Sydney Classic Premium available
4.9★ (794 ratings) · Current rank #32
Highlights · computed from our daily tracking data
- Sydney currently ranks #32 and has stayed inside the top 50 in every daily snapshot since Sep 17, 2024 (707 snapshots).
- Its best position in our tracking is #30, first reached on Jan 29, 2026.
- It accounts for roughly 0.7% of all active installs across the themes we track.
- It is averaging 889 downloads/day over the last 30 days, down 10% versus the month before (991/day).
- The latest release, v2.71, shipped on Aug 26, 2026 (5 days ago) — release #157 since the theme joined the directory in 2015.
- Beyond WordPress.org, BuiltWith detects 91,485 live sites running Sydney across the web, including 429 of the one million most-visited sites.
Performance · Google Lighthouse, official wordpress.org demo
| Mobile | Desktop | |
| Largest Contentful Paint | 3.8 s | 1.3 s |
| First Contentful Paint | 2.6 s | 0.7 s |
| Total Blocking Time | 0 ms | 0 ms |
| Cumulative Layout Shift | 0.051 | 0.122 |
| Page weight | 1.3 MB | 1.3 MB |
Lab (Lighthouse) data measured on the official demo at wp-themes.com, where every theme serves identical content — so scores isolate the theme's own CSS/JS payload. Tested Aug 3, 2026. Scores vary ±5 between runs. Run a live test ↗
Real-world usage · live sites, via BuiltWith
Ranking history
Ranking history — data table
| Date | Ranking history |
|---|---|
| 2026-08-31 | #32 |
| 2026-07-31 | #32 |
| 2026-06-30 | #34 |
| 2026-05-31 | #31 |
| 2026-04-30 | #36 |
| 2026-03-31 | #34 |
| 2026-02-28 | #35 |
| 2026-01-31 | #32 |
| 2025-12-31 | #37 |
| 2025-11-30 | #38 |
| 2025-10-31 | #38 |
| 2025-09-30 | #39 |
| 2025-08-31 | #39 |
| 2025-07-31 | #40 |
| 2025-06-30 | #41 |
| 2025-05-31 | #41 |
| 2025-04-30 | #41 |
| 2025-03-31 | #41 |
| 2025-02-28 | #39 |
| 2025-01-31 | #37 |
| 2024-12-31 | #37 |
| 2024-11-30 | #40 |
| 2024-10-31 | #35 |
| 2024-09-30 | #34 |
Latest reading of each month from our daily snapshots; the chart holds the full daily history.
Active installs
Active installs — data table
| Date | Active installs |
|---|---|
| 2026-08-31 | 80,000 |
| 2026-07-31 | 80,000 |
| 2026-06-30 | 80,000 |
| 2026-05-31 | 80,000 |
| 2026-04-30 | 90,000 |
| 2026-03-31 | 90,000 |
| 2026-02-28 | 90,000 |
| 2026-01-31 | 90,000 |
| 2025-12-31 | 90,000 |
| 2025-11-30 | 90,000 |
| 2025-10-31 | 90,000 |
| 2025-09-30 | 90,000 |
| 2025-08-31 | 100,000 |
| 2025-07-31 | 100,000 |
| 2025-06-30 | 100,000 |
| 2025-05-31 | 100,000 |
| 2025-04-30 | 100,000 |
| 2025-03-31 | 100,000 |
| 2025-02-28 | 100,000 |
| 2025-01-31 | 100,000 |
| 2024-12-31 | 100,000 |
| 2024-11-30 | 100,000 |
| 2024-10-31 | 100,000 |
| 2024-09-30 | 100,000 |
Latest reading of each month from our daily snapshots; the chart holds the full daily history.
Downloads per day
Downloads per day — data table
| Date | Downloads per day |
|---|---|
| 2026-08-30 | 467 |
| 2026-07-31 | 455 |
| 2026-06-30 | 549 |
| 2026-05-31 | 568 |
| 2026-04-30 | 336 |
| 2026-03-31 | 707 |
| 2026-02-28 | 598 |
| 2026-01-31 | 241 |
| 2025-12-31 | 264 |
| 2025-11-30 | 287 |
| 2025-10-31 | 412 |
| 2025-09-30 | 550 |
| 2025-08-31 | 388 |
| 2025-07-31 | 371 |
| 2025-06-30 | 673 |
Latest reading of each month from our daily snapshots; the chart holds the full daily history.
Details
| Author | aThemes |
|---|---|
| Current version | 2.71 |
| Versions released | 157 |
| Last updated | 2026-08-26 |
| Added to directory | 2015-04-25 |
| Requires WordPress | — |
| Requires PHP | 7.2+ |
| Type | Classic theme |
| First tracked here | 2024-09-17 |
Description
Sydney is a fast, highly customizable WordPress theme for businesses, freelancers, and creative portfolios that want a professional online presence. It works with both Elementor and the WordPress block editor and includes a library of block patterns for building pages fast. Sydney gives you full design control: all Google Fonts, color and layout options, logo upload, a full-screen slider, header images, and sticky navigation. It's responsive, translation- and RTL-ready, WooCommerce-compatible, and built with clean, SEO-friendly code. With 80,000+ active installs and a 4.9-star rating from 750+ reviews, Sydney is a trusted choice for company and portfolio sites. Start fast by importing a ready-made demo: https://athemes.com/sydney-demos/
Frequently asked questions
How many websites use Sydney?
WordPress.org reports 80K+ active installs. BuiltWith independently detects 91,485 live websites running Sydney.
How popular is Sydney?
As of August 31, 2026, Sydney ranks #32 in the WordPress.org popular themes list. Its best position in our tracking is #30.
When was Sydney last updated?
Sydney was last updated on August 26, 2026 (version 2.71). It has shipped 157 releases in total.
Who makes Sydney?
Sydney is developed by aThemes. It joined the WordPress.org theme directory in April 2015.
How fast is Sydney?
On the official WordPress.org demo, Sydney scores 84/100 for mobile performance in Google Lighthouse and 92/100 for desktop (tested August 2026).
