As we’ve explained in this post, there are lots of benefits in using the WordPress web publishing software to build and manage your digital presence. One of these is that WordPress makes it very easy to add content, expand your website’s functionality, or reconfigure the layout of your website without web coding skills or knowledge required.
WordPress gives you the ability to quickly and easily add, delete, and manage various blocks of content on your site’s sidebar (and 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 theme you have installed) like:
- nested list of pages
- site categories
- archives
- menus that display only selected pages
- links to resources
- posts that you want to promote
- post comments
- advertising banners
- user testimonials
- poll results
- content from RSS feeds
- registration box
- video thumbnails
- twitter feeds
- display widgets from external sites (e.g. affiliate programs)
- administrative forms (e.g. login, register, etc.)
(Widgets make managing and using WordPress easy)
To learn more about what WordPress widgets are, how they work and how using widgets can help you expand the functionality of your website, see this article:
In this step-by-step tutorial series you will learn how to use and configure various commonly-used WordPress widgets.
How To Use Widgets In WordPress
Basic Concepts
Before we get into configuring and using widgets, it helps to first cover some of the basic concepts of how to use widgets:
Most WordPress Themes Support Widgetized Areas
Many WordPress themes support widgets and provide built-in areas in the theme’s layout where you can use widgets, such as the sidebar, header area, and footer sections. Depending on what theme you are using, widgets can sometimes also be used below or above the content area …
(Many WordPress themes offer users multiple widget-enabled areas)
These widget-ready areas correspond to a feature inside your Widget administration screen called “Widget Areas” …
(Widget Areas)
Widgets Panel
The Widgets area displays all the widgets that you currently have available.
On the right-hand side of the screen, you can see all “active” widgets …
(Widgets can be activated or deactivated with drag & drop ease)
Available widgets can be made Active or Inactive by dragging-and-dropping items to different areas of the panel.
Widgets dragged from the Available Widgets section to widget areas like the sidebar, footer, etc. become immediately activated for use.
In addition, the Widgets panel includes an Inactive Widgets section that lets you remove widgets that you no longer want to actively display on your site. Inactive widgets do not lose their settings.
Rearrange WordPress Widgets With Drag-And-Drop
You can easily add new functionality to your site, and activate, deactivate, rearrange and remove widgets just by dragging and dropping items inside the Widgets section …
(Rearrange your site’s widgets using drag & drop)
You can also easily reconfigure the order of your theme’s widget-enabled layout using drag & drop.
For example, in the image below, the widgets have already been configured to display things on your site like:
- A newsletter opt-in form,
- A click for support button, and
- A ‘click to call’ section from a widgetized WP plugin (i.e. a WordPress plugin with an accompanying widget) …
(Widgets control the order certain features appear on your WordPress site)
If you could peek inside the Widget area, you would see that the front end features appear on the site’s sidebar area in exactly the same order as their corresponding widgets have been arranged in the backend widget area …
Let’s now reorganize the above widgets in the Sidebar Widget Area by dragging & dropping items …
(Drag and drop widgets in the widget area to rearrange their order)
The widgets have now been reordered in your sidebar navigation menu …
This immediately reorganizes the layout of your sidebar.
Rearranging sidebar elements with widgets can help improve visitor experience.
Note in the screenshot below that the ‘click to call’ feature (3) is now the first item on the sidebar navigation menu, and the support banner (2) now sits above the newsletter opt-in form (1) …
(Rearrange sidebar layout using widgets to improve your site’s visitor experience)
Removing Widgets From The Sidebar
Removing widgets from your sidebar menu is very easy.
For example, let’s show you how to delete the Search widget from your sidebar …
(WordPress Search widget)
To delete a widget from an active Widget area, you can either expand the widget and click the Delete link …
(How to delete a widget)
Or just drag the widget out of the Active Widgets area and into the Inactive Widgets area …
(Remove your WP widgets)
Repeat this process for any widgets you want to remove from your sidebar navigation menu. You can always reinstate a widget by dragging it back into the active widgets area.
Widget Settings
Most widgets can be customized further. This can include things like hiding information from users (but allowing access to registered 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 toggle between expanding and collapsing the item …
(Toggle to expand/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 settings …
(Widget settings)
Some widgets may require or offer no customization, or they may only allow you to add an optional title …
(Some widgets provide users with little to no configuration options)
Widget Previews
Depending upon the WP theme you choose, you’re also able to manage and customize widgets without actually making changes to your site. This way, you can be sure that you are happy with your customizations before making any permanent changes to your website.
The ability to manage widgets from within your dashboard is a valuable 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 (to avoid making errors), or manage your widgets on the fly using the Widget editor area.
(Edit widgets in the Customize section)
If you need to make changes to your site while viewing the front-end, just click on the Customize link …
(Customize your site quickly)
This will bring you to the Customizer area in the backend.
You can do many edits, modifications and adjustments in preview mode (like inserting, removing and moving widgets around), and this will all be done in real time. If you like the results, click the “Save and Publish” button and the changes will instantly become visible on your site.
(Widget management – configure widgets on the fly!)
After your changes have been saved, all changes made to widgets will be automatically updated.
Since the theme you choose can affect how elements display on your site, we recommend installing your theme first before configuring widgets.
Also, remember to use the Customizer feature to preview your changes. This saves you from having to keep two browsers open while you complete 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, the next step is to learn how to configure a number of commonly-used widgets in WordPress.
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This is the end of part 1 of this series of tutorials.
To continue, click here:
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"I am beyond impressed with what you have put together. I can tell that you put a ton of hard work into building what you have. You have the absolute best content on WordPress I have ever seen!" - Robert T. Jillie
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