As we’ve discussed in previous posts, by default, WordPress treats your site as a ‘blog’ and shows your latest post entries on the front page, unless you specify a page as your home page.
In another post, we also discuss how to create a blog page to display your most recent published articles.
Regardless of your choice to have your most recent published articles on your main page or your blog page, With WordPress you can specify the number of published blog posts to appear on these pages (i.e. ‘1’, ’5’, ’12’ etc.)
Your site will then display blog posts on your blog page up to the maximum number of blog post entries you have specified, even if your website contains more blog posts than the number of posts you have set to display …
The ability to specify the number of posts display on your web site is useful.
For example, you can display only the most recent entry you have published. This is useful, if, for example, you promote a weekly special, a ‘deal of the day’ type of offer, publish the latest results of your sports team, post upcoming events, set up a quarterly team page for updates and announcements, etc.
You can also use this feature to fill an ugly space on your blog page if your sidebar menu runs too long …
Whatever the reason, WordPress gives you the flexibility to set the number of posts to display on your blog page.
In this tutorial, you are going to learn how easy it is to set how many posts to show up on your WordPress blog.
Specifying The Number Of Blog Posts To Display On Your Blog
WordPress allows you to choose how many blog posts you want to show on the blog page of your web site.
The number of entries you would like displayed is completely up to you. WordPress doesn’t limit this amount …
Note: We suggest that you select a sensible setting that won’t overload your page as the content loads on your site. You can always increase or decrease the number of items displayed on your blog page.
To specify the number of blog post entries you want to display on the blog page of your site, choose Settings > Reading from the WP dashboard menu …
Configure the settings in the Reading Settings screen as per the screenshot below:
How To Modify The Number Of Posts Displayed On Your Main Page
If you are using your site as a blog (i.e. the default WordPress option), where the home page shows your latest published blog posts, then edit your settings as described below:
- Front page displays: Set this to Your latest posts
- Blog pages show at most: X posts (where ‘X’ is the number of blog posts that you want to display – i.e. ‘1’, ’5’, ’10’, ’12’ etc.)
- Click on Save Changes when done…
Editing The Number Of Posts Showing On Your Blog Page
If you are using your site as a website, where the main page shows a fixed page and your newest published blog posts show up on a separate blog page, then edit your settings as described below:
- Front page displays: Set this to A static page, then select Posts page: > your Blog Page from the drop down menu
- Blog pages show at most: X posts X posts (where ‘X’ is the number of blog posts you want showing – i.e. ‘1’, ’5’, ‘7’, ’15’ etc.)
- Click on Save Changes when done …
Now, when visitors come to your site, they will see blog posts showing either on your main page or blog page, up to the maximum number of posts you have specified …
To learn how to change the length of your post excerpts, see the tutorial below:
Congratulations! Now you know how to change the amount of blog posts you would like to show on your website’s blog page.
Related Posts
If you are learning how to use WordPress, you may also find the following posts useful:
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"Wow! I never knew there's so much to learn about WordPress! I bought one of the WordPress for Dummies three years ago, such authors need to be on this course!" - Rich Law, Create A Blog Now