What is a Responsive WordPress Theme

If you’re working on your website, you’ve probably been told to make sure it’s built as a “responsive theme” or that it’s “mobile responsive” and wondered what is a responsive WordPress theme? 

In this article I’ll cover what is a responsive WordPress theme and why you want to have it for your site.

What is a Responsive WordPress Theme

A responsive WordPress theme is a theme that was developed to look good across all screens.  Meaning that if your website is responsive then visitors viewing it on your mobile device can read the site information easily and navigate through the site without hassle.

WordPress theme developers use code that allows the website to resize as the screen size adjusts. This includes dynamically resizing images as well as increasing user readability.

Responsive WordPress themes are so important, we’ve made sure all ThemeLab’s themes are responsive for your business website.

Why is Responsive Website Important for Your Business

As more and more people use their smartphones and tablets to search the web, having a functioning website on those smaller screens is important. If a visitor can’t read your content or navigate through your site on their mobile device, they’re more likely to exit your site and visit one of the millions of others on the internet to get their answers.

If you have google analytics setup on your site, you can view the number of mobile visitors to desktop visitors to see how a mobile site can affect  your business. If you have a high rate of mobile visitors coming to your site, then access your own website from a mobile device and see what kind of experience it is for you. This will tell you how a user feels when they visit your site.

If you have a high bounce rate on your site, then you’ll also want to look at your mobile visitors to see if the mobile visitors bounce rate is causing this. According to GoRocket, the average bounce rate for mobile devices is around 60% which is about 20% higher than the other types. If your site is mobile friendly with responsive WordPress theme, your bounce rate could be lowered.

How to Check if Your Site is Responsive

If you have a site set up now and aren’t sure if it’s responsive or not, you can just use your browser to check.

Use your full width browser and change the size of it. If your site’s paragraphs and words move to fit within the shrinking width it is likely responsive.

Google has recently started testing sites for their mobile friendliness and are rewarding site owners who have mobile responsive sites in the search results. You can check your site on their Mobile Friendly Test page to see what is says and follow the suggestions to improve it.

There are a few ways you can work on your site to increase it’s mobile friendly score that might also help with search results for mobile users.

As you work to make sure your site is mobile responsive for your visitors, also consider the overall user experience and the importance of making your site easy to use and simple to navigate for your visitors.

I hope this article helped you understand what a Responsive WordPress theme is.

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