Being able to provide visitors with 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.
The WordPress visual editor offers many great features, but there are some things that the default editor doesn’t let you do, such as letting you easily create tables.
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 simply not a practical option.
Fortunately, WordPress plugins let you do almost anything you can imagine, and inserting tables into your content with the click of a mouse is no exception.
In this step-by-step 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 Insert Tables Into Pages And Posts In WordPress
If you want to create and add tables to your WordPress posts or pages without touching code, then the step-by-step tutorial below will show you how to do this using a FREE plugin called TablePress.
TablePress – WP Plugin
TablePress is a very powerful and time-saving WordPress plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in your WordPress posts and pages simple and easy.
TablePress requires no knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. It provides a simple interface that lets you easily edit your table data. You can add any kind of data to your tables.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to add features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for site users. You can easily include the tables into your pages and blog posts using shortcodes and even display tables using text widgets.
Tables can also be imported and exported from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON.
This plugin was written and 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, install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it directly from your WP Dashboard …
After installing and activating the plugin, you will see a new menu item displayed in your Dashboard menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and choose Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” page controls your plugin styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can specify where the TablePress menu entry appears on your admin menu.
By default, the menu entry appears somewhere near the middle of your menu. If you plan to use this plugin often, then you can position the menu option closer to the top of the menu by selecting “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu entry will now show towards the top area of the admin menu …
You can also play with other plugin options in the “Plugin Options” tab, such as formatting styles for your tables, default language, etc. Leave the settings as they are if you don’t need to change things in this section.
With TablePress, you create and edit your tables within the plugin area. Tables are then placed via a shortcode into your pages. The table will then display or update after publishing your page.
The advantage of doing this is that you can easily change the data in your tables without having to touch your posts. The plugin then updates all of your table data everywhere where the table has been added to your content.
To add a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Type in the name, an optional description, and the number of rows and columns you would like for your 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 tables you create at anytime…
Once your new table is created, it will display in the “All Tables” list and get assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode lets you easily add 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 really easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click in 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 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 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 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 information after creating it in the “Table Manipulation” area. You can perform a range of operations on your table, such as adding links or images, 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 site visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, set the number of table rows showing on your site (and let users specify the number of rows displayed), display table information, etc …
You can preview your table anytime, by clicking on the Preview button …
A preview window will open in your web browser allowing you to preview the table. Certain features like JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display once your table is published …
Remember to click the Save Changes button when finished to update your 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 the tables you have created are displayed in a list. You can edit, see the shortcode, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
How To Use The Shortcode
You can insert tables into any pages and posts with a shortcode.
Click 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 the table to be inserted 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 WordPress HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon displays a list of your available tables.
Select the table you want to embed into the content and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be added …
Your table contents will display as soon as you publish your post or page …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about this plugin is that you can edit things after publishing the table without having to open your post or page. Change 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 this plugin, is that if you plan to keep adding more 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 the 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 the table file, you can then easily re-import the table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress, 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” section. You can also import multiple tables from compressed (ZIP) files and select whether to import tables as a new table or replace an existing table.
To learn more about the plugin, including where to access documentation about 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 an extremely useful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and embed tables into your page content.
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum