The ability to easily add tables to your pages can be very useful. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to people in a format that can make your information easier to understand.
WordPress provides users with a great visual editor, but there are some things that the default editor doesn’t let you do, like being able to create tables without having to learn code.
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 users, this is simply not a practical option.
Fortunately, WordPress plugins give users almost unlimited expansion capabilities, and inserting tables into your content is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to easily create and add tables into your posts and pages without requiring knowledge of HTML or CSS or coding skills.
How To Create And Insert Tables Into Your Content Without Touching Code
If you want to add tables into your WordPress content and don’t have the skills and knowledge to create tables using HTML or CSS, the step-by-step tutorial below will show you how to easily add tables into your WordPress posts and pages using a FREE plugin called TablePress.
TablePress – WordPress Plugin
TablePress is a great WordPress plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress.
TablePress requires no knowledge of HTML, CSS, etc. The plugin lets you easily edit table data. You can add any kind of data, even formulas to your tables.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to add features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for visitors. You can easily insert tables into your posts and pages using shortcodes and even display tables using text widgets.
You can also import and export tables from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON.
The plugin was created by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
How To Use TablePress – Step-By-Step Tutorial
To create and add tables to WordPress with TablePress, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from your WordPress Dashboard …
After the plugin has been installed and activated, a new menu item will be added to your admin 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 change where the TablePress menu entry appears on your admin menu.
Normally, the menu entry displays somewhere around the middle of your menu bar. If you plan to use this plugin a lot, then you can easily position the menu option towards the top of the admin menu by specifying “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item now appears near the top of the admin menu …
You can also play with other settings in the “Plugin Options” screen, like table formatting styles, default language, etc. If you don’t need to change these settings, simply leave the default options.
With TablePress, tables are created and formatted within the plugin area. Tables are then added via a shortcode into your pages. The table will then display when your post or page is published or updated.
The advantage of working directly from the plugin is that you can easily modify the data inside your tables without having to open any of your pages. TablePress then updates all of your table data in all locations where the table has been added to your content.
To create a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Enter 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 your table at anytime…
Once the new table has been created, it will display in the “All Tables” list and be assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode allows you to easily insert tables anywhere inside a post or page simply by inserting or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display a table …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to it is very easy.
In the “Table Content” section, just click inside the cell and either type or paste your content. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. add bold text, insert links, etc …)
Once your new table is created, displays a number of additional options that will allow you to 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 rows when visitors hover their mouse over the table, show the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also edit your table after it has been created in the “Table Manipulation” area. You can perform various operations on your table, like adding links or images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and cloning selected rows and columns, adding new rows and columns, combining cells, etc …
You can also enable JavaScript library features in your tables that will allow site visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, change the number of table rows displayed on your posts (and also allow visitors to 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 allowing you to preview your table. Certain features like JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display once your table is published …
Remember to click the Save Changes button when finished to update your table data …
To view a list of all your tables TablePress > All Tables …
Your tables are listed here. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, export, delete and preview tables …
Using The Shortcode
You embed a table into any pages and posts using the TablePress shortcode.
Get the shortcode for your tables by clicking on the Show Shortcode menu item under the table title to get the shortcode …
The plugin also adds a menu item 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 your table to show then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also insert a table when working in the “Text” area of the editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of all your available tables.
Select the table you want to add to the post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be added …
The table contents will display as soon as you publish your post or page …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about this plugin is that you can edit data after publishing the table without having to edit your post or page. Tweak the content in the plugin area, then save the new table settings and refresh your post 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, just export your current table, then add new items, 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 your admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select the table(s) 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 editing and resaving your table file, you can then easily re-import your table into WordPress.
To import a table, go to your sidebar menu and 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. You can also import existing tables from the WP-Table Reloaded plugin
To import a table, select and enter the import source in the “Import Tables” section. You can import multiple tables from compressed (ZIP) files and choose whether to import tables as a new table or write over an existing table.
For more information about the plugin, including accessing documentation about extra features, get technical support for the plugin, 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 an extremely powerful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and insert tables into your WordPress posts and pages.
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