Being able to easily add tables on your website can be very useful. 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 it won’t let you do by default, such as giving you the option to create tables without having to learn code.
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 WordPress users, this is not a practical option.
Fortunately, WordPress plugins give users almost unlimited expansion capabilities, and creating tables 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 Create And Add Tables In WordPress Posts And Pages
To add tables into your WordPress content without touching code, we’ll use a FREE WordPress plugin called TablePress.
TablePress
A powerful and time-saving WordPress plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in your WordPress posts and pages simple and easy is TablePress.
TablePress requires no knowledge of HTML, CSS, etc. It provides a simple user interface that lets you easily edit your table data. Tables can contain any kind of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like pagination, sorting, filtering, and more for your site visitors. You can easily insert tables into your posts and pages using shortcodes and display these using text widgets.
You can also import and export tables from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON.
The plugin was developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
Using TablePress WP Plugin – Step-By-Step Tutorial
To create and add tables to WordPress using TablePress, install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download this plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from your 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 select Plugin Options from the submenu list …
The “Plugin Options” page affects the plugin’s styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can modify the position of the TablePress menu entry in your WP admin menu.
Normally, the menu entry displays around the middle of your menu. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can position the menu item near the top of the menu by selecting “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item will now appear close to the top area of the admin menu …
You can also play with other options in the “Plugin Options” section, such as table formatting styles, default language, etc. Leave all settings as they are if you don’t need to change things in this area.
With TablePress, tables are created and formatted inside the plugin section. Tables are then inserted via a shortcode into your pages. Your table will then display when saving and publishing your pages or posts.
The benefit of working directly from the plugin is that you can easily change the data in your tables without having to touch your pages and posts. The plugin then updates all of your table data everywhere where the table has been added to your content.
To create a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Type in the name, a description (optional), and the number of rows and columns you want for your new table into the “Add New Table” form in the Add New tab, and click on the Add Table button to create your new table. You can edit the name, description and size of your tables at anytime…
Once the new table has been created, it will be added to the “All Tables” list and be assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode lets you easily insert tables anywhere in your content by simply inserting or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display your table …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to it is easy.
In the “Table Content” section, just click inside the cell and either type or paste the content you want to display. You can add text, images and HTML formatting to your content (e.g. bold or italicize words, insert hyperlinks, etc …)
After your new table has been 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, display alternate background colours on consecutive rows, highlight a row when visitors hover 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” area. You can perform a number of edits on your table, such as 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 that will allow your site users to sort, filter and search your table content, change the number of table rows displayed on your page (and let users 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 displaying the table. Certain features like JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display once your table is published …
Click the Save Changes button when finished to save your table data …
Once 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 your tables will be displayed in this area. You can edit, see the shortcode, copy, export, delete and preview your tables …
How To Use The Shortcode
You can insert tables inside pages and blog posts using the TablePress shortcode.
You can get the shortcode for your tables by clicking on the Show Shortcode menu item under the table title to get the shortcode …
The plugin also adds a menu item to your WordPress content 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 be embedded then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also add a table when working inside the “Text” area of the editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon opens a window containing a list of all the available tables you have created.
Select the table you want to embed into your content and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be placed in the location you specified …
The table 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 the contents of your table after publishing the table without having to edit your post or page. Change 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 new data to an existing table, just export your current table, then add new information, 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 an existing table, click on TablePress > Export a Table in your main menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, choose the table(s) you want 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 table file to your hard drive …
After changing and resaving your file, you can then reimport the table into WordPress.
To import a table, go to your menu and select TablePress > Import a Table …
TablePress can import tables from existing data, such as CSV file data, from a spreadsheet application, an HTML file resembling a webpage, or its own format. You can also import existing tables from the WP-Table Reloaded plugin
To import a table, select and enter the import source in the “Import Tables” section. You can import multiple tables from a ZIP file and choose whether to import tables as a new table or write over an existing table.
For more information about using the plugin, including accessing the plugin documentation for additional features, or get technical support for the plugin, contact the plugin developer, etc., click on the “About Tab” in the plugin admin section, or select TablePress > About TablePress …
As you can see, TablePress is quite a useful time saving free plugin will help you easily create and insert tables into your page content.
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