Being able to easily add tables on your pages can be really handy. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to people in a way that makes your information easier to understand.
WordPress provides users with 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 add tables manually to your content in WordPress if you know HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), for many non-technical WordPress users, this is simply not a practical option.
Fortunately, you can do almost anything you can imagine on a WordPress site with plugins, and adding tables to your content with the click of a mouse is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to easily create and add tables into your site’s pages without requiring knowledge of HTML or CSS or coding skills.
Creating And Inserting Tables Into Posts And Pages In WordPress
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 easily do this using a FREE plugin called TablePress.
WP Plugin – TablePress
A powerful and time-saving WordPress plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress is TablePress.
TablePress doesn’t require you to have any knowledge of HTML, CSS, etc. It provides a simple interface that lets you easily edit your table data. You can add any type of data, even formulas to tables.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like pagination, sorting, filtering, and more for your site visitors. You can include the tables into your pages and blog posts using shortcodes and 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.
This plugin was developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
Using TablePress – Tutorial
To create and manage tables in WordPress with TablePress, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download this plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from within your own WordPress Dashboard …
After installing and activating the plugin, a new menu item will appear on your Dashboard menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the submenu list …
The “Plugin Options” page controls your plugin styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can modify the position of the TablePress menu entry in your Dashboard menu.
By default, the menu entry appears somewhere in the middle of your menu. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can position the menu item towards the top of your admin menu by specifying “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item now shows towards the top area of your menu list …
You can also play with other options in the “Plugin Options” section, like table formatting styles, default language, and so on. If you don’t need to modify this section, simply leave the options as the default.
With TablePress, you create edit and format tables within the plugin section. Tables are then added via a shortcode into your pages. The tables will then display or update when saving your pages or posts.
The advantage of working directly from the plugin is that you can easily modify the data in your tables without having to open any of your posts. TablePress then updates all of your table information in all locations where the table has been added to your content.
To create a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Type in a table name, a description (optional), and the number of rows and columns you want for the 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 allows you to easily insert tables anywhere in your content by simply inserting or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want your table to be displayed …
Once a new table has been created, adding content to it is easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click inside the cell and either type or paste the content you want to display. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. add bold text, insert links, etc …)
After your new table has been created, the plugin also displays a number of additional options that will allow you to configure your table.
For example, in the “Table Options” area you can select 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 rows when a visitor hovers their mouse over the table, print the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also edit your table information after creating it in the “Table Manipulation” subsection. You can insert links or images, hide, show, insert, delete and clone selected rows and columns, add new rows and columns, combine cells, etc …
You can also enable JavaScript library features in your tables that will allow your visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, set the number of table rows showing on your site (and let visitors 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 such as the JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display when your table is published …
Click the Save Changes button when finished to save your table information …
To view a list of all your tables TablePress > All Tables …
All your tables are listed here. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
How To Use The Shortcode
You embed a table into your posts and pages with a shortcode.
Click on the Show Shortcode menu item below 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 cursor where you want your table to be embedded then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also add a table when working in the “Text” area of the WP editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of all existing tables.
Select the table you want to embed into the post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be inserted …
The 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 things after publishing the table without having to edit your post or page. Edit the content in the plugin area, then save your new table settings and refresh your content to view the updated information.
Another great time-saving feature of the TablePress 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 data, 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, select TablePress > Export a Table in the WP admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, choose 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 making changes and resaving your table file, you can then easily reimport your table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress, go to your sidebar menu and 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, 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 import multiple tables from a ZIP file and choose whether to import a table as a new table or write over an existing table.
For more information about using TablePress, including accessing the plugin documentation for additional features, 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 a very powerful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and insert tables into your page content.
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