In this roundup, for your consideration, we’ve collected the best WordPress freelance marketplace themes available. You might be interested in building your own Upwork, Guru or oDesk style website. You might want to set up an alternative to Fiverr. Or, you think your community might benefit from its very own TaskRabbit. Whatever the case, one of these themes will give you an inexpensive head start.
The basic requirements are fairly straight forward: a worthwhile marketplace theme will find some way to connect potential clients to skilled freelancers. The way this is handled will depend on the desired marketplace model. You might want users to post services that visitors can then buy (like Fiverr and other micro job sites). Or, you might want users to post projects that freelancers can bid on (similar to Elance and Upwork). Finally, a combination might be what you’re looking for, with functionality similar to TaskRabbit.
There are some excellent options in this list. Those omitted from this list were omitted due to buggy performance or lackluster, dated design. A loose order is intended, and our first two selections are hands down our favorite.
And if the themes on this list aren’t quite what you’re looking for, you might find something that suits your needs better in our article the Best WordPress Job Board Themes. You may also want to check out our list of top WordPress membership site themes.
But enough about that. Let’s see what we’ve got…
Freelance Engine
Without a doubt, FreelanceEngine by EngineThemes is our top pick for best freelancer/project marketplace theme. We’ve made no secret in the past about our admiration of EngineThemes. In our opinion, they’re one of the top five independent shops.
The contemporary design of FreelanceEngine is minimal, content-focused, and wisely abandons frivolous visual gimmicks in favour of excellent user experience. It’s fast, and it’s responsive – responsive in terms of both performance and in the mobile sense – and it’s just as well realized on the backend as the front.
Perhaps one of the strongest points of the design – and we’ve noted this before about EngineThemes products – is that it somehow avoids cliches that turn up over and over in premium themes. Your site will maintain a proprietary feel, particularly after making customizations with the included style customizer.
The functionality is extremely solid, and everything you need is provided to build a fully-featured site along the lines of Elance, Guru and oDesk. Users can post, browse and bid on projects. Freelancer profiles are incuded, and the theme even integrates support for Escrow.
Monetizing a site is a breeze, and site owners can charge for single project listings, or offer package plans.
FreelanceEngine is translation ready, SEO ready, and a steal at only $89 for the basic version. You could spend thousands of dollars with custom designs, fussing with plugins, or just install this theme and get started promoting your marketplace. Highly recommended.
HireBee
Even though we included HireBee on our post of the Best WordPress Job Board Themes, it probably belongs here more.
There’s a lot of functionality packed in this projects & freelance marketplace theme (check out the product details page for the fully rundown). In fact, it could be the most feature rich theme on our list, beating out FreelanceEngine in terms of what’s offered. But it does come with a slightly higher price tag, and while we like the design, we can’t help but think the EngineThemes product wins out.
Whether or not you go with this option instead will depend largely on your design preference. It’s a close call.
MicroJobEngine
Alright–so this is another fantastic freelance marketplace theme created the talented folks at EngineThemes. It’s a bit newer, and explicitly tailored to a Fiverr-style business model. Without hesitation, MicrojobEngine, along with FreelanceEngine, are currently the best options on the premium WordPress theme market for creating a robust freelancing & microjob website short of having a custom solution developed and designed (which would cost a hell of a lot more money). If you’re finding it hard to decide, you can’t go wrong with either. Let’s just get that opinion out of the way.
Once again, the UX is top-notch and the design is modern and distinct: it’s tasteful and minimal without sacrificing any character or drifting toward generic and bland. Compared to some of the other selections further down our list (which, frankly, we’ve received mixed feedback about in the comments below), EngineThemes hits the mark pretty much across the board.
It’s a bit more expensive than any theme you might find on ThemeForest, but still perfectly affordable at $89. You might also want to take advantage of the extra paid plugins EngineThemes offers after the fact, but they’re not required to get things up and running.
If you’ve got a few minutes, click through and have a closer look at the details and the provided demo. We think you’ll be impressed. The theme includes 12 months of support and updates.
