The Material Design system by Google was released in 2014 and by 2018, most to the Google products and others had embraced the new system. Over the years, the system has evolved and now is getting a lot of interest. As a little experiment, Google decided to create a Wordpress plugin and theme featuring the Material Design system. If you are familiar with Wordpress, installing and creating a custom theme with the Material Design for Wordpress plugin and theme is a great way to learn about Material Design and update your website.

The website for BellaOnline's MUSED Literary Review needs a new design, so I decided to give the Material Design for Wordpress plugin and theme a try. The first step is to install and activate the plugin. Assuming that you already have your Wordpress website installed, let's get started.

Note: The plugin and theme, as well as the Material Design system itself, is continuously being improved. At this time, the instructions below are current.

1. From the Wordpress Dashboard menu, click Plugins - Add New.


2. On the next screen, search for material design google. You should see the Material Design for Wordpress plugin listed at the top (see screenshot).


3. First we need to click the Install Now button. Next, click the Activate button (see screenshot).


4. After activation, you will be on the Start Building screen, click the Next Step button.


5. On the Install Addons screen, click the two toggle buttons to install both the theme and examples and click the Next Step button (see screenshot).


6. On the Congrats screen, click the Finish button (see screenshot).

Now, you are ready to go to the Wordpress Customizer, where you can customize colors, fonts, shapes and icons to match your brand.

Update: After following the steps above and you go to the Customizer, you will notice a message indicating that the theme has not been installed. Click the Install button and the theme will be installed and activated (see screenshot).

Material is a design system created by Google LLC.
(C) Google LLC 2021. Google, Google Docs and the Google logo are registered trademarks of Google LLC. Screenshots used with permission.
This tutorial is not endorsed by or affiliated with Google in any way.