Being able to provide visitors with tables on your pages can be very useful. Tables help you sort and present data to people in a format that can make your information easier to understand.
WordPress provides users with a feature-rich visual editor, but there are some things that the default editor doesn’t do, such as giving you the option to easily create tables.
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 most non-technical WordPress users, this is not a practical option.
Fortunately, WordPress plugins let you do almost anything you can imagine, and adding tables is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to create and add tables easily into your posts and pages with no coding skills required.
How To Create And Add Tables Into Your Content Easily In WordPress
To create and add tables to your WordPress posts or pages with no coding skills required, we’ll use a FREE WordPress plugin called TablePress.
WP Plugin – TablePress
TablePress is a great WordPress plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress.
TablePress doesn’t require you to have any knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. It lets you easily edit your table data. Tables can contain any type of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to add features like pagination, sorting, filtering, and more for site users. You can easily include the tables into your content 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.
TablePress was 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 – Tutorial
To create and manage tables in WordPress posts or pages, install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it directly from within your own WordPress Dashboard …
Once you have installed and activated the plugin, a new menu item will be added to your admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” page affects the plugin’s behavior in different areas of your site …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can change the position of the TablePress menu entry in your admin menu.
Normally, the menu item appears around the middle of your menu. If you plan to use this plugin a lot, then you can easily position the menu option towards the top of your admin menu by choosing “Top-level (middle)” in the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item will now display close to the top area of your menu list …
You can also play with other plugin options in the “Plugin Options” screen, such as formatting styles for your tables, default language, and so on. If you don’t need to change this section, then just leave the default options.
With TablePress, tables are created and formatted within the plugin screen. Tables are then inserted via a shortcode into your pages. The tables will then display when saving and publishing your page.
The advantage of working directly from the plugin is that you can easily update the data inside your tables without having to open any of your posts and pages. TablePress then updates all of your table data 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 a table name, a description (optional), and the number of rows and columns you want 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 change the name, description and size of your table 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 insert tables anywhere in your content by simply typing 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 very easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click inside the cell and either type or paste your content. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. add bold text, insert hyperlinks, etc …)
Once your new table is created, you will see a number of additional options that will allow you to 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 rows when visitors hover their mouse over the table, display the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also edit your table content after it has been created in the “Table Manipulation” section. You can perform a number of table edits, such as inserting images and links, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and cloning selected rows and columns, adding new rows and columns, 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 displayed on your post (and also allow users to 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 like JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display once your post or page is published …
Click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to update your table information …
To view a list of all the tables you have created choose TablePress > All Tables …
A list of all the tables you have created will be displayed in this section. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, export, delete and preview tables …
How To Use The TablePress Shortcode To Embed Tables Into Your Pages And Blog Posts
You embed tables into your pages and blog posts using a shortcode.
Get the shortcode for your tables by clicking on the Show Shortcode menu item under 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 cursor where you want the table to be inserted 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 editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon opens a window containing a list of all your available tables.
Select the table you want to embed into your post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be inserted into your content …
Publish your post or page to view your table and table contents …
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 your new table settings and refresh your content 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 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 a table, click on TablePress > Export a Table in your admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select the table(s) you want 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 making changes and resaving the table file, you can then easily re-import your table into WordPress.
To import a table, go to your admin menu and choose TablePress > Import a Table …
TablePress can import tables from existing data, such as CSV file data, from a spreadsheet application, 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 source in the “Import Tables” section. You can import multiple tables from ZIP files and select whether to import a table as a new table or replace an existing table.
To learn more about using TablePress, including where to access the plugin documentation for extra 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 plugin that is free and will help you easily create and insert tables into your WordPress posts and pages.
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"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)