As we explain in this article, there are many benefits in choosing the WordPress web publishing tool to build, manage and grow your business online. One of these is that WordPress makes it very easy to add content, enhance your site, and reconfigure your site’s layout without coding skills required.
WordPress allows you to quickly and easily add, delete, and manage content on your website’s sidebar area (or header and footer sections, depending on your theme) using widgets.
Once you know how to use widgets, you can easily add things to your site’s sidebar area (plus headers and footers and other areas, depending on the WordPress theme you have installed) like:
- list of pages
- content categories
- archive
- customized menus
- links to external sites
- links to your recent posts
- user comments
- advertising
- customer testimonials
- survey results
- RSS feed items
- subscriber form
- video galleries
- social media buttons
- display widgets from external sites (e.g. Facebook friends)
- administrative forms (e.g. login, register, etc.)
(WordPress widgets make managing and using WordPress easy)
To learn more about what WordPress widgets are, how they work and why widgets can make managing your site easier, see this article:
In this tutorial series we show you how to use and configure a number of frequently-used widgets in WordPress.
Using Widgets
Widgets – The Basics
Before we start learning how to configure widgets, it helps to first go over some of the basics about using widgets:
Most WordPress Themes Support Widgetized Layouts
Most WordPress themes support widgets and provide built-in areas in your theme’s layout where widgets can appear, such as the sidebar menu, header area, and the footer area. Depending on the theme installed on your site, widgets can sometimes also be used inside the content area …
(Many themes provide a number of widget-ready sections)
These widgetized areas correspond to a feature inside the Widget administration screen called “Widget Areas” …
(Widget Areas)
The Widgets Panel
The Widgets area displays a list of all the widgets that are available.
On the right-hand side of the screen, you can see your “active” widgets …
(Widgets can be activated or deactivated by dragging & dropping)
Available widgets can be made Active or Inactive using drag-and-drop.
Widgets dragged from the Available Widgets section to widget areas like your sidebar, footer, etc. instantly become active on your site.
In addition, your Widgets screen includes an Inactive Widgets section that lets you remove widgets that you no longer want to use on your website. Inactive widgets do not lose their settings.
Rearrange Widgets With Drag-And-Drop
You can easily add functionality to your site, or activate, deactivate, rearrange and remove things using widgets just by dragging and dropping items inside the Widgets section …
(Rearrange widgets using drag and drop)
You can also easily reorder the layout of your theme’s widgetized layout by dragging and dropping widgets.
For example, take a look at the image below. In this example site, the widgets have already been configured to display the following to visitors:
- An opt-in form,
- A contact support button, and
- A ‘click to call’ function from a widgetized plugin (i.e. a plugin with an accompanying widget) …
(Widgets control the order certain features display on your site)
Inside the Widget area, you would see that the front-end features appear on the site in exactly the same order as their corresponding widgets have been arranged in the back-end widget section …
If we reorganize the above widgets in the Main Sidebar Widget Area using drag & drop …
(Drag & drop to rearrange widgets in your widget area)
The widgets have now been reordered in the sidebar …
As you can see, this instantly changes the layout of the sidebar.
Rearranging sidebar elements using widgets can help to improve your site’s user experience.
Note in the screenshot below that the ‘click to call’ function (3) is now at the top of the sidebar menu, and the ‘contact us’ banner (2) has been moved to the location above the newsletter sign-up form (1) …
(Reorganizing sidebar layout using widgets can help to improve your site’s user experience)
Deleting Widgets From Your WordPress Blog Sidebar
Removing widgets from your sidebar is really easy.
For example, let’s show you how to remove the Search widget from your sidebar navigation section …
(WordPress Search widget)
To delete an active widget, you can either expand the widget settings and click the Delete link …
(Delete your WordPress widgets)
Or just drag the widget out of the Active Widgets section and into the Inactive Widgets area …
(Remove your widget)
Repeat this process for all widgets you want removed from your sidebar. You can always reinstate widgets by moving them back into the active widgets area.
Widget Settings
Most widgets can be customized. This can include things like making certain types of information hidden to your site visitors but visible to registered users, displaying additional forms, fields, or information, specifying sizes of sidebar images, videos, etc.
Clicking on the little triangle in the corner of a widget toggles between expanding and collapsing the item and displays the widget’s settings …
(Toggling expands/collapse widget settings)
When the widget expands, you can change and save your settings, delete the widget from the “Active Widgets” section, close the widget, or click on the triangle to collapse the widget …
(Widget settings)
Some widgets may require or offer no customization, or they may only allow you to add an optional title …
(Some widgets provide users with little to no customizable options)
WP Theme Customizer
Depending upon which WP theme you have installed, you’re also able to customize and manage your widgets without making actual changes to your site. This way, you can be sure that you are happy with your customizations before committing anything to your website or blog.
The ability to manage widgets from within your WordPress dashboard is a great feature of WordPress. You can work in preview mode inside the WordPress Theme Customizer screen (Appearance > Customize) and see how the widget content will appear prior to publishing it (to avoid making errors), or change your widgets on the fly using the Widget editor screen.
(preview widget changes live in the Customize section)
Wherever you are on the front-end just calick the Customize link in the toolbar …
(Toolbar Customize Link)
This brings you to the Customizer screen in the back-end.
You can do plenty of modifications and adjustments to the widgets in preview mode (like adding, removing and reorganizing your widgets), and see all changes in real time. If you are happy with the results, click the “Save and Publish” button and the changes will be instantly updated and reflected on your site.
(Widget management – work in preview mode)
After saving changes, WordPress will automatically update the widget settings and display the new changes to your site visitors.
Because the WordPress theme you use can affect how elements display on your site, we recommend installing your theme first before configuring widgets.
Also, remember to use the Customizer feature to preview your changes. This saves you from having to keep two browsers open while you complete this tutorial.
Now that you know the basics of using widgets, it’s time to learn how to start configuring various commonly-used widgets in WordPress.
***
This is the end of part one of this tutorial on using WordPress widgets.
Click here to continue:
***
"Learning WordPress has been a huge stumbling block for me. I've been looking for something that covers absolutely everything but doesn't cost an arm and a leg. Thank you so much ... you have just provided me with what I have been looking for! Truly appreciated!" - Tanya
***