Back to Community
Home / Community / Theme → Twenty fifteen

Troubleshooting Common Twenty Fifteen Theme Layout and Comment Issues

32 threads Sep 11, 2025 Theme → Twenty fifteen

Content

The Twenty Fifteen theme is a popular, clean, and responsive default WordPress theme. However, like any software, users can occasionally encounter issues. Based on community discussions, two of the most frequent problems involve layout on mobile devices (like iPads) and comments not appearing or functioning correctly. This guide will explain why these issues happen and provide the most common solutions.

Common Problem 1: Layout Issues on iPad and Other Mobile Devices

Why it happens: The Twenty Fifteen theme is designed to be responsive, meaning it should automatically adjust its layout to fit different screen sizes. Problems often arise when the viewport meta tag in the HTML <head> is missing, incorrect, or has been modified. This tag is crucial for telling mobile browsers how to handle the page's dimensions and scaling. Another common cause is custom CSS in a child theme or from a plugin that conflicts with the theme's built-in responsive styles.

How to fix it:

  1. Check the Viewport Meta Tag: Ensure your site's header contains the correct viewport tag. It should look like this: 
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">
    If you have modified this tag, reverting it to the default state often resolves the problem.
  2. Use a Child Theme: If you need to make CSS adjustments, always use a child theme. Directly editing the parent theme's files will cause your changes to be lost when the theme updates and could break the layout. Create a child theme and add only the necessary CSS overrides there.
  3. Check for Plugin Conflicts: Temporarily deactivate all plugins to see if the layout corrects itself. If it does, reactivate them one by one to identify the plugin causing the conflict.

Common Problem 2: Comments Not Appearing or Working

Why it happens: Comments in WordPress are controlled by two main factors: the global discussion settings and the settings on individual posts or pages. The Twenty Fifteen theme will not display comment functionality if it is disabled in these settings. A frequent oversight is that comments are often disabled by default on Pages (as opposed to Posts).

How to fix it:

  1. Enable Threaded Comments: Navigate to Settings > Discussion in your WordPress dashboard. Ensure the box for Enable threaded (nested) comments is checked. This is required for the 'Reply' link to appear.
  2. Enable Comments on Pages: By default, WordPress often has comments turned off for Pages. To enable them, edit the specific Page where you want comments. In the editor screen, click on the 'Screen Options' tab in the top right corner and ensure 'Discussion' and 'Comments' are checked. Now, in the editor, you should see a 'Discussion' meta box where you can check 'Allow Comments'.
  3. Check the Global Setting: Also in Settings > Discussion, verify that the setting Allow people to post comments on new articles is enabled. This controls the default for new posts and pages.

By following these steps, you should be able to resolve the most common layout and comment issues encountered with the Twenty Fifteen theme. If problems persist, searching for the specific error message or behavior on independent troubleshooting forums often yields solutions from other users who have faced similar challenges.

Related Support Threads Support