A news or magazine homepage has to solve a problem most website templates never face: showing dozens of stories at once without collapsing into noise. We design these templates in-house at uiCookies around exactly that constraint — a lead story that clearly outranks the rest, sections that behave like editorial desks, and article pages built for actual reading rather than one hero image and three paragraphs.
Everything in this category is built on Bootstrap 5 and ships jQuery-free, so the front-end stays fast and dependency-light and is easy to wire to whatever runs behind it — WordPress, Ghost, a headless CMS, or a hand-built static pipeline. The markup is plain HTML you can open and edit; no build step is required to change a headline, swap a nameplate, or restyle a section.
Every template here is free to download and use, including on commercial and client work, and each ships with a live demo so you can see the layout in motion before committing. Pick the front page that matches how your publication actually thinks about its stories.
The templates
TechNews
Built specifically for technology coverage, TechNews leads with a weighted featured-story grid that lets one headline dominate while related stories fill in around it. Dedicated category sections keep verticals like reviews, how-tos, and breaking news visually distinct, and the article template is tuned for the mix of screenshots, long explainers, and detail-heavy writing that tech publishing tends to run. It's the right pick for a gadget blog, a software-news outlet, or any publication where the story stream is heavy on visuals.
Sports Magazine
Sports Magazine turns up the visual energy with a bold featured grid made for match photography and big-moment headlines, so the front page reads like game day. Category blocks split coverage by league or sport, and a tabbed sidebar flips between latest and most-popular without a page reload — handy when scores and standings shift hour to hour. Reach for it if you run a sports portal, a fan site, or a team blog that lives on fast-moving, image-driven stories.
The Gazette
The Gazette is the one built to look like an actual newspaper — a centered broadsheet nameplate, a live headline ticker, and a three-column lead with a World-in-Brief rail down the side. Four editorial desks (World, Business, Technology, and Culture) organize the front page the way a real masthead would, alongside a Most-Read list and a live-markets sidebar for finance-minded readers. Its restrained ink-on-paper palette and single press-red accent make it the natural choice for a serious daily, a digital news outlet, or anyone who wants gravitas over flash.
Compare at a glance
| Template | Best for | Layout | Standout feature |
|---|---|---|---|
| TechNews | Tech blogs & gadget news | Weighted featured grid + category sections | Article pages tuned for visuals & explainers |
| Sports Magazine | Sports portals & fan sites | Bold featured grid + category blocks | Tabbed latest/popular sidebar |
| The Gazette | Serious news & digital dailies | Broadsheet front page, three-column lead | Headline ticker + live-markets rail |
How to choose
Start with how much you publish and how fast. A high-volume outlet pushing dozens of stories a day needs the density and strict lead-story hierarchy you get from The Gazette or TechNews, where one headline clearly outranks the rest and sections behave like desks. A lower-frequency title — a weekend sports column, a niche tech newsletter — can afford more breathing room and fewer front-page slots. Count how many stories you genuinely need above the fold before you fall for a homepage screenshot.
Don't judge a magazine template by its homepage alone — readers spend their time on the article page, so open the demo's single-post view and check the things that matter for long-form: comfortable line length, readable body type, and sensible handling of pull-quotes, inline images, and captions. Back on the homepage, decide whether you want session-boosting furniture like a Most-Read list or a tabbed latest/popular sidebar (Sports Magazine and The Gazette both include one). Those drive pages-per-visit, but only pay off once you have a deep enough back catalogue to surface.
Performance is where news sites quietly fail. A magazine homepage can pull in dozens of thumbnails, so lazy-load everything below the fold, export images at the size they're actually displayed, and keep an eye on the lead image as your LCP element. Because every template here is Bootstrap 5 and jQuery-free, you start out lean — the real risk is what you bolt on afterward, so add ad scripts and third-party embeds deliberately rather than by reflex. The markup is plain HTML, so restyling is a matter of Bootstrap's CSS variables and utility classes, and the section blocks are modular enough to duplicate or drop; when you connect it to WordPress, Ghost, or a headless CMS, map the editorial desks to your categories or tags so the front page keeps its structure as content flows in.
Frequently asked questions
Are these templates really free, even for commercial or client projects?
Yes. Every news and magazine template here is free to download and use, including on commercial sites and paid client work. They're designed and maintained in-house by uiCookies, so there's no third-party licensing to untangle.
Can I edit them without a build step or npm?
Yes. Each template is plain HTML with Bootstrap 5, so you can open a file and change a headline, swap the logo, or restyle a section in any editor. There's no compiler, framework, or build pipeline required to make changes.
Will they work with a CMS like WordPress or Ghost?
The templates are static HTML front-ends, so they're a starting point for a theme rather than a drop-in theme themselves. Because the markup is clean and jQuery-free, it's straightforward to port into a WordPress or Ghost theme or a headless setup — map the sections and desks to your categories and wire up the loops.
Are they responsive on phones and tablets?
Yes. They're built on Bootstrap 5's responsive grid, so the featured grids, category blocks, and sidebars reflow down to a single readable column on small screens. Test with your own longest headlines and largest images, since real editorial content is always messier than demo copy.
How do they handle performance with so many images on the homepage?
The front-end is lightweight to begin with — Bootstrap 5, no jQuery, and minimal JavaScript. For a busy homepage, lazy-load below-the-fold thumbnails and export images at display size; on news sites the biggest speed risks are usually the ad scripts and social embeds you add later, not the template itself.
Can I change the colors, fonts, and branding to match my publication?
Absolutely. Colors and type run on Bootstrap 5's CSS variables and standard utility classes, so restyling The Gazette's ink-on-paper look or TechNews's palette is a matter of overriding a few values. Drop in your own nameplate or logo and adjust the accent color to make it yours.
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