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.
The WordPress visual editor is great, but there are some things that it doesn’t do by default, such as letting you easily create tables.
Although you can add tables manually to your content in WordPress if you have knowledge of HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), for most non-technical WordPress users, this is simply not a feasible 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 tutorial you will learn how to create and insert tables easily into your posts and pages without requiring knowledge of HTML or CSS or coding skills.
How To Create And Add Tables With WordPress
To add tables into your WordPress content with no HTML or CSS knowledge required, we’ll use a FREE plugin called TablePress.
WP Plugin – TablePress
A powerful and time-saving plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress simple and easy is TablePress.
TablePress doesn’t require you to have any knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. The plugin lets you easily edit your table data. You can add any type of data, even formulas to tables.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to add features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for visitors. You can easily include the tables into your 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 formats.
This plugin was developed 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, install and activate the TablePress plugin.
You can download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from within your Dashboard …
Once you have installed and activated the plugin, you will see a new menu item in your WP admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the submenu list …
The “Plugin Options” area affects the plugin’s styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can specify the position of the TablePress menu entry in your admin menu.
Normally, the menu entry displays somewhere near the middle of your menu column. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can position the menu item close to the top of the admin menu by specifying “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item will now display near the top of your menu list …
You can also play with other plugin options in the “Plugin Options” tab, such as table formatting styles, default language, and so on. Leave all options as they are if you don’t need to change things in this section.
With TablePress, you create and edit tables inside the plugin section. Tables are then placed via a shortcode into your WordPress posts and pages. Your table will then display or update after your post or page is published or updated.
The advantage of doing this is that you can easily update the information inside your tables without having to touch your posts. TablePress then updates all of your table information in all instances where the table has been added to your content.
To create a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Enter the table name, a description (optional), and the number of rows and columns you want for your new table into the “Add New Table” form in the Add New tab, and click on the Add Table button to create your new table. You can edit the name, description and size of your tables at anytime…
Once your new table is 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 simply by typing or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display your table …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to the table is easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click in the cell and either type or paste your content. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. bold or italicize words, insert hyperlinks, etc …)
Once your new table is created, additional options appear that let you configure your table.
For example, in the “Table Options” area you can specify the first row of your table to be the table header or the last row of the table to be the table footer, make the background of consecutive rows alternate in color, highlight rows when a visitor hovers their mouse over the table, display the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also modify your table information after it has been created in the “Table Manipulation” section. You can perform a number of table manipulations, such as inserting links and images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and cloning selected rows and columns, 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 showing on your content (and let users specify the number of rows displayed), display table information, etc …
You can see how your table looks anytime, by clicking on 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 …
Remember to click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to update your new table data …
After you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by choosing TablePress > All Tables …
A list of all your tables will be displayed in this area. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
How To Use The Shortcode
You can embed tables into your content using a shortcode.
Click on the Show Shortcode menu item under your 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 the table to be embedded then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also add a table when working inside the “Text” area of the WordPress editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of your available tables.
Select the table you want to embed into your post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be added …
Your 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 information after publishing the table without having to open your post or page. Change the content in the plugin area, then save the new table settings and refresh your content to view the updated content.
Another great time-saving feature of the TablePress plugin, is that if you plan to keep adding new data to an existing table, you can simply export your current table, then add new items, make changes, etc. You can then re-import your table file with the news changes and your table content will be automatically updated throughout your site.
To export an existing table, click on TablePress > Export a Table in your WP admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select the table(s) you want to export (tip: 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 making changes and resaving your table file, you can then reimport the table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress, select TablePress > Import a Table …
TablePress can import tables from existing data, such as CSV file data, from a spreadsheet application, an HTML file, or its own JSON 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” area. You can import multiple tables from ZIP files and choose whether to import a table as a new table or replace an existing table.
For more information about using TablePress, including where to access the plugin documentation for extra features, or get technical support for the plugin, contact the plugin author, etc., click on the “About Tab” in the plugin admin section, or select TablePress > About TablePress …
As you can see, TablePress is quite a useful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and add tables into your page content.
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