Globalization has enabled us to reach audiences far and wide. If you are creating an international website or wish to get traffic to your page from every region of the world then choosing a theme that supports RTL is the best option. This is a really good practice and that is why all major websites have the option of changing languages, including the RTL ones. This ensures that they account for all the people around the world.
Few languages around the world use RTL texts. Nonetheless, the number of people who speak and write RTL language is easily over 410 million. Can you imagine how annoying it might be for Arabic, Farsi, Hebrew or Urdu speaking people to visit a website in their respective languages (left to right layout) only to find that all the important links and tabs are in the opposite direction? To be honest, it’s like they are viewing the website backwards!
When native RTL speakers visit a website in their own language, they expect it to read from right to left. It is just like when you visit a website in English, you expect it to read from left to right. English may be considered an international language but creating a truly international website means that you need to consider the population that does not speak English.
If you create a WordPress website with RTL-supported themes, you not only live up to the expectations of people living in those countries but also make a good first impression. It’s a powerful but very effective business tactic. This gesture will show that you respect their standards and culture. It’s a practical way of improving your brand’s face value.
WordPress is one of the most efficient platforms for designing a website that supports RTL. You don’t need a developer for writing codes or developing a separate RTL version for your webpage. You can opt for WordPress themes that support RTL and you’re good to go. For an ordinary static website, the switching process between RTL and LTR modes takes a little longer. The loading process is slow. However, WordPress improves the loading speed and transition between different languages becomes quick and smooth.
Almost all the premium and most free WordPress themes support RTL languages. There are innumerable choices to suit all styles and budgets. Here are our favorite picks from the market. Enjoy the list of best RTL WordPress Themes for Arabic, Farsi and Hebrew Languages.
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1. Porto | Multipurpose & WooCommerce Theme
Let’s face it; some of the world’s richest people speak RTL languages. If you intend to develop a luxury brand or business, you wouldn’t want to miss an opportunity to generate revenue from this specific market. Porto is a premium WordPress theme designed for eCommerce, corporate websites and content platforms.
It is extremely RTL friendly because the layout of the website is easily customizable with drag and drop features. This means that if you switch to any RTL language the text will easily shift around to support that language. 90+ pre-designed demos can help in creating a website for any niche. It gives super high performance and powerful theme options.
Porto supports Elementor page builder so possibilities for planning and creating web page designs are limitless. Tweak every element of your website to suit all device sizes. It is fully responsive. WPBakery integration means you don’t need to have any prior coding knowledge to design and run your website, Porto will take care of everything.
Inline Front editor, impressive Backend editor, Visual Composer, Gutenberg support and exclusive WooCommerce features are also worth mentioning. Porto’s demo import engine works well on low level servers. All in all, it is an extremely competent multipurpose theme that can take your business venture to the next level.
Get to know more about Porto through its here or preview the theme here.
| Porto | |
| Compatible With | BuddyPress 3.0–5.0.x Elementor Visual Composer 5.1.x WooCommerce 4.3–5.1.x WPBakery Page Builder 5.5–6.1.x WPML Bootstrap 4.x |
| One-Click Importer? | Yes |
| Layouts Available | 122 |
| Documentation | Well Documented |
| Compatible Browsers | IE9–11 Firefox Safari Opera Chrome Edge |
| Last Update | 31 July 2021 |
| Software Version | WordPress 4.6.1–5.7.x |
2. Soledad – Multi-Concept Blog Magazine AMP WordPress Theme
Believe us when we say that Soledad is the biggest and fastest theme for any news portal, bubbly magazines, blogs or basically any business under the sun. It has a whooping 6886+ homepage demos! With so many options it’s hard to miss any details at all.
Right to Left language support is one of the main value points of this theme. The experience is smooth and easy. It is compatible with Elementor Page Builder and provides 30+ easily customizable and gorgeously designed elements.
1000+ sliders and blog/magazine layouts allow you to create as many unique pages as you want. In addition, you get multiple single post templates for creating stories. Full AMP support means your website will be 100% responsive on mobile devices. Designed with best SEO practices, it gives Schema Markup and Google Structured Data Support. Compatible with any SEO plugin including Yoast SEO, Rank Math, All in One SEO.
Soledad comes integrated with WPBakery, Slider Revolution, Gutenberg, WPML and Polylang. With powerful and free Penci’s plugin you can easily start your own food blog. 6 portfolio layouts and WooCommerce integration can help start up businesses. From the customization point of view this might be one of the best themes that we have come across in a long time. It is definitely worth your time.
