Being able to display tables on your website can be really handy. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to people in a way that makes your information easier to understand.
The WordPress visual editor is great, but there are some things that the default editor won’t do, such as letting you 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 most non-technical users, this is not a practical option.
Fortunately, you can do almost anything you need done on a WordPress site with plugins, and adding tables to your content is no exception.
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn how to easily create and insert tables into your WordPress posts and pages without requiring knowledge of HTML or CSS or coding skills.
How To Easily Create And Add Tables Into Your Content
If you want to add tables to your WordPress posts or pages without touching code, the step-by-step tutorial below will show you how to add tables into your WordPress posts and pages using a FREE plugin called TablePress.
WP Plugin – TablePress
TablePress is a great WordPress plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress a very simple and easy process.
TablePress requires no knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. It lets you easily edit 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 your site visitors. You can easily include the tables into your content using shortcodes and display tables using text widgets.
A table can also be imported and exported from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON.
This plugin was written and developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
Using TablePress Plugin For WordPress – 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 directly from your own WP Dashboard …
Once the plugin has been installed and activated, you will see a new menu item added to your WordPress admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the submenu list …
The “Plugin Options” area affects the plugin’s behavior in different areas of your site …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can modify the position of the TablePress menu entry in your Dashboard menu.
Normally, the menu item displays somewhere near the middle of your menu column. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can easily position the menu item closer to the top of the menu by selecting “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu entry now shows near the top area of your admin menu …
You can also play with other options in the “Plugin Options” tab, like table formatting styles, default language, and so on. If you don’t need to change these settings, then just leave the options as the default.
With TablePress, you create edit and format your tables within the plugin screen. Tables are then inserted via a shortcode into your WordPress posts and pages. Your tables will then display or update when your content is published.
The advantage of working directly from the plugin is that you can easily change the information inside your tables without having to open any of your posts. TablePress then updates all of your table information everywhere where the table has been added to your content.
To create a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Enter the table name, an optional description, and the number of rows and columns you would like for your 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 your table at anytime…
Once your new table has been created, it will appear in the “All Tables” list and get assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode lets you easily add tables anywhere inside a post or page simply by inserting or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display a table …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to your table is easy.
In the “Table Content” section, just click in the cell and type or paste the content you want to display. You can add text, images and HTML formatting to your content (e.g. add bold text, insert hyperlinks, etc …)
After your new table has been created, you will see additional options for configuring your table.
For example, in the “Table Options” section you can select the first row of your table to be the table header or the last row of the table to be the table footer, display alternate background colours on consecutive rows, highlight rows when visitors hover 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” section. You can perform a range of different table manipulations, like adding links or images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and duplicating selected columns and rows, adding new columns and rows, combining cells, etc …
You can also enable JavaScript library features in your tables that will allow site visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, change the number of table rows showing on your posts (and also allow visitors to change the number of rows displayed), display table information, etc …
You can preview your table anytime, by clicking the Preview button …
A preview window will open allowing you to preview your table. Certain features like JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display once your post or page is published …
Remember to click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to save your new table information …
Once you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by selecting 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 …
Using The TablePress Shortcode To Embed Tables Into Your Page Content
You embed a table into any pages and blog posts with a shortcode.
Get the shortcode for your tables by clicking on the Show Shortcode menu item under your 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 cursor where you want the table to show 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 editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon opens a window containing a list of your available tables.
Select the table you want to insert into the post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be added to your content …
The table and table contents will display as soon as you publish your post or page …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about TablePress is that you can edit information after publishing the table without having to open your post or page. Just tweak the content in the plugin area, then save the new table settings and refresh your content to view the updated content.
Another great time-saving feature of this 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 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 an existing table, select TablePress > Export a Table in the main menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, choose the table(s) you would like 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 table file, you can then reimport the table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress, select TablePress > Import a Table …
TablePress can import tables from existing data, such as CSV file data, from a spreadsheet application, an HTML file, or its own JSON format. You can also import existing tables from the WP-Table Reloaded plugin
To import a table, select and enter the source in the “Import Tables” section. You can import multiple tables from compressed (ZIP) files and choose whether to import tables as a new table or write over an existing table.
To learn more about the plugin, including where to access the plugin documentation for extra features, or get technical support for the plugin, 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 useful time saving free plugin will help you easily create and add tables into your WordPress posts and pages.
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