Being able to provide visitors with tables on your website can be very useful. Tables help you sort and present data to visitors in a way that makes your information easier to understand.
WordPress offers a great visual editor, but there are some things that it won’t do by default, like being able to create tables without having to learn code.
Although you can create tables manually in WordPress if you know HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), for many non-technical users, this is not a feasible option.
Fortunately, you can do just about anything you can imagine on a WordPress site with plugins, and creating tables is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to create and insert tables easily into your posts and pages with no coding skills required.
How To Create And Add Tables To WordPress Pages And Posts
Follow the step-by-step tutorial below to learn how to easily create and add tables in WordPress using a FREE WordPress plugin called TablePress.
TablePress
TablePress is a powerful and time-saving WordPress plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in your WordPress posts and pages a very simple and easy process.
TablePress doesn’t require you to have any knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. It lets you easily edit table data. Your tables can contain any kind of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for your visitors. You can easily include the tables into your post content using shortcodes and even display these inside text widgets.
A table can also be imported and exported from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON formats.
This plugin was developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
How To Use TablePress – Step-By-Step Tutorial
To create and manage tables in WordPress using TablePress, install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download this plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it directly from your own WP Dashboard …
Once you have installed and activated the plugin, you will see a new menu item has been added to your WordPress admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the submenu list …
The “Plugin Options” screen controls your plugin styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can change the position of the TablePress menu entry in your Dashboard menu.
By default, the menu entry displays somewhere in the middle of your menu bar. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can easily position the menu item closer to the top of the admin menu by choosing “Top-level (middle)” in the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item will now appear at the top section of the menu list …
You can also play with other settings in the “Plugin Options” tab, such as formatting styles for your tables, default language, and so on. Leave the settings as they are if you don’t need to change things in this section.
With TablePress, tables are created and edited within the plugin screen. Tables are then placed via a shortcode into your text. The table will then display or update when your post or page is republished.
The advantage of doing this is that you can easily update the information in your tables without having to open any of your posts. The plugin then updates all of your table information 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 name, an optional description, 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 any tables you create at anytime…
Once the new table has been created, it will appear in 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 typing or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display a table …
Once a new table has been created, adding content to it is easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click in 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 links, etc …)
After your new table has been created, additional options appear that let you configure your table.
For example, in the “Table Options” area 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 colour, 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 content after creating it in the “Table Manipulation” section. You can perform a range of operations on your table, such as inserting links or images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and duplicating selected rows and columns, adding new columns and rows, combining cells, etc …
You can also enable JavaScript library features in your tables that will allow visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, change the number of table rows displayed on your post (and let visitors change 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 allowing you to preview your table. Certain features like JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display when your post or page is published …
Click the Save Changes button when finished to update your new table information …
To view a list of all the tables you have created select TablePress > All Tables …
All your tables are displayed in this section. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, delete, export and preview your tables …
How To Use The Shortcode To Insert Tables Into Your Pages And Blog Posts
You insert tables into your pages and posts with a shortcode.
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 shortcode menu icon 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 appear then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also insert a table when working inside the “Text” area of the editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress Text Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of all your existing tables.
Select the table you want to add to your content and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be added to your content …
Your 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 change the contents of your table 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 post to view the updated content.
Another great time-saving feature of the TablePress 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 data, 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, click on TablePress > Export a Table in the admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, choose the table(s) you would like 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 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 the sidebar menu and choose 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. 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” area. You can also import multiple tables from a ZIP file and select whether to import a table as a new table or write over an existing table.
To learn more about using the plugin, including where to access 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 quite a powerful and feature-rich plugin that is free and will help you easily create and add tables into your page content.
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