Click here to see more information or preview the theme here.
| Soledad | |
| Compatible With | bbPress 2.3–2.6.x BuddyPress 2.5–5.0.x Elementor Events Calendar Visual Composer 4.10–5.1.x WooCommerce 4.0–4.6.x WPBakery Page Builder 6.0–6.1.x WPML |
| One-Click Importer? | Yes |
| Layouts Available | 6000+ |
| Documentation | Well Documented |
| Compatible Browsers | IE11 Firefox Safari Opera Chrome Edge |
| Last Update | 27 July 2021 |
| Software Version | WordPress 4.0–5.7.x |
3. WoodMart – Responsive WooCommerce WordPress Theme
Giant software companies such as iOS, Windows and Android provide RTL language modes in their devices. Why? Because it helps them reach a larger audience and improves how people perceive their brand. In short, it increases their business. WoodMart is designed keeping this potent business tactic in mind.
It’s a WooCommerce theme that exhibits 60+ demo layouts to design any kind of online shop. Elementor Page Builder makes customization easy with drag & drop facility. Almost all shop links and widgets are powered by AJAX technology. Developers have made sure that the display is equipped with the highest possible pixel density that adjusts as per the user’s device.
Once multi-language translation plugins such as WPML or Polylang are installed and activated, WoodMart will efficiently shift all the necessary elements to integrate any RTL language. No matter which RTL language your user chooses, your design will look equally good and stunning with all the tabs and links in the right places.
Customizable header and footers, 3 styles for HTML Forms, 5 blog designs, built in Quick View and AJAX support are some features worth mentioning.
To know more about this theme, check it out here, or preview the theme here.
| WoodMart | |
| Compatible With | Elementor WooCommerce 4.0–5.1.x WPBakery Page Builder 6.0–6.1.x WPML |
| One-Click Importer? | Yes |
| Layouts Available | 72 |
| Documentation | Well Documented |
| Compatible Browsers | Firefox Safari Opera Chrome Edge |
| Last Update | 5 July 2021 |
| Software Version | WordPress 5.0–5.7.x |
4. Sahifa – Responsive WordPress News / Magazine / Blog Theme
Sahifa is a premium WordPress theme that renders news portals, magazine websites and blogs a modern and stylish look. Content is especially important for news and magazine websites. As such all demo pages are designed in such a way that the content remains in focus. There are three different animation effects available for presenting breaking news.
This theme is extremely RTL-friendly. Built-in translation panel makes the transition between languages smooth and easy. As soon as you install the theme, you’ll get RTL support since it is WPML ready. Live RTL page demo is available so that you can have a real-time look at what your page will look like.
Additionally, it is fully responsive, WooCommerce ready, bbPress ready with a built-in review system to give the best user experience. iLightBox and Taqyeem plugins are already included in the package so there is no need to buy them separately – you save on these plugins.
There are 8 theme skins, 6 footer layouts, 10 page templates, 35 custom widgets and 46 predefined background patterns to provide exclusive customization experience. Most blog themes do not offer a page builder for homepage; however, Sahifa is an exception. It offers page builder even with homepages so that you can customize your blog in any style that you deem fit.
To decide, walk through the theme first or preview it live here.
| Sahifa | |
| Compatible With | bbPress 2.5.x BuddyPress 2.3–2.5.x WooCommerce 3.0–3.5.x WPML |
| One-Click Importer? | Yes |
| Layouts Available | 7 |
| Documentation | Well Documented |
| Compatible Browsers | IE9–11 Firefox Safari Opera Chrome Edge |
| Last Update | 23 May 2021 |
| Software Version | WordPress 4.3–5.7.x |
5. Striking – MultiFlex & Ecommerce Responsive WP Theme
Not a day goes by when we don’t come across disgruntled customers who bought a theme that claimed it was ‘multipurpose, responsive with multi-language support’ but turned out otherwise. It’s one thing to claim but it’s entirely another to actually live up to expectations. Striking is a superior and clean theme that delivers whatever it claims.
It is 100% compatible with the latest stable PHP 8. It features a heavy-duty framework which can help in managing large sites and web requirements. This is a WPML approved theme which means that you can add RTL languages with ease and no additional hassle. Full CSS is built into the theme to allow every function to work seamlessly in RTL languages.
One-click installation enables you to easily transfer your settings to your website. Customization is simple with Revolution Slider and a demo with Revolution Slider is also available. Striking is a very flexible theme with great customer support.
