Being able to display tables on your website can be very useful. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to visitors in a format that can make your information easier to understand.
WordPress provides users with a feature-rich visual editor, but there are some things that it doesn’t let you do by default, such as giving you the option to easily create tables.
Although you can add tables manually to your content in WordPress if you know HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), for many non-technical WordPress users, this is not a practical option.
Fortunately, you can do almost anything you need done on a WordPress site with plugins, and adding tables to your content with the click of a mouse is no exception.
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn how to easily create and insert tables into your posts and pages without requiring knowledge of HTML or CSS or coding skills.
How To Create And Add Tables In WordPress Posts And Pages
Follow the step-by-step tutorial below to learn how to create and add tables into your WordPress posts and pages using a FREE WordPress plugin called TablePress.
TablePress – WordPress Plugin
TablePress is a great WordPress plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress.
TablePress doesn’t require you to have any knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. The plugin lets you easily edit table data. Your tables can contain any kind of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for your visitors. You can include the tables into your page content using shortcodes and display these inside text widgets.
A table can also be imported and exported from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON.
This plugin was developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
Using TablePress Plugin For WordPress – Step-By-Step Tutorial
To create and add tables to WordPress posts or pages, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
You can download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from within your own WordPress Dashboard …
After the plugin has been installed and activated, you will see a new menu item has been added to your main menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the submenu list …
The “Plugin Options” area controls your plugin styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can modify the position of the TablePress menu entry in your Dashboard menu.
By default, the menu entry displays around the middle of your menu bar. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can position the menu option closer to the top of the Dashboard menu by choosing “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu entry will now show at the top section of your menu list …
You can also play with other settings in the “Plugin Options” section, such as formatting styles for your tables, default language, and so on. Leave all options as they are if you don’t need to change things in this area.
With TablePress, tables are created and modified within the plugin section. Tables are then placed via a shortcode into your posts. The tables will then display or update when saving and publishing your page.
The advantage of doing this is that you can easily modify the information in your tables without having to open any of your posts. The plugin then updates all of your table data inside all posts and pages where the table has been added to your content.
To create a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Type in a name, a description (optional), and the number of rows and columns you want for the new table into the “Add New Table” form in the Add New tab, then click on the Add Table button to create your new table. You can edit the name, description and size of any table you create at anytime…
Once your new table has been created, it will appear in the “All Tables” list and get assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode lets you easily add tables anywhere inside a post or page by simply inserting or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display a table …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to your table is very easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click in the cell and type or paste your content. You can add text, images and HTML formatting to your content (e.g. add bold text, insert hyperlinks, etc …)
After your new table has been created, displays a number of additional options that will let you configure your table.
For example, in the “Table Options” section you can select the first row of your table to be the table header and the last row of the table to be the table footer, display alternate background colours on consecutive rows, highlight a row when a visitor hovers their mouse over the table, print the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also edit your table after creating it in the “Table Manipulation” section. You can perform various edits on your table, such as adding images or links, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and duplicating selected columns and rows, adding new columns and rows, combining cells, etc …
You can also enable JavaScript library features in your tables, such as allowing your site users to sort, filter and search your table content, change the number of table rows displayed on your pages (and let users specify the number of rows displayed), display table information, etc …
You can see how your table looks anytime, by clicking the Preview button …
A preview window will open displaying your table. Certain features such as the JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display when your table is published …
Click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to save your table information …
Once you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by clicking on TablePress > All Tables …
A list of all the tables you have created will be displayed in this screen. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, delete, export and preview your tables …
How To Use The TablePress Shortcode
You can embed tables inside any posts and pages with the TablePress shortcode.
Click on the Show Shortcode menu item under the table title to get the shortcode …
The plugin also adds a shortcode menu icon to your WordPress editor. This allows you to easily insert tables into your posts and pages while working on your content.
Place your cursor where you want the table to show then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also insert a table when working in the “Text” area of the editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In Text Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon opens a window containing a list of all your available tables.
Select the table you want to embed in your post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be inserted into your content …
Publish your post or page to display the table …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about TablePress is that you can change information after publishing the table without having to open your post or page. Edit the content in the plugin area, then save your new table settings and refresh your page to view the updated content.
Another great time-saving feature of this plugin, is that if you plan to keep adding more data to an existing table, you can simply export your current table, then add new data, make changes, etc. You can then re-import your exported file with the news changes and your table content will be automatically updated throughout your site.
To export a table, select TablePress > Export a Table in the WP admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select the table(s) you want to export (you can select multiple tables by holding down the “Ctrl” key), then select the Export Format you want(e.g. CSV) and any other export options you’d like to make and click on the Export Table button to download the file to your hard drive …
After changing and resaving your file, you can then easily reimport your table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress from your hard drive, select TablePress > Import a Table …
TablePress can import tables from existing data, such as CSV file data, from a spreadsheet application (e.g. Excel), an HTML file, or its own format.
To import a table, select and enter the import source in the “Import Tables” area. You can import multiple tables from ZIP files and choose whether to import tables as a new table or write over an existing table.
For more information about using the plugin, including where to access documentation about extra features, or get technical support, contact the plugin developer, etc., click on the “About Tab” in the plugin admin section, or select TablePress > About TablePress …
As you can see, TablePress is a very useful time saving plugin that is free and will help you easily create and insert tables into your page content.
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