Top 10 Most Popular Drupal Themes

Drupal is arguably the most customisable open-source CMS system available. However, it's not the prettiest thing out of the box. That's why themes were developed. They turn Drupal's powerful backend features into something pretty to look at. Ian Wright from Exert Market Web Design looks at the 10 most popular Drupal themes based on the current number of active installations:

1. Zen

Zen is far and away the most popular theme for Drupal. It's built around HTML5 and is responsive, yet simple and very customisable. It's great as a base to build upon.

2. Omega

Omega is designed for people who would rather design using code than a sleek user interface. While this makes it a bit more of an advanced theme to use the advantage is that you have total control over look and feel.

3. AdaptiveTheme

AdaptiveTheme is another HTML5 responsive theme for Drupal 7. It's also much easier to use than the alternatives, with a point and click interface. No need to hire a web designer to use this one.

4. Fusion

Fusion is powerful base theme you build off of. Based around a simplified 960px layout, it can be configured for responsive design. Another key feature is the ability to code once use multiple times. Worth a look for something a little different.

5. Marinelli

Marinelli is based around a 3 column, tableless layout and wide image banner and a "top-tabbed" primary-links system. It features a rotating banner system which is great to highlight different parts of your site. Somewhat more basic than some of the themes above, the advantage is that it can be used out the box.

6. Danland

Danland is a simple theme for both Drupal 6 and 7. Tested across multiple browsers you can feel confident that your website will appear how it's supposed to each and every time. It features an image slideshow and proper tags for SEO.

7. Corporate Clean

Corporate Clean as the name suggests is designed for corporate sites who want a clean, professional and responsive design. Based on PSD templates it's now fully responsive and can be customized for 1, 2, or 3 columns and features advanced web form integration. Use it as is or hire a designer to make it look and feel exactly the way you want.

8. Tao

Tao is not meant for general use but instead is designed to work with subthemes that do the heavy lifting. It unifies template families, overrides core annoyances, and gives more control over CSS than is typically found in a theme.

9. Rubik

Rubik is an additional add-on for the Tao theme (see above). Like Tao it is an admin theme and adds functionality through icons and reduces visual noise, making the whole Drupal experience cleaner and easier.

10. Business

Business as you would expect is designed for businesses that want to use Drupal out of the box. The theme is not dependant on any other core themes, which makes set-up and installation easier. It's based around fixed width of 920px and offers 1 and 2 column layouts. Designed to use HTML5 and advanced CSS you will be able to customise many of the features for your site.