Being able to provide visitors with tables on your website can be very useful. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to visitors in a way that makes your information easier to understand.
The WordPress visual editor offers many features, but there are some things that the default editor doesn’t do, like being able to create tables without having to learn code.
Although you can create tables manually 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 simply not a realistic option.
Fortunately, you can do almost anything you can imagine on a WordPress site with plugins, and adding tables is no exception.
In this step-by-step tutorial you will learn how to create and add tables easily into your content without requiring knowledge of HTML or CSS or coding skills.
How To Insert Tables Into Posts And Pages In WordPress
To add tables to your WordPress posts or pages with no HTML or CSS knowledge required, we’ll use a FREE WordPress plugin called TablePress.
TablePress – WordPress Plugin
A powerful and time-saving plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in your WordPress posts and pages a very simple and easy process is TablePress.
TablePress does not require you to have any knowledge of HTML, CSS, etc. It provides a simple user interface that allows you to easily edit table data. Your tables can contain any type of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for visitors. You can insert tables into your post content using shortcodes and display these inside text widgets.
You can also import and export a table from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON formats.
This plugin was written and developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
How To Use TablePress Plugin For WordPress – Step-By-Step Tutorial
To create and add tables to WordPress using TablePress, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
You can download this plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it directly from within your WordPress Dashboard …
After installing and activating the plugin, you will see a new menu item added to your admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” section controls your plugin styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can change where the TablePress menu entry appears on your admin menu.
By default, the menu item displays around the middle of your menu bar. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can position the menu item near the top of your menu by selecting “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item now appears closer towards the top of your admin menu …
You can also play with other options in the “Plugin Options” tab, like formatting styles for your tables, default language, etc. If you don’t need to modify this section, simply leave the default options.
With TablePress, tables are created and edited within the plugin screen. Tables are then added via a shortcode into your posts. Your table will then display or update when your content is published or updated.
The great thing about doing this is that you can easily update the information inside your tables without having to open any of your pages. The plugin then updates all of your table information inside all posts and pages 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 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 edit the name, description and size of your tables at anytime…
Once your new table has been created, it will be listed in the “All Tables” list and get assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode allows you to easily insert tables anywhere inside a post or page by simply typing or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display your table …
Once a new table has been created, adding content to your table is really easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click inside the cell and type or paste the content you want to display. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. bold or italicize words, insert links, etc …)
Once your new table is created, displays 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 and the last row of the table to be the table footer, display alternate background colors on consecutive rows, highlight rows when a visitor hovers their mouse over the table, show the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also edit your table content after creating it in the “Table Manipulation” section. You can perform various operations on your table, such as adding images or links, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and duplicating 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 visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, change the number of table rows displayed on your page (and also allow users to 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 on your 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 …
Remember to click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to update your new table information …
After you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by clicking on TablePress > All Tables …
All your tables are listed here. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
Using The Shortcode
You can insert tables into posts and pages using the TablePress shortcode.
Get the shortcode for your tables by clicking on the Show Shortcode menu item below your 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 the table to show then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also add a table when working inside the “Text” area of the editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of all the available tables you have created.
Select the table you want to embed in the content and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be added to your content …
Publish your post or page to view your table and table contents …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about this plugin is that you can change data after publishing the table without having to open your post or page. Tweak the content in the plugin area, then save your new table settings and refresh your page 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 table file with the news changes and your table content will be automatically updated throughout your site.
To export a table, click on TablePress > Export a Table in your WP admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, choose the table(s) 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 file, you can then easily reimport the table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress from your hard drive, 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 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 also import multiple tables from a compressed (ZIP) file and select whether to import a table as a new table or replace an existing table.
To learn more about using the plugin, including accessing documentation about additional features, get technical support, 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 time saving free plugin will help you easily create and embed tables into your WordPress posts and pages.
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