MicroJob
Next up, we have MicroJobs, a brand new premium marketplace theme from PremiumPress that seeks to recreate the functionality and features of popular micro-freelancing sites like Fiverr.
The design is modern, following contemporary design trends. Like FreelanceEngine, the flat, understated design of MicroJobs pulls focus to content, ensuring a top-notch user experience without needless distraction or confusion.
Easily monetized, the theme provides support for both free and paid listings. Users can post individual, one-off listings, and industrious users can choose membership plans.
The theme includes a built-in Workflow system allowing freelancers and their clients to communicate effortlessly (and eventually sign-off on a job well done). A user feedback and rating system provides buyers with the ability to leave hepful ratings that inform other potential buyers. You know, like Fiverr.
MicroJobs is easy to customize, but as an added bonus, every purchase of PremiumPress theme gives you access to a selection of child themes. An excellent value overall.
ProjectTheme
The ProjectTheme occupies a space between TaskerDev, and our favorite WordPress freelance marketplace theme, FreelanceEngine.
You could use this one for an Elance/oDesk style website, or, again, as a TaskRabbit style site that focuses on bringing communities together to buy & sell real world services. Help high school kids find lawns to mow.
Like TaskerDev, it has everything you need to build a fully-featured marketplace, right down to Escrow support and several different monetization options. Users can also sell and buy digital goods, and take advantage of the built-in credit system, using virtual cash to pay for projects and proposals.
ProjectTheme is responsive, translation ready, and provides excellent social media integration.
Taskerr
In case the extra R doesn’t tip you off, Taskerr, like the MicroJobs theme, aims to help users built their own micro job marketplace akin to Fiverr.
The design is similarly clean and flat, and fully responsive. It looks great and works great across a range of mobile devices.
Taskerr comes with monetize options: site admins can charge sellers a fixed price for listings, and upsell those listings with featured placement options.
Users and admins alike will find the intuitive interface simple to use, and a powerful backend panel will give you extra control over frontend appearance and design.
Pricerr
Another extra “R”? You guessed it: Pricerr by SiteMile also tackles the micro job niche.
Marketed as a turn-key solution, Pricerr comes with all the necessary marketplace functionality: users can post projects/jobs/tasks, clients can purchase them. As an extra, this theme even supports bitcoins. (Don’t do anything shady!)
Installation of Pricerr couldn’t be easier, and takes no more than five minutes. But SiteMile still offers free installation for inexperienced users, which makes this one a particularly good option for users brand new to WordPress the platform.
TaskerDev
Now that we’ve looked at few micro job-oriented themes, TaskerDev provides a slightly different marketplace experience, having more in common with the popular site TaskRabbit than Elance, oDesk or Fiverr.
The theme allows users to both offer services and request them. TaskerDev gives you full control over your marketplace in the backend, and provides features like Escrow, private messaging, and a feedback system. Multiple payment gateways are supported and the site can be totally monetized: charge listing fees, bid fees, or even take a percentage cut of each sale.
Excellent integration with Twitter and Facebook is another plus. Definitely worth a closer look if this is the sort of marketplace model you have in mind.
WPFreelance
A recent addition to our roundup, WPFreelance is a freelance marketplace theme from BoxThemes. The development team brings over 10 years of WordPress experience to the table, and everything you need to get started is included with the theme.
The design is minimal and modern, with the developers prioritizing speed, functionality, and user experience over cumbersome visual gimmicks and superfluous, unfocused functionality.
Noteworthy features include payment integration via PayPal, commissions fees, and a bidding system. Feedback & ratings, private conversations, and dispute management ensure smooth communication between freelancers and their clients. Usability tweaks like social login are also a nice touch.
The codebase is SEO friendly, ready for translation, and responsive for consistent performance across the full spectrum of mobile devices and smartphones. Overall, WPFreelance is a streamlined, well-realized theme backed by a helpful, fast support team.