If you want to prevent detectors from knowing the theme you are using, you can hide the theme name. Hiding the theme name to prevent people from knowing your theme is an added advantage to the security of your website. Websites that accept payments or sensitive information should use a custom theme or hide their theme name to prevent hackers from hacking your website. Before proceeding to making any changes to your theme, ensure you backup your website first. So, if anything goes wrong you can restore it back to its original state.
How to hide WordPress theme name
Follow these steps to hide your WordPress theme name.
- Locate the theme folder using FTP. If you have access to cPanel, the go to File Manager > public_html > wp-content
- Locate the theme folder under the wp-content folder, right click on it and select the ‘Rename’ option
- Rename the theme folder to whatever you desire. This should be the first step after installing the WordPress theme because when you change the theme name your theme setting will be reset to default
- Open your theme folder and locate the style.css file
- Open the style.css file. In leading part of style.css you will see the theme name. Rename it also and save the changes
- Go to WordPress dashboard > Appearance > Themes and activate your theme under the new name
Note:
- If you are using a child theme, first rename the parent theme then proceed to rename the child theme’s style.css file
- Renaming your theme will stop its automated updates, you must do it manually in the future
