Being able to display tables on your pages can be very useful. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to visitors in a format that can make your information easier to understand.
The WordPress visual editor offers many features, but there are some things that the default editor doesn’t let you do, such as giving you the option to easily create tables.
Although you can add tables manually to your content in WordPress if you have knowledge of HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), for many non-technical WordPress users, this is simply not a realistic option.
Fortunately, you can do just about anything you need done on a WordPress site with plugins, and inserting tables into your content is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to create and insert tables easily into your WordPress posts and pages with no coding skills required.
How To Add Tables With WordPress
To add tables to your WordPress posts or pages with no coding skills required, we’ll use a FREE plugin called TablePress.
TablePress
TablePress is a very powerful and time-saving WordPress plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress simple and easy.
TablePress requires no knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. The plugin provides a simple interface that lets you easily edit table data. Your tables can contain any kind of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to add features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for your visitors. You can include the tables into your pages and blog posts using shortcodes and even display tables using text widgets.
You can also import and export a table 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).
How To Use TablePress WordPress Plugin – Step-By-Step Tutorial
To create and add tables to WordPress with TablePress, install and activate the TablePress plugin.
You can download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from your own Dashboard …
After the plugin has been installed and activated, you will see a new menu item in your main menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and choose Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” area controls your plugin styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can specify the position of the TablePress menu entry in your WP admin menu.
Normally, the menu entry appears somewhere near the middle of your menu bar. If you plan to use this plugin a lot, then you can easily position the menu option close to the top of the menu by specifying “Top-level (middle)” in the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu entry now appears closer to the top section of your menu list …
You can also play with other options in the “Plugin Options” tab, like formatting styles for your tables, default language, etc. Leave these options as they are if you don’t need to change things in this area.
With TablePress, you create and edit your tables inside the plugin screen. Tables are then added via a shortcode into your pages. The table will then display when your content is republished.
The great thing about doing this is that you can easily update the data in your tables without having to manually edit your pages and posts. TablePress then updates all of your table data inside all posts and pages where the table has been added to your content.
To add a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Enter a table name, a description (optional), 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 change the name, description and size of your tables at anytime…
Once your new table is created, it will get added to the “All Tables” list and be assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode allows you to easily insert tables anywhere inside a post or page simply by typing or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want your tables to display …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to the table is easy.
In the “Table Content” section, just click in the cell and type or paste your content. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. add bold text, insert hyperlinks, 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 specify the first row of your table to be the table header and the last row of the table to be the table footer, make the background of consecutive rows alternate in color, highlight a row 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 edit your table after creating it in the “Table Manipulation” subsection. You can perform a range of table operations, like adding links and images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and cloning selected rows and columns, adding new rows and columns, combining 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, change the number of table rows displayed on your page (and also allow users to specify the number of rows displayed), display table information, etc …
You can see how your table looks anytime, by clicking the Preview button …
A preview window will open in your web browser displaying the table. Certain features like JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display once your post or page is published …
Click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to save your new table data …
After you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by clicking on TablePress > All Tables …
A list of all the tables you have created will be displayed in this section. You can edit, see the shortcode, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
How To Use The Shortcode To Embed Tables Into Your Pages And Posts
You embed tables into your posts and pages using the TablePress shortcode.
Click on the Show Shortcode menu item below the table title to get the shortcode …
The plugin also adds a shortcode menu icon 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 WP editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress Text Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of your available tables.
Select the table you want to insert into your post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be placed in the location you specified …
Publish your post or page to display your table and table contents …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about this plugin is that you can edit data after publishing the table without having to open your post or page. Just tweak 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 this plugin, is that if you plan to keep adding new data to an existing table, you can simply export your current table, then add new items, make changes, etc. You can then re-import your exported 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 WP admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select the table(s) 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 table file to your hard drive …
After editing and resaving your file, you can then easily re-import your table into WordPress.
To import a table, 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 JSON format.
To import a table, select and enter the import source in the “Import Tables” area. You can also import multiple tables from compressed (ZIP) files and choose whether to import a table as a new table or replace an existing table.
To learn more about the plugin, including accessing the plugin documentation for extra features, or get technical 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 an extremely powerful and feature-rich plugin that is free and will help you easily create and embed tables into your site content.
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum