What is CHILD theme in WordPress?

A child theme in WordPress is a theme that inherits the functionality and styling of another theme, called the parent theme. The purpose of using a child theme is to make changes to the website’s appearance and functionality without modifying the parent theme’s code directly.

When you create a child theme, you can add your own styles, templates, functions, and plugins to your website while still using the parent theme’s code as a foundation. This allows you to take advantage of the features and stability of the parent theme, while still being able to make customizations to your website without risking losing those changes when the parent theme is updated.

To create a child theme, you first need to have a parent theme installed on your WordPress site. Then, you can create a new folder within the wp-content/themes directory and give it a name that reflects the child theme, such as my-child-theme. Inside that folder, you need to create two files: style.css and functions.php.

The style.css file is used to add your custom styles to the website, and it should contain a comment header that specifies the parent theme as well as any other required information. The functions.php file is used to add custom functions and other modifications to the website.

By using a child theme, you can make changes to your website without worrying about losing those changes when the parent theme is updated. Additionally, because the child theme relies on the parent theme for much of its functionality, it is less likely to break or cause compatibility issues with other plugins and themes on your site.

In summary, using a child theme in WordPress provides a number of benefits, including the ability to make customizations to your website while still relying on a stable, well-supported parent theme, and the ability to easily update the parent theme without losing your customizations.