# How to use plugins from a theme?

**URL:** <https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-use-plugins-from-a-theme/5669>\
**Category:** Help\
**Created:** [February 22, 2021, 12:49pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-use-plugins-from-a-theme/5669 "2021-02-22T12:49:34Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Morten](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/morten/32/3278_2.png) [@Morten](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/Morten)\
**Post date:** [February 22, 2021, 12:49pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-use-plugins-from-a-theme/5669/1 "2021-02-22T12:49:36Z")

</div>

I’m unable to use the plugins specified in my theme.

**Plugins can be specified in themes**  
Reading the theme docs I can see that plugins are inherited.

> Jekyll themes specify plugins and package up assets, layouts, includes, and stylesheets

**Example theme with plugin**  
I’ve made a [simple example theme](https://github.com/MortenHofft/jtheme) with a custom Liquid tag as a plugin (using the Jekyll docs tag example (/docs/plugins/tags/). It works perfectly when building the theme.

**Example site using theme**  
But, I now want to use that theme (and inherit the plugin as well). I try to do so [in this sample repo](https://github.com/MortenHofft/jtheme-use)

**Error**  
But when I try to serve the site I get an error:

```auto
/Users/myname/.gem/ruby/2.7.0/gems/liquid-4.0.3/lib/liquid/document.rb:23:in `unknown_tag': Liquid syntax error (line 10): Unknown tag 'render_time' (Liquid::SyntaxError)

```

It is worth mentioning that I use Jekyll-remote-theme plugin

(I would have provided more links, but I’m not allowed to)

What am I doing wrong?  
I would appreciate any help. Thank you.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Morten](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/morten/32/3278_2.png) [@Morten](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/Morten)\
**Post date:** [February 22, 2021, 12:52pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-use-plugins-from-a-theme/5669/2 "2021-02-22T12:52:27Z")

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I have no idea how I missed this before writing that question

> <https://github.com/benbalter/jekyll-remote-theme/issues/75>
>
> Describe the bug
> We have a few custom tag plugins in the \_plugins folder in a remote theme. Using the theme in...

Apparently it is the remote theme plugin that won’t support plugins.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![MichaelCurrin](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/michaelcurrin/32/2340_2.png) [@MichaelCurrin](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/MichaelCurrin)\
**Post date:** [February 22, 2021, 4:52pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-use-plugins-from-a-theme/5669/3 "2021-02-22T16:52:40Z")

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I had the same issue not long ago.

I am using Remote Theme plugin to point to a theme and run on GH Pages.

I set the theme in config.

And I install the theme locally using the theme in Gemfile. (GH Pages ignores this file)

> <https://github.com/MichaelCurrin/dev-cheatsheets/blob/master/Gemfile#L6>

Because of using Remote Theme plugin, the installed theme is not actually used.

But… all the theme’s plugins get installed.

* * *

Note that in my project linked above I do not mention jekyll-sitemap etc. as a plugin in Gemfile. But I am still able to use them.

Here are my theme dependencies. If you look at my site you’ll see that there is a sitemap.xml created by the plugin.

> <https://github.com/MichaelCurrin/fractal/blob/master/fractal.gemspec#L21>

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![MichaelCurrin](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/michaelcurrin/32/2340_2.png) [@MichaelCurrin](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/MichaelCurrin)\
**Post date:** [February 22, 2021, 5:02pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-use-plugins-from-a-theme/5669/4 "2021-02-22T17:02:36Z")

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Note there is no plugins key in my [config](https://github.com/MichaelCurrin/dev-cheatsheets/blob/master/_config.yml).

A bit off topic.

Weirdly, if I setup another site with a minima theme built into GH Pages and **not** use Remote Theme, then I **must** add the sitemap and feed plugins in the config. But just these two.

And it only affects remote builds.

And the other plugins work fine without setting in plugins.

> <https://github.com/MichaelCurrin/jekyll-blog-demo/blob/master/_config.yml#L20>