Riot
A bold, colourful neo-brutalist Ghost theme for creator newsletters, paid communities and personal brands.
// overview
About Riot
Riot is a loud, joyful neo-brutalist theme for creator newsletters, paid communities and personal brands. Stickers, candy colours and a big subscribe form make your newsletter feel like you, not like a template.
Who it is for
- You run a newsletter, course or creator business
- You want a personal, fun brand with your face on it
- You sell paid memberships or plan to
- You want colour without designing anything
Probably not for you if
- You want a quiet, minimal look — see Noir
- You publish breaking news many times a day
- Your brand must stay corporate and neutral
Pages and layouts
Page templates: Membership, Topics, Writers, Signin, Signup, Account.
Extra post layouts: No image.
Getting set up
- Hero image: upload a photo of yourself in Hero image (Homepage tab). A portrait photo of at least 900 × 1100 px works best.
- Tag colours: give each main tag a colour in Tags → Edit → Color. Post headers, cards and topic cards use it.
- Featured posts: mark 3 posts as Featured for the 'Start here' section.
- Upload the theme zip in Ghost Admin → Settings → Design, then fill in the theme settings.
- Import the sample content if you want to start from the demo and replace it with your own posts.
What you download
- The theme, ready for Ghost 6.0 or later (riot_1.0.0)
- Documentation in HTML
- Sample content you can import into Ghost
- 12 months of updates and support from the people who built it
Requirements
A Ghost 6 site: Ghost(Pro) on a plan that allows custom themes, or self-hosted Ghost. Memberships and paid tiers use Ghost's own members feature and its Stripe connection; the theme adds the pages and the paywall design. Demo photos are not included in the download.
// features
What's included
- Sticker-covered homepage hero with a big subscribe form
- Personal photo frame with a spinning star and a name sticker
- Tilted, animated topic marquee
- 'Start here' grid of your featured posts in rotating candy colours
- Issue list with dates, topic stickers and lock badges
- Colour-block post header that takes the colour of the post's tag
- No-image post template for text-only issues
- Subscribe box, author card and previous/next issue after every post
- Topics page with bright colour cards
- Membership page with tiers and a monthly/yearly switch
- Styled paywall for members-only and paid issues
- Sign in, sign up and account pages
- Light, dark and system modes with a reader toggle
- Reading progress bar and image lightbox
- Self-hosted fonts (Bricolage Grotesque, Space Mono)
- Fully translatable, 19 theme settings, no jQuery
Compatibility & tags
Changelog
v1.0.0 · 2026-09-29
- First release.
// faq
Questions about Riot
Read more about Riot
Best Ghost Theme for a Food Blog in 2026: What a Recipe Site Really Needs
A recipe site is not a normal blog. Readers cook from it with flour on their hands. Here is what a Ghost theme for food bloggers has to do, and where Saffron fits.
How to Set Up Paid Memberships in Ghost with Stripe (2026 Guide)
Ghost has subscriptions built in, and it takes no cut of your revenue. Here is how to connect Stripe, design your tiers, lock the right posts and avoid the common mistakes.
Best Ghost Theme for a Podcast Website in 2026
Your podcast host gets your show into Apple and Spotify. Your website is where listeners become subscribers and members. Here is how to build that site on Ghost.
You might also like
all_ghostcms
GhostA bright, joyful Ghost theme for food blogs and recipe newsletters, with a smart recipe card.
GhostA vibrant, gradient-glow Ghost theme for podcasts, radio shows and audio newsletters.
GhostA sharp, newspaper-style Ghost theme for finance, business and economics newsletters.