Templates are amazing! We can choose them, just like to we do with our clothes, to decide our website's look and to reach our goal more quickly: to go live with a complete website.

WebSite X5 has always offered a library of preset templates. Over the years we have been adding new ones, available upon payment or for free on our Marketplace.

Thanks to your requests and proposals, we have reconsidered the Template's functioning and introduced some important changes.

Let's find them out together:

1. 100 brand new Templates

On the web, everything changes at the speed of light, and Templates need to keep up with all new trends. This time, we didn't just re-design some existing Templates. We made a more radical choice: we have eliminated all the old Templates, and we have substituted them with 100 band new ones. They are perfect to satisfy any need, and they are already optimized for mobiles.

2. Each Template is a mini-site

Up to WebSite X5 17, we used to have two kinds of Templates: the Graphic and the Full ones. The former were the preset ones available in the software, and they were simple graphic layouts which only included the settings defined on Step 2; the latter were those available on our Marketplace. They were real mini-sites, i.e. complete projects with their own graphic design, pages and contents.

We realized this distinction between Graphic and Full Templates could lead to misunderstandings, and that it is much quicker and easier to start from a drafted project than from an empty graphic container.

Because of this, we have removed the distinction between Graphic and Full Templates.

Now all the Templates we offer, both in the preset Template library included in WebSite X5 and on our Marketplace, are projects for websites. You can simply customize them with your contents, without changing anything else, and immediately go live.

Of course, you are free to customize the Template as you wish: as always, you can easily change any element, you can add and remove pages, activate/deactivate functions according to your needs. The difference is that instead of beginning with a white canvas, you can start with some guidelines, suggesting you how to proceed to create your pages. In this way, creating a high-quality website will be even easier.

3. Choosing the Templates thanks to the internal Live preview

It is important to choose the right Template. And now that the Template defines both the graphic aspect and the website's structure, making the best choice is even more crucial.

As a matter of fact, a static preview based on a single little image is not the best way to choose the template we want to use. It is much better to have the possibility of opening the Template on the Browser, so to browse through the pages, see how it is organized and verify any graphic detail, as well as how it looks on tablet and smartphone. That's exactly what you can do thanks to the newly introduced internal Live preview.

When you start a new project, browse though the categories, select the Template you like and open the Live preview: you will immediately see if it's the right choice for you.

To sum up, with the update to version 2019.1, the Templates and the way they are managed have changed deeply. Templates are now real projects ready to be customized, and you can choose them thanks to the internal Live preview.

So everything is quicker and easier: you just need to find the right template, customize its graphic layout, its structure and contents and you go live with a nice and effective website.

These are surely considerable advantages, but if you are used to the previous WebSite X5 versions, you might still have some questions:

-Can I change the Template for an existing project?

As the new Templates aren't just simple graphic layout anymore, but complete projects with pages and contents, once you choose a template while creating a project, you cannot go back to the Template Library to select a different one.

Still, you can change the graphic settings defined on Step 2, without changing the website's contents (pages, blog, e-commerce etc.).

To do this, you just need to open an existing project you want to take the style of, and choose the Export this Template settings option on Step 2- Template> Export/Import settings.

Now open your project, and in the Export/Import settings section choose the Import the settings of a new Template option.

This option is particularly useful if you need to create identical websites for different languages. If you make any graphic changes for a language, you can easily export them and apply them to the projects for the other languages.

-Can I still use one of the old preset Graphic Templates of version 17?

In versions previous to 2019.1, Graphic Templates were still available, i.e. only the settings related to the graphic design defined on Step 2- Template.

You can import these settings with the above mentioned procedure, if an existing project with these graphic settings is available.