As discussed in this article, one of the many benefits of using WordPress is that you can easily add content, expand your website’s functionality, and rearrange the layout of your website with no web programming skills or knowledge required.
WordPress allows you to easily insert, remove, and manage various types of content on your blog’s sidebar (or header and footer sections, depending on what theme you have installed) using widgets.
Once you know how to use widgets, you can easily add things to your site like:
- nested page lists
- categories
- archived blog post entries
- customized menus
- links to external sites
- links to recent posts
- excerpts of recent comments added to posts
- clickable ads
- quotations
- poll results
- RSS feed items
- subscription form
- video galleries
- twitter feeds
- display widgets from other sites (e.g. Facebook friends)
- administrative forms (e.g. login, register, etc.)
(WP widgets help make managing and using WordPress easier)
To learn more about what WP widgets are, how widgets work and how using widgets can help you expand the functionality of your website, see this article:
In this tutorial series we teach you how to use and configure various commonly-used WordPress widgets.
Using Widgets In WordPress
The Basics
Before configuring and using widgets, let’s first make sure that you understand some of the basics of how to use widgets:
Most WordPress Themes Support Widget-Ready Areas
Most WordPress themes support widgets and provide built-in widget-ready sections in your theme’s layout where you can add widgets, such as the sidebar, header area, and the footer area. Depending on the theme, widgets can also be used inside the content area …
(Many themes offer users multiple widgetized areas)
These widget-ready layouts correspond to a feature inside your Widget management panel called “Widget Areas” …
(Widget Areas)
The Widgets Screen
The Widgets section displays all the widgets that are available.
On the right-hand side of the screen, you can see all “active” widgets …
(Activate or deactivate widgets by dragging & dropping)
Available widgets can be activated or deactivated using drag & drop.
Widgets dragged from the Available Widgets section to widget areas like the sidebar, footer, etc. automatically become active.
In addition, the Widgets screen includes an Inactive Widgets section that lets you remove any widgets that you no longer want to actively display on your website. Inactive widgets do not lose their settings.
Rearrange Widgets Using Drag And Drop
You can easily add, activate, deactivate, reorder and delete things using widgets with drag and drop in the Widgets area …
(Rearrange your site’s widgets using drag and drop)
You can also easily reorder the layout of your widget-enabled sections using drag and drop.
For example, take a look at the image below. In this site, the widgets have already been configured to display the following to visitors:
- A subscription form,
- A contact support button, and
- A ‘click to call’ function from a widgetized WP plugin (i.e. a plugin that adds an accompanying widget to your site) …
(Widgets control how certain features appear on your WordPress site)
Inside the Widget area, you would see that the front-end features display on the site in exactly the same order as they have been arranged in the back-end widget section …
If we reorganize these widgets in the Main Sidebar Widget Area by dragging & dropping some of the elements around …
(Drag & drop widgets in your widget area to rearrange their order)
The widget features have now been reorganized in your sidebar …
As you can see, this instantly reorganizes the layout of the sidebar.
Reorganizing sidebar elements with widgets can help improve your site’s visitor experience.
Note in the screenshot below that the ‘click to call’ function (3) is now the first item on the sidebar area, and the ‘contact us’ graphic banner (2) is placed above the newsletter opt-in form (1) …
(Rearranging sidebar elements with widgets can help improve visitor experience)
Removing Widgets From The Sidebar
Removing widgets from your WordPress sidebar is very easy.
For example, let’s show you how to delete the Search widget from your sidebar menu …
(Search widget)
To remove a widget from an active Widget area, you can either open up the widget and click the Delete link …
(Delete WordPress widgets)
Or just drag the widget out of the Active Widgets section and into the Inactive Widgets area …
(Removing widgets)
Repeat this process for all widgets you want removed from your sidebar. You can always reinstate a widget by dragging it back into the active widgets area.
Widget Settings
Many widgets can be customized. This includes hiding information from users, displaying additional forms, fields, or information, specifying dimensions of sidebar images, videos, etc.
Click on the little triangle in the corner of a widget to expand the item …
(Toggling expands/collapse widget settings)
When the widget expands, you can change and save your settings, click Delete to 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 offer little to no configurable options)
Customize Widgets Section
Depending on which theme you choose, you’re also able to manage and customize your widgets without actually making changes to your site. This way, you can be sure that you like the customized edits before committing anything live to your site.
The ability to manage widgets from your WordPress dashboard is a valuable feature of WordPress. You can work in preview mode inside the WordPress Theme Customizer screen (Appearance > Customize) and see how your widget content will appear prior to publishing changes (and avoid making mistakes), or manage widgets on the fly using the Widget editor area.
(Edit widgets live in the Customize feature)
If you need to make changes to your site while viewing the front-end, just click on the Customize link …
(Toolbar Customize Link)
This will bring you to the Customizer section in the backend.
You can do a number of things to widgets in preview mode (like inserting, deleting and moving widgets around), and see all changes in real time. If you are happy with the results, click the “Save and Publish” button and your changes will be instantly updated and made visible on your site.
(Widget management – configure widgets on the fly!)
After saving changes, all changes made to widgets will be automatically updated.
Because WordPress Themes can display elements differently on your site, we recommend that you install the theme first before configuring widgets.
Also, remember to use the WordPress Customizer to preview all changes. This will save you from having to keep two browsers open while you go through this tutorial (one to work in and one to check how your changes are coming along).
Now that you know the basics of using widgets, it’s time to learn how to configure various commonly-used widgets in WordPress.
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This is the end of part one of this series of tutorials about using Widgets.
To continue, click this link:
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