As we discuss in this post, one of the many great benefits of using WordPress to manage and grow your web presence is that you can easily add content, improve your site’s functionality, or reconfigure the layout of your site with no web coding skills required.
WordPress gives you the ability to quickly and easily insert, delete, and manage content from your site’s sidebar (or header and footer sections, depending on what theme you are using) using widgets.
Once you know how to use widgets, you can easily add things to your site’s sidebar area (plus headers and footers and other areas, depending on the WordPress theme you have installed) like:
- nested page lists
- categories
- post archives
- customized menus
- links to external sites
- posts that you want to promote
- comments
- advertising banners
- customer testimonials
- poll questions & results
- content from RSS feeds
- opt-in form
- videos
- twitter feeds
- add widgets from external sites (e.g. affiliate programs)
- administrative forms (e.g. login, register, etc.)
(WordPress widgets make managing and using WordPress easy)
To learn more about what WP widgets are, how widgets work and how using widgets can help you expand the functionality of your website, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial series you will learn how to use and configure various frequently-used WordPress widgets.
How To Use Widgets In WordPress
What You Need To Know First
Before we start learning how to configure widgets, let’s first cover some of the basic concepts of how to use widgets:
Most WordPress Themes Support Widgetized Layouts
Many WordPress themes support widgets and provide widgetized sections in your theme’s layout where widgets can appear, such as the sidebar navigation section, header area, and the footer area. Depending on what theme you are using, widgets can also be found below or above the content area …
(Many themes provide a number of widget sections)
These widgetized sections correspond to a feature inside your Widget panel called “Widget Areas” …
(Widget Areas)
The Widgets Screen
The Widgets screen displays a list of all the widgets that are available.
On the right-hand side of the screen, you can see all “active” widgets …
(Activate or deactivate widgets using drag-and-drop)
Available widgets can be made Active or Inactive using drag & drop.
Widgets dragged from the Available Widgets section to widget areas like the sidebar, footer, etc. automatically become active and available for use.
In addition, the Widgets area includes an Inactive Widgets section that lets you remove any widgets that you no longer want to use on your site. Inactive widgets do not lose their pre-configured settings.
Reorganize WordPress Widgets Using Drag & Drop
You can easily add, activate, deactivate, reorder and delete widgets by dragging and dropping items in the Widgets area …
(Rearrange widgets on your WordPress site using drag & drop)
You can also easily rearrange the order and layout of your website’s widget-ready layout using drag-and-drop.
For example, in the image below, the widgets have already been configured to show the following:
- An opt-in form,
- A click for support banner, and
- A ‘click to call’ section from a widgetized plugin (i.e. a WordPress plugin that adds an accompanying widget to your site) …
(Widgets control the order certain features appear on your site)
Inside the Widget area, you would see that the front-end features display on the site in exactly the same order as their corresponding widgets have been arranged in the back-end widget area …
If we reorganize the above widgets in the Sidebar Widget Area using drag-and-drop …
(Drag and drop widgets in your widget area to rearrange their order)
The widgets have now been reorganized in the sidebar …
This instantly reorganizes the layout of your site’s sidebar.
Reorganizing sidebar layout with widgets can help improve user experience.
Note in the screenshot below that the ‘click to call’ feature (3) is now first the sidebar, and the support section (2) can now be found above the newsletter subscription form (1) …
(Rearranging sidebar elements with widgets can help to improve visitor experience)
Removing Widgets From Your WordPress Sidebar Navigation Section
Deleting widgets from your WordPress sidebar is very easy.
For example, let’s show you how to remove the Search widget from your sidebar …
(Search widget)
To delete an active widget, you can either open up the widget settings and click the Delete link …
(How to delete your widgets)
Or just drag the widget out of the Active Widgets section and drop it into the Inactive Widgets area …
(Removing your widgets)
Repeat this process for all widgets you want to remove from the sidebar area. You can always restore a widget by dragging it back into the active widgets area.
Widget Settings
Most widgets offer various options that allow you to further configure things. This can include things like making certain types of information hidden to visitors but visible to registered users, displaying additional forms, fields, or information, specifying dimensions of sidebar images, videos, etc.
Clicking on the little triangle in the corner of a widget toggles between expanding and collapsing the item and displays the widget’s settings …
(Toggle to expand/collapse widget settings)
When the widget expands, you can change and save your settings, delete the widget from the “Active Widgets” section, close the widget, or click on the triangle to collapse the widget …
(Widget settings)
Some widgets may require or offer no customization, or they may only allow you to add something like an optional title …
(Some widgets provide users with little to no customizable options)
Widget Previews
Depending on the WP theme you are using, you’re also able to preview any changes live without actually making changes to your site. This way, you can be sure that you like what you see before making any permanent changes to your website or blog.
The ability to manage widgets from the dashboard is a great feature of WordPress. You can work in preview mode inside the WordPress Theme Customizer screen (Appearance > Customize) and see how the widget content will appear before publishing any changes you’ve made (and avoid making errors), or manage widgets on the fly using the Widget editor screen.
(Edit widgets in the Customize feature)
If you need to make changes to your site while viewing the frontend, just click on the Customize link …
(Toolbar Customize Link)
This will bring you to the Customizer feature in the backend.
You can do several things in preview mode (like inserting, deleting and reorganizing your widgets), and it’s all done in real time. If you like what you have done, click the “Save and Publish” button and your changes will instantly become available on the blog’s frontend.
(Widget management – work in preview mode)
Once your changes have been saved, all changes made to widgets will be automatically updated.
Since WordPress Themes can display elements differently on your site, we recommend installing the theme first before configuring widgets on the sidebar.
Also, remember to use the Customizer feature to preview your changes. This saves you from having to keep two browsers open while you go through this tutorial.
Now that you know the basics of using widgets, the next step is to start configuring a number of frequently-used widgets in WordPress.
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This is the end of part 1 of this series of tutorials on how to use Widgets.
To continue reading, click here:
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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
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