OpenCart Community

OpenCart Template Design Contest




1st Prize 500USD
2nd Prize 250USD
3rd Prize 100USD

This forum is for the sole purpose of template submissions for the OpenCart 1.5 template contest! The entire forum will be locked on the 31st January 2013 which is the deadline for design entries.


post here: http://forum.opencart.com/viewtopic.php ... 68#p370368

Please submit a 1024 x 768 screenshot in our Final Submissions thread. You may create a separate thread with your template name following this format as the title: Template Contest Entry - [Template Name]. This is where you can post more shots of your theme, discuss etc.

You will be required to post a link leading to a sample Open Cart installation with your theme running

We’ve also created a WIP (work in progress) thread where you guys can post whatever you have done so far and bounce some ideas around!

Designers can submit more than one entry for this competition but can only win one prize.

Designers may submit more than one entry.

Forum members are free to reply to a entry thread with thoughts and comments, however we will be very strict in monitoring this forum for off topic comments. Please keep all comments specific to the template the thread relates to.

Contest Rules and Requirements

// Requirements
Compatible with newest Open Cart Version 1.5.4.1
All template files must be licensed under the GNU/GPL version 2.

Templates must be an original work of the person making the design entry. Using images from other sources would require permission from the content owner.

You may use vQmod for specific features but no core files are to be edited.

Templates must use the Open Cart Sample content and not require any moving/modifying of modules/content.

Templates should look and function similarly in Chrome, FireFox, Safari, and Opera.

Templates should not break with any of the sample content.

Core Team members may not submit entries in the template contest.

// Disallowed Content
No nudity
No offensive imagery - Moderators will decide if images are inappropriate

All rules and requirements may change as the competition moves along.

Good luck to all the template designers!

Templates must be valid XHTML 1.0 and CSS.

OpenCart Default theme is currently HTML 5

W3C CSS validity is also unlikely to be achieved, because most theme stylesheets (including OC Default) are using some CSS3 to insure multi-browser compatibility. Even "jquery-ui-1.8.16.custom.css" is a fail!
As wroughtec observation above, I think a little clarification on HTML and CSS validation rules is required.

its the design only its not a css or html w3c competition.

Thanks for the clarification Daniel.
I think this Theme Competition is a great idea and I am looking forward to see all the entries.
I'll probably have a go myself too.
Thank you and best of luck to all the participants!

Just wondering what is the owner status of the winning theme?
Does it still belong to the developer and he/ she allowed to sell it after contest or it will belong to OpenCart?
Incase you guys include the 1st winner theme in OpenCart download for future release and give him attribution link.

Some dev will found allowed to sell as commercial theme as a good opportunity.
While other dev more interested to see his contributions as part of OpenCart.

1.5.4.1?? why not 1.5.5 (next versión new theme)?? i see many many and bigs changes between versions, both will be compatibles?? you can go to work with the 1.5.5 version that is posted on github and yes i know this still on development but can use the catalog part. That is a simple question and sorry for my english.

qahar wrote:Just wondering what is the owner status of the winning theme?
Does it still belong to the developer and he/ she allowed to sell it after contest or it will belong to OpenCart?
Incase you guys include the 1st winner theme in OpenCart download for future release and give him attribution link.

Some dev will found allowed to sell as commercial theme as a good opportunity.
While other dev more interested to see his contributions as part of OpenCart.

I think if you are making the theme for opencart... it will likely be the new default opencart theme.. so good luck reselling the stock theme

qahar wrote:Does it still belong to the developer and he/ she allowed to sell it after contest or it will belong to OpenCart?

Posted rules say it has to be licensed under GPLv2.

you keep your own work.

you can sell it via opencart or not. its up to you.

all work though must have been done by you. you can not use other peoples themes and modify them a bit.

its good promotion for your services, design and skills as well as promotion for the opencart platform.

come on guys start posting some template themes.

also i'm thinking of writing a template competition system for the main site if this goes well.

Qphoria wrote:I think if you are making the theme for opencart... it will likely be the new default opencart theme.. so good luck reselling the stock theme

But Q, with this strict rule, I'm sure it will be disqualified after submited lol..

GeeHim wrote:Templates must use the Open Cart Sample content and not require any moving/modifying of modules/content.

rph wrote:Posted rules say it has to be licensed under GPLv2.

Daniel wrote:you keep your own work.
you can sell it via opencart or not. its up to you.
all work though must have been done by you. you can not use other peoples themes and modify them a bit.

Ah.. much cleared now..

Daniel wrote:come on guys start posting some template themes.

Be patient, the contest is still announced in two days.

Daniel wrote:also i'm thinking of writing a template theme system for the main site if this goes well.

Now I found my self is motivated..

i meant template competition system

This is exciting, I am getting in on this. Are you trying to find a possible new opencart default theme?

no. we can do that later. at the moment i just want to get the latest version out. should be this week.

Awesome and great idea! We will join the competition aswell!

very excited and also in


one more question can we add additional module without editing core files,

can we add new tables to database

GeeHim wrote:

Looks like somebody has just learnt how to use drop shadow, no offence but this text on the banner looks horrible.

Guys, what's going on?

17 themes are submitted at this moment. And only 1 of them is really avaible for download for free!
13 themes are strictly commercial (you need to pay some money to download them). 3 themes have unknown status (but still no ability to download).

I'm in great doubt that any of these is licensed under GPL2 - otherwise I have rights to purchase them and post for free download here )))

What about some validation process in this contest?

Daniel & Opencart Team said authors can sell there themes, but themes should be licensed under GPL2. I don't understand what it means.

Lets hope we will get clarification on this. Btw there are some many old themes submitted to competion, guy's there in no use of it, your entiry will be not even consider.

Competion is ony for NEW THEMES, so no tricks plz lets be HONEST guy's.

What time zone will the contest end in?