your theme’s layout, with a live preview.Upload your own theme (Publisher and Business)Upload a custom theme as a zip file, activate it, edit its code in the browser, and fix the errors that stop a theme from working.Pages and your site’s navigationCreate standalone pages like About and Contact, and choose what appears in your site’s menus.Plans and what each includesStarter, Publisher and Business compared: price, members, staff, newsletters, paid tiers and themes, and what happens when you reach a limit.

Still stuck?

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