Being able to provide visitors with tables on your content can be very useful. Tables help you sort and present 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, such as giving you the option to easily create tables.
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 users, this is simply not a practical option.
Fortunately, WordPress plugins let you do almost anything you can imagine, and inserting tables into your content is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to easily create and add tables into your posts and pages without requiring knowledge of HTML or CSS or coding skills.
How To Add Tables To 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
A powerful and time-saving WordPress plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress a very simple and easy process is TablePress.
TablePress requires no knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. It provides a simple user interface that allows you to easily edit your table data. You can add any kind of data, even formulas to your tables.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to add features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for visitors. You can insert tables into your post content using shortcodes and even display these inside text widgets.
Tables can also be imported and exported from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON formats.
The 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 WordPress Plugin – Step-By-Step Tutorial
To create and manage tables in WordPress posts or pages, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
You can download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it directly from within your own WordPress Dashboard …
After the plugin has been installed and activated, a new menu item will display on your main menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” area controls your plugin styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can modify where the TablePress menu entry appears on your Dashboard menu.
By default, the menu item displays somewhere near the middle of your menu. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can position the menu option close to the top of your admin menu by specifying “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item will now show near the top section of your menu …
You can also play with other options in the “Plugin Options” area, like table formatting styles, default language, and so on. If you don’t need to change these settings, then just leave the default options.
With TablePress, tables are created and edited within the plugin area. Tables are then inserted via a shortcode into your pages. Your tables will then display after saving and publishing your page.
The benefit of working directly from the plugin is that you can easily change the data inside your tables without having to open any of your pages and posts. TablePress 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 …
Enter the 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, then click on the Add Table button to create your new table. You can edit the name, description and size of any table you create at anytime…
Once the new table is created, it will get added to 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 by simply typing or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want your table to be displayed …
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 format your content (e.g. add bold text, insert links, etc …)
Once your new table is created, the plugin will display additional options for configuring 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 rows when a visitor hovers their mouse over the table, display 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” section. You can perform a range of manipulations on your table, like inserting links and 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, such as allowing site visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, set the number of table rows showing on your post (and let visitors specify 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 such as the JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display once your table is published …
Click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to update your new table data …
To view a list of all your tables TablePress > All Tables …
All your tables are displayed in a list. You can edit, see the shortcode, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
Using The Shortcode To Insert Tables Into Your Pages And Posts
You insert a table into your content using the TablePress shortcode.
You can 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 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 WordPress Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also insert a table when working inside the “Text” area of the WP editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In Text Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of all existing tables.
Select the table you want to insert into your post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be inserted …
Publish the post or page to display the table …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about this plugin is that you can change 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 page to view the updated information.
Another great time-saving feature of the TablePress plugin, is that if you plan to keep adding 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, select TablePress > Export a Table in your 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 table file to your hard drive …
After changing and resaving your file, you can then re-import the table into WordPress.
To import a table, 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 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 source in the “Import Tables” area. You can import multiple tables from compressed (ZIP) files and choose whether to import a table as a new table or replace an existing table.
To learn more about TablePress, including where to access the plugin documentation for extra features, get plugin 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 insert tables into your WordPress posts and pages.
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