What is the BizVektor Theme?
If you run a business or a blog in Japan, you’ve probably heard of BizVektor. It’s a free, easy-to-use theme with a simple design that gives you decent customization options. It’s understandable that it became such a popular theme in Japan.
Thousands of sites are/were built on BizVektor. I can’t tell how many sites use it now because it’s no longer available in WordPress.org’s theme library. But to get a sense, here are the numbers for the author’s other products:
- “Lightning” (the new BizVektor) — 50,000+ active installations
- “VK All in One Ex Unit” plugin — 100,000+ active installations
BizVektor is dangerously outdated
In 2018, the BizVektor creator wrote a post advising users to consider changing to Lightning. The theme is no longer supported, so updates are not available through WordPress’s auto-update system.
If BizVektor is installed in your WordPress right now it’s several years old, and that’s very dangerous. It could lead to your site getting hacked, possibly forcing you to migrate your server. I know people whose sites were hacked specifically due to old theme code installed on their site. We helped one such client whose site was tagged as malware in Google, sending security warnings to everyone who found it in the search pages — the consequences of getting hacked can be heavy!
Consider switching to Lightning
Although there are some ups and downs in the process, I would strongly suggest looking into switching your theme if you’re using BizVektor. It will definitely outweigh the trouble of getting hacked!
Check out this post about our first job switching to lightning and some of the problems that are in store when you make the move (don’t worry, if you’re prepared, you shouldn’t have too much trouble).
