The ability to easily add tables to your website can be very useful. Tables help you sort and present data to people in a way that makes your information easier to understand.
The WordPress visual editor offers many great features, but there are some things that it doesn’t do by default, like being able 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 many non-technical users, this is not a realistic option.
Fortunately, WordPress plugins give users almost unlimited expansion capabilities, and inserting tables into your content with the click of a mouse is no exception.
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn how to create and add tables easily into your pages and blog posts with no coding skills required.
How To Easily Create And Add Tables Into WordPress Without Touching Code
If you want to create and add tables to your WordPress posts or pages with no coding skills required, the tutorial below will show you how to easily add tables into your WordPress posts and pages using a FREE WordPress plugin called TablePress.
TablePress – WP Plugin
A very powerful and time-saving WordPress plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress is TablePress.
TablePress requires no knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. It provides a simple user interface that allows you to easily edit your table data. You can add any type of data, even formulas to your tables.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for visitors. You can easily insert tables into your pages and blog posts using shortcodes and even 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.
TablePress was written and developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
Using TablePress – Tutorial
To create and manage tables in WordPress posts and pages, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
You can download this plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it directly from within your own WP Dashboard …
After the plugin has been installed and activated, a new menu item will display on your WordPress admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and choose Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” section affects the plugin’s behavior in different areas of your site …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can modify where the TablePress menu entry appears on your admin menu.
Normally, the menu item appears 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 closer to the top of the Dashboard menu by selecting “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu entry now appears close to the top of the menu …
You can also play with other plugin options in the “Plugin Options” area, such as formatting styles for your tables, default language, and so on. If you don’t need to modify this section, just leave the default options.
With TablePress, tables are created and formatted inside the plugin area. Tables are then added via a shortcode into your pages. The table will then display after your content is saved.
The advantage of working directly from the plugin is that you can easily change the information in your tables without having to touch your posts and pages. The plugin then updates all of your table data in all locations where the table has been added to your content.
To add a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Type in a table name, an optional description, and the number of rows and columns you would like 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 the new table is created, it will be listed in the “All Tables” list and be assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode allows you to easily add tables anywhere inside a post or page by simply typing or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display a 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 type or paste the content you want to display. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. add bold text, insert links, etc …)
Once your new table is created, additional options appear that 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 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 after it has been created in the “Table Manipulation” section. You can insert images and links, hide, show, insert, delete and duplicate selected rows and columns, add new columns and rows, combine cells, etc …
You can also enable JavaScript library features in your tables, such as allowing your visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, set the number of table rows showing on your pages (and also allow visitors to change the number of rows displayed), display table information, etc …
You can preview your table anytime, by clicking on the Preview button …
A preview window will open allowing you to preview your table. Certain features such as the JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display once your post or page is published …
Click the Save Changes button when finished to save your new table data …
To view a list of all the tables you have created click on TablePress > All Tables …
A list of all the tables you have created will be displayed in this area. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
Using The Shortcode
You insert tables inside page content with the TablePress shortcode.
Click 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 mouse 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 add a table when working inside the “Text” area of the WordPress editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress Text Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon opens a window containing a list of all your tables.
Select the table you want to embed into your post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be inserted …
Publish your post or page to view the table and table contents …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about this plugin is that you can edit things after publishing the table without having to edit your post or page. Change the content in the plugin area, then save your new table settings and refresh your post to view the updated content.
Another great time-saving feature of the TablePress 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 table 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 admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, choose 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 file, you can then easily re-import the table into WordPress.
To import a table, go to your 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.
To import a table, select and enter the source in the “Import Tables” section. You can also import multiple tables from ZIP files and choose whether to import a table as a new table or write over an existing table.
To learn more about TablePress, including accessing the plugin documentation for extra features, 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 a very powerful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and embed tables into your page content.
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