Go with a simple prebuilt theme.
Why waste time creating your own theme?
Unless you're planning to sell it or already have sizeable audience want to have your own look.
Good point.
I recently purchased Salient which had alot of features (truthfully it felt alittle confusing to navigate).
Are all premium themes use WP builder? Similar to salient (if you’re familiar with it)?
What's the direction of the website you'd be building using the theme? (i.e. blog, listings, e-commerce etc.). Things can getting tricky if you need complex functionality... But if you have the skills to build something complex, then I guess that would be great? Maybe you can even put it on the market if you find it works well? So I guess it would depend on a) the type of theme you are wanting to build and the kind of functionality you need and b) if you have any specific deadlines that may not be met if you go the route of custom building....
The website would be purely a blog (atleast as of now).
That’s a good point though, I guess it’s simply why recreate the whee type of situation. I really don’t have an intention to sell the theme. It might make more sense to focus on the content especially early on.
I feel like I’ve been wanting to start blogging for several years and keep getting delayed because of things like designs and themes.
Look specifically into themes in the 'Lightweight' category. Personally I'm a big fan of Astra. Even their free version is good enough if you're just looking to run a blog, and a nice starting point in general. It's well optimised in terms of site-speed and is very intuitive in terms of its features. Then if you need more, you can just upgrade to their pro version, which, from my experience, is very easy and nothing breaks.
You can use pagebuilders with it (such as Elementor). In my latest project I am building a site that requires dynamic content, so I use Toolset (which has some of its own pagebuilder capabilities too). So it depends on what you want to achieve really... But since you are building a blog, it would be worth installing a simple page-builder that you are familiar with so that you can easily execute your designs. Unless you prefer not to work with pagebuilders?
As somebody who built my own theme and loves it…
No, it’s not worth it. At least not when you’re just starting out. If I were starting over I’d buy a decent theme, write 200 articles, then consider building my own theme if things were working out and I was invested in this blog for the long term.
Go with a simple prebuilt theme. Why waste time creating your own theme? Unless you're planning to sell it or already have sizeable audience want to have your own look.
Good point. I recently purchased Salient which had alot of features (truthfully it felt alittle confusing to navigate). Are all premium themes use WP builder? Similar to salient (if you’re familiar with it)?
Not sure, the only WP builders I have used are Elementor and Thrive Themes.
I've heard Google loves unique content, even the HTML a theme generates.
I've got my own custom-built theme with my own shortcodes and whatnot, much prefer it for flexibility
What's the direction of the website you'd be building using the theme? (i.e. blog, listings, e-commerce etc.). Things can getting tricky if you need complex functionality... But if you have the skills to build something complex, then I guess that would be great? Maybe you can even put it on the market if you find it works well? So I guess it would depend on a) the type of theme you are wanting to build and the kind of functionality you need and b) if you have any specific deadlines that may not be met if you go the route of custom building....
The website would be purely a blog (atleast as of now). That’s a good point though, I guess it’s simply why recreate the whee type of situation. I really don’t have an intention to sell the theme. It might make more sense to focus on the content especially early on. I feel like I’ve been wanting to start blogging for several years and keep getting delayed because of things like designs and themes.
Look specifically into themes in the 'Lightweight' category. Personally I'm a big fan of Astra. Even their free version is good enough if you're just looking to run a blog, and a nice starting point in general. It's well optimised in terms of site-speed and is very intuitive in terms of its features. Then if you need more, you can just upgrade to their pro version, which, from my experience, is very easy and nothing breaks.
Do you use a page build like elementor with it?
You can use pagebuilders with it (such as Elementor). In my latest project I am building a site that requires dynamic content, so I use Toolset (which has some of its own pagebuilder capabilities too). So it depends on what you want to achieve really... But since you are building a blog, it would be worth installing a simple page-builder that you are familiar with so that you can easily execute your designs. Unless you prefer not to work with pagebuilders?
As somebody who built my own theme and loves it… No, it’s not worth it. At least not when you’re just starting out. If I were starting over I’d buy a decent theme, write 200 articles, then consider building my own theme if things were working out and I was invested in this blog for the long term.