Return: The Theme Manual

The BuddyPress Default theme is excellent for testing BuddyPress features but is rather bland with limited customization options.

To make your network vibrant you’ll want to install and customize a new BuddyPress theme to the complement feel of your niche area.

Installing new themes is really easy and WPMU DEV BuddyPress themes make customizing extremely simple as all have extensive theme options.

All WPMU DEV BuddyPress themes are designed so you don’t need to edit a single line of code or hack one element of their theme to make your BuddyPress network look brilliant.

Installing a theme from WPMU DEV

1. Download and unzip the downloaded file

• Please note the themes are contained within a zip file inside the folder you unzipped and you will need to unzip this file also.
• For example, with BuddyPress Daily theme you need to also unzip buddypress-daily-theme-1

2. You’ll see several files and folders depending on the theme package.  Most themes contain a folder for the parent and child theme within the folder called themes.

3. Upload both the parent theme folder and child theme folder to wp-content/themes/

• For example, with BuddyPress Daily theme you need to upload bp-daily and bp-daily-child to wp-content/themes/ (bp-daily folder is the parent theme folder)

4. Make sure your install path is correct for example: /www/var/site/wp-content/themes/thethemename not /www/var/site/wp-content/themes/themes/thethemename

See Next: Enabling your BuddyPress theme for your main blog only