WordPress.com Themes Get a Batch of New Customization Options

One of the disadvantages of using a blogging platform, like WordPress.com, is that you're more limited in your customization options than you'd be if you used your own WordPress install.

But WordPress.com is working on enabling bloggers to make their blog exactly how they want to.

There are now over 150 themes to choose from, many with customization options, like color variations, of their own.

WordPress has been working on adding even more options. It's already adding quite a few themes every few days or weeks, but it is also improving the existing ones.

"We know how much you love customizing your themes and making them your own so we made sure that our best, our most popular, and our most beautiful themes let you do just that," WordPress.com's Ian Stewart wrote.

"The Custom Header Image feature lets you quickly add your own personal stamp on a theme," he said.

"We went and added it to themes missing it that could really use it and use it well. You’ll now find that it’s available in themes like Notepad, Titan, Simpla, Grid Focus, and Chaos Theory," he added.

Custom header images for more themes is just one improvement. WordPress.com also added more color schemes, as many as five new ones, to several existing themes.

Twenty Ten, last year's default theme for WordPress installs, is also one of the most popular on the site. Now, the custom header option has more features, for example you can change the color of the header text or hide it altogether.

Many themes got some under-the-hood enhancements, by adding support to more advanced WordPress features that may not have been available at the time the theme was originally created. Post Formats support and better comment labeling are two such improvements.