You can check out information regarding this theme here or preview it here.
| Striking | |
| Compatible With | bbPress 2.6.x BuddyPress 5.2–6.4.x Easy Digital Downloads 2.9.x Elementor Elementor Pro Events Calendar Events Calendar Pro Gravity Forms 1.9.x Visual Composer 5.1.x WooCommerce 4.8–5.1.x WPBakery Page Builder 6.1.x WPML |
| One-Click Importer? | Yes |
| Layouts Available | 1 |
| Documentation | Well Documented |
| Compatible Browsers | IE11 Firefox Safari Opera Chrome Edge |
| Last Update | 5 July 2021 |
| Software Version | WordPress 5.5–5.8.x |
6. Valenti – WordPress HD Review Magazine News Theme
Customers regularly turn towards review websites to gain more insight into their favorite products. Owners of review websites need to have a clear crisp layout to enhance user experience. Thus, the audiences keep returning to their website. Valenti is an excellent option to help you in this regard. It’s a neat contemporary review/magazine WordPress theme with a spectacular HD (retina-ready) display. Equipped with a detailed mobile optimization function, new sticky sidebars, various blog styles, infinite scroll options, and a new navigational menu system, Valenti is way ahead of the pack!
It is WPML ready and already can be easily translated into any language, including the RTL ones. It is SEO optimized for all the languages so that your website never loses its online presence no matter what the language and user demographics.
Using exclusive Valenti Drag and Drop Page Builder, you can create a custom homepage for your site. There are 4 different modern grid modules and full-width slider to show featured or latest posts. It is 100% compatible with WooCommerce and gives full redesign and integration to match the look and feel of the theme.
This theme is also fully compatible with BuddyPress and bbPress. For your consideration, the developers have put links to live websites that are already using Valenti, click here for more information, or preview the theme here.
| Valenti | |
| Compatible With | Aesop Story Engine bbPress 2.4–2.6.x BuddyPress 3.0–6.4.x Elementor Elementor Pro Visual Composer 5.1.x WooCommerce 4.0–4.6.x WPBakery Page Builder 6.1.x WPML |
| One-Click Importer? | Yes |
| Layouts Available | 8 |
| Documentation | Well Documented |
| Compatible Browsers | IE11 Firefox Safari Opera Chrome Edge |
| Last Update | 7 June 2021 |
| Software Version | WordPress 4.8–5.7.x |
7. LISTABLE – A Friendly Directory WordPress Theme
Listable is an ideal choice for both local as well as global directory websites. Whether you wish to create an income-generating commercial directory site or want to create a community website to highlight different attractions in your area, Listable should be your go-to theme.
You can either add listings by yourself or allow visitors to sign up on your website and start adding their own listings to your directory in exchange for a fee. It gives you the ease of creating multiple payment plans through the theme’s settings. It will auto-generate a pricing table, thereby making it easy for your customers to compare the different pricing options available for them.
As the site owner you can add listings from both the front and back end. However, your visitors can only add their listings via custom-built front-end submission form. Since it’s a directory for local and global listings, so it’s only reasonable to expect that it provides multi-language support. Listable is fully compatible with WPML. It is highly adaptable with both LTR and RTL languages. Switching among them is not a problem at all.
It allows you to showcase a search form on your homepage. Your visitors can use it to search through your listings as soon as they arrive. You can also configure category icons to your homepage which will allow your visitors to filter the listing by attraction or business type.
We really like the fact that additional functionality is made available via plugins and not automatically bundled into the theme. This way you will only need to enable the features you plan on using and your WordPress installations remain uncluttered from unnecessary features and codes.
Listables provides some comprehensive features with great monetization options. To know more about this theme click here for more information or view the demo here.
| LISTABLE | |
| Compatible With | Gravity Forms Visual Composer 5.1.x WooCommerce 3.1.x WPML |
| One-Click Importer? | Yes |
| Layouts Available | 1 |
| Documentation | Well Documented |
| Compatible Browsers | IE11 Firefox Safari Opera Chrome Edge |
| Last Update | 4 March 2021 |
| Software Version | WordPress 4.8–5.1.x |
Conclusion
Buying a WordPress theme is a long-term and most important investment that you make for your business. Therefore, you should look at all aspects before purchasing a theme. Our collection of Best RTL WordPress themes ensures to introduce you with only tried and tested themes. We would recommend that you shortlist Porto, Valenti, and Listable. Go through their features one by one and also read user reviews. You’ll definitely end up with making a wise decision.
We hope this post has been useful in helping you shortlist the RTL WordPress theme that you need. You may also like to read about the best newsletter wordpress plugins in helping with your email marketing campaigns.
Should you need access to a variety of premium plugins to build your wordpress site, do also check out envato elements‘ subscription plan starting from $16.50/month or Monsterone’s subscription plan from $14.95/month.
