The ability to easily add tables to your pages can be very useful. Tables help you sort and present data to visitors in a way that makes your information easier to understand.
WordPress provides users with a great visual editor, but there are some things that it doesn’t do by default, such as giving you the option to easily create tables.
Although you can create tables manually in WordPress if you know HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), for most non-technical WordPress users, this is not a feasible option.
Fortunately, you can do almost anything you can imagine on a WordPress site with plugins, and adding tables is no exception.
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn how to easily create and add tables into your posts and pages with no coding skills required.
Creating And Inserting Tables Into Pages And Posts In WordPress
To add tables to your WordPress posts or pages with no HTML or CSS knowledge required, we’ll use a FREE WordPress plugin called TablePress.
TablePress
A very powerful and time-saving plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress is TablePress.
TablePress requires no knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. The plugin lets you easily edit your table data. Tables can contain any kind of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to add features like pagination, sorting, filtering, and more for your visitors. You can insert tables into your posts and pages using shortcodes and even display these using text widgets.
A table can also be imported and exported from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON formats.
The plugin was created by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
Using TablePress Plugin For WP – Tutorial
To create and manage tables in WordPress posts and pages, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download this plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from your WordPress Dashboard …
After installing and activating the plugin, you will see a new menu item in your WordPress admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and choose Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” screen affects the plugin’s styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can specify where the TablePress menu entry appears on your Dashboard menu.
By default, the menu item appears somewhere near the middle of your menu. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can position the menu item closer to the top of the menu by choosing “Top-level (middle)” in the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu entry will now show at the top section of your admin menu …
You can also specify other plugin options in the “Plugin Options” section, such as table formatting styles, default language, etc. If you don’t need to change this section, simply leave the default options.
With TablePress, tables are created and edited inside the plugin area. Tables are then placed via a shortcode into your pages. Your table will then display or update after publishing your page.
The advantage of working directly from the plugin is that you can easily change the information in your tables without having to manually edit your pages and posts. TablePress then updates all of your table information in all locations where the table has been added to your content.
To create a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Type in the table name, an optional description, and the number of rows and columns you want for your 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 tables you create at anytime…
Once your new table has been created, it will be listed in the “All Tables” list and get assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode lets you easily add tables anywhere in your content by simply typing or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display your table …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to it is easy.
In the “Table Content” section, just click in the cell and type or paste the content you want to display. You can add text, images and HTML formatting to your content (e.g. bold or italicize words, insert hyperlinks, etc …)
After your new table has been created, you will see additional options for configuring your table.
For example, in the “Table Options” section you can specify 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 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 creating it in the “Table Manipulation” area. You can perform a range of manipulations on your table, such as inserting links or images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and cloning selected columns and rows, adding new rows and columns, combining cells, etc …
You can also enable JavaScript library features in your tables that will allow your site users to sort, filter and search your table content, change the number of table rows displayed on your site (and also allow users to change 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 on your browser displaying the table. Certain features like JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display once your post or page is published …
Remember to click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to save your new table information …
Once you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by selecting TablePress > All Tables …
Your tables are displayed in this section. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
Using The TablePress Shortcode To Insert Tables Into Your Pages And Posts
You insert tables inside any pages and blog posts with the TablePress 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 mouse cursor where you want your table to appear then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also add a table when working in the “Text” area of the editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon opens a window containing a list of all the available tables you have created.
Select the table you want to add to the post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be inserted into your content …
Publish your post or page to view the table …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about TablePress is that you can edit the contents of your table after publishing the table without having to open 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 information.
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 information, 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, select TablePress > Export a Table in your main menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select the table(s) you would like 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 editing and resaving the table file, you can then easily reimport the table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress from your hard drive, go to the admin 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 resembling a webpage, or its own format. You can also import existing tables from the WP-Table Reloaded plugin
To import a table, select and enter the source in the “Import Tables” area. You can also import multiple tables from compressed (ZIP) files and select whether to import tables as a new table or replace an existing table.
To learn more about using the plugin, including where to access the plugin documentation for extra features, or get plugin support, 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 WordPress posts and pages.
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