Minimum Template Files for Theme Development

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WordPress has minimum theme template files as

  • style.css
  • index.php

and also some other files as listed here.

If the theme developer wants to build theme with less bells and whistles, what are some of the template files which should be included at minimum? There isn’t any guidelines in the WordPress codex. Only thing that you can find is what files and when to include them. For making use of most of the WordPress functions without any conflict, there doesn’t seem to be specific number mentioned for number of template files.

So how many files should be there when you build a theme from say raw html template?

2

To have the theme listed:

  • style.css

With at minimum this:

/*   
Theme Name: Minimum Theme
Description: Test
Author: Test
Version: 1.0
*/

For the theme to be functional:

  • index.php

index.php must have a post loop, so this would be the bare minimum functional index.php

<html>
<head><?php wp_head(); ?></head>
<body>
<?php
if ( have_posts() ) {
    while ( have_posts() ) {
        the_post();
        the_title( '<h3>', '</h3>' );
        the_content();
    }
}
wp_footer();
?>
</body>
</html>

index.php is the defacto fallback for all template files WordPress might look for. All the rest are entirely optional, though I advise that you use them.

For more information on which templates are possible, see here:

http://codex.wordpress.org/Template_Hierarchy

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