How To: Adding Options to Your WordPress Theme

If you’ve downloaded a bunch of WordPress themes to try them out, you have probably noticed that some themes come with an Options menu, while a majority of themes do not. The function of the Options panel allows users to control certain theme functions from their dashboard without actually altering any of the code.

Having an Options panel is definitely not crucial to the success of a WordPress theme, but it will help your theme to appeal to a lot of additional users. If you are a theme designer, you may have wondered whether it is difficult or not and how exactly to set this up. It actually involves the creation/altering of four files: functions.php, header.php, style.php, style.css. If you’d like to set this up for one of your themes, The Undersigned has made a great post detailed how to add options to your WordPress theme, where you are walked through the steps it takes to add an options panel. I recommend giving it a shot if you offer a WordPress theme. It could help double the number of users.