Being able to easily add tables on your content can be really handy. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to visitors in a way that makes your information easier to understand.
WordPress offers a feature-rich visual editor, but there are some things that it won’t let you do by default, like being able 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 not a practical option.
Fortunately, WordPress plugins give users almost unlimited expansion capabilities, 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 pages and blog posts with no coding skills required.
How To Create And Add Tables In Your Content Without Touching Code
Follow the step-by-step tutorial below to learn how to create and add tables into your WordPress content using a FREE WordPress plugin called TablePress.
TablePress
A very powerful and time-saving plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in your WordPress posts and pages simple and easy is TablePress.
TablePress doesn’t require you to have any knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. It provides a simple user interface that lets you easily edit table data. Tables can contain any type of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like pagination, sorting, filtering, and more for your visitors. You can easily insert tables into your content using shortcodes and display tables using text widgets.
Tables can also be imported and exported from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON.
The 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, install and activate the TablePress plugin.
You can download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from within your own Dashboard …
After installing and activating the plugin, a new menu item will display on your WordPress admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the submenu list …
The “Plugin Options” screen 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 WP admin menu.
Normally, the menu item appears somewhere around 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 Dashboard menu by selecting “Top-level (middle)” in the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item will now display closer to the top section of your menu list …
You can also specify other options in the “Plugin Options” tab, such as table formatting styles, default language, and so on. Leave all options as they are if you don’t need to change things in this section.
With TablePress, tables are created and formatted within the plugin screen. Tables are then added via a shortcode into your posts. Your table will then display after your post or page is published or updated.
The benefit of doing this is that you can easily update the information inside your tables without having to touch your posts. TablePress then updates all of your table data inside all posts and pages where the table has been added to your content.
To add a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Type in a name, a description (optional), 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 change the name, description and size of your table at anytime…
Once the new table is 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 in your content simply by inserting or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display a table …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to it is very easy.
In the “Table Content” section, just click in the cell and type or paste your content. You can add text, images and HTML formatting to your content (e.g. bold or italicize words, insert links, etc …)
After your new table has been created, the plugin also displays additional options for configuring 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 color, highlight rows when visitors hover their mouse over the table, print 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” area. You can perform a range of different manipulations on your table, such as inserting links and images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and duplicating selected columns and rows, adding new columns and rows, 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, change the number of table rows showing on your page (and let users change 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 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 …
Click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to update your table information …
Once you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by choosing TablePress > All Tables …
All the tables you have created are displayed in this section. You can edit, see the shortcode, copy, export, delete and preview tables …
How To Use The Shortcode To Insert Tables Into Your Content
You embed tables into pages and posts with 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 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 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 Text Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon displays a list of all existing tables.
Select the table you want to add to the content 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 this plugin is that you can change information after publishing the table without having to edit your post or page. Edit the content in the plugin area, then save the 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, just export your current table, then add new information, 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 a table, click on TablePress > Export a Table in your main menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select 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 file to your hard drive …
After editing and resaving your table file, you can then re-import your table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress, go to your admin 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 format.
To import a table, select and enter the source in the “Import Tables” section. You can import multiple tables from a ZIP file and select whether to import a table as a new table or replace an existing table.
For more information about TablePress, including where to access the plugin documentation for additional 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 quite a powerful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and embed tables into your page content.
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