wp theme list

Overview

The starting point for theme management. List every theme installed in your WordPress instance, identify which one is active, see version numbers, and check for available updates.

What It Does

wp theme list queries the filesystem and WordPress theme API to display a summary of installed themes. It identifies parent and child themes and their current activation state.

Syntax

wp theme list [OPTIONS]

Arguments & Options

Flag	Description
--status=STATUS	Filter by status: active, inactive, parent
--update=VALUE	Filter by update availability: available, none
--fields=FIELDS	Fields to display (e.g., name, status, version, update)
--format=FORMAT	Output format: table, json, csv, yaml, count

Basic Usage

List all themes

wp theme list

Output:

+-----------------+----------+--------+---------+
| name            | status   | update | version |
+-----------------+----------+--------+---------+
| twentytwenty    | inactive | none   | 2.5     |
| twentytwentyone | inactive | none   | 2.1     |
| twentytwentyfour| active   | available| 1.0     |
+-----------------+----------+--------+---------+

List only themes with updates helper

wp theme list --update=available

Get active theme name only

wp theme list --status=active --field=name

Real-World Scenarios

Scenario 1: Bulk check for updates across multiple sites

for url in $(wp site list --field=url); do
  echo "--- $url ---"
  wp theme list --update=available --url="$url"
done

Scenario 2: Clean up inactive themes

# List inactive themes to decide which to delete
wp theme list --status=inactive --fields=name,version

Quick Reference

wp theme list                          # All themes
wp theme list --status=active          # Only active
wp theme list --update=available       # Only needing updates
wp theme list --format=json            # Export to JSON

Next Steps

• wp theme status — more detailed status overview.
• wp theme install — add a new theme.
• wp theme update — update installed themes.