As we have discussed in this post, one of the many benefits of using WordPress is that you can easily add content, expand your site’s functionality, or redesign the layout of your site with no web coding skills required.
WordPress gives you the ability to easily insert, delete, and reconfigure content on your site’s sidebar menu (and header and footer sections too, depending on what theme you have installed) using widgets.
Once you know how to use widgets, you can easily add things to your site like:
- nested list of pages
- content categories
- archived published posts
- menus
- links to external sites
- your most read posts
- excerpts of recent comments added to your posts
- clickable ads
- quotations
- survey questions & results
- RSS content
- newsletter subscription form
- product images
- social media sharing buttons
- add widgets from external sites (e.g. Facebook)
- administrative forms (e.g. login, register, etc.)
(WordPress widgets help make managing and using WordPress easy)
To learn more about what WP widgets are, how they work and why widgets make managing your site easier, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial series we explain how to use and configure a number of commonly-used WordPress widgets.
How To Use Widgets
Widgets – The Basics
Before configuring and using widgets, let’s explain some of the basic concepts of how to use widgets:
Most WordPress Themes Support Widgetized Layouts
Most WordPress themes support widgets and provide built-in widgetized areas in your theme’s layout where you can use widgets, such as the sidebar, header area, and footer sections. Depending on the theme, widgets can also appear below or above the content area …
(Many WordPress themes provide a number of widget-enabled sections)
These widgetized sections correspond to a feature inside your Widget administration panel called “Widget Areas” …
(Widget Areas)
Widgets Panel
The Widgets section displays all the widgets that you currently have available.
On the right-hand side of the window, you can see all “active” widgets …
(Activate or deactivate widgets using drag & drop)
Available widgets can be activated or deactivated using drag-and-drop.
Widgets dragged from the Available Widgets section to widget areas like the sidebar, footer, etc. automatically become active.
The Widgets panel also includes an Inactive Widgets section that lets you remove any widgets that you no longer want actively displayed on your website. Inactive widgets retain their settings.
Reorganize WordPress Widgets Using Drag-And-Drop
You can easily add, activate, deactivate, rearrange and remove things using widgets using simple drag and drop inside the Widgets section …
(Rearrange widgets on your WordPress site using drag-and-drop)
You can also easily reconfigure your theme’s layout by using drag-and-drop.
For example, in the image below, the widgets have already been configured to display things on your site like:
- A subscription form,
- A contact support button, and
- A ‘click to call’ function from a widgetized WP plugin (i.e. a plugin with an accompanying widget) …
(Widgets control how certain features on your site appear)
Inside the Widget area, you would see that the front end features appear on the site in exactly the same order as they have been arranged in the active widget section …
Let’s now reorganize the above widgets in the Sidebar Widget Area using drag and drop …
(Drag and drop to rearrange widgets in the widget area)
The widgets have now been reordered in your sidebar …
As you can see, this immediately reorganizes the order of items in your site’s sidebar.
Rearranging sidebar layout with widgets can help to improve visitor experience.
Note in the screenshot below that the ‘click to call’ function (3) is now the first item on the sidebar, and the ‘contact us’ graphic banner (2) can now be found above the newsletter opt-in form (1) …
(Reorganize sidebar elements using widgets to improve your site’s visitor experience)
Removing Widgets From Your WordPress Blog Sidebar Menu
Removing widgets from the sidebar navigation menu is really easy.
For example, let’s remove the Search widget from the sidebar …
(Search widget)
To remove a widget from an active Widget area, either open up the widget settings and click the Delete link …
(How to delete widgets)
Or just drag the widget out of the Active Widgets section and into the Inactive Widgets section …
(Remove widgets)
Repeat this process for any widgets you want removed from your sidebar navigation menu. You can always reinstate a widget by dragging it back into the active widgets area.
Widget Settings
Many widgets can be customized further. This can include things like hiding information from users (but allowing access to registered users), displaying additional forms, fields, or data, specifying sizes of sidebar images, videos, etc.
Click on the little triangle in the corner of a widget to expand the item …
(Toggle to expand/collapse widget settings)
When the widget expands, you can change and save your settings, remove your 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 something like an optional title …
(Some widgets provide users with little to no configuration options)
Customize Widgets Section
Depending on which WordPress theme you use, you can also customize widgets without making actual changes to your site. This way, you can be sure that you are happy with what you have done before committing anything to your website.
The ability to manage widgets from your WP dashboard is a great feature of WordPress. You can work in preview mode inside the WordPress Theme Customizer screen (Appearance > Customize) and see how your widget content will appear before publishing any changes (and avoid making mistakes), or change widgets on the fly using the Widget editor area.
(Edit widgets live in the Customize feature)
Wherever you are on the front-end just calick the Customize link in the toolbar …
(Customize link in the toolbar)
This brings you to the Customizer area in the backend.
You can do plenty of modifications and adjustments in preview mode (like adding, deleting and moving widgets around), and it will all be done in real time. If you are happy with what you’ve done, click the “Save and Publish” button and the changes will then be instantly updated and reflected on your site.
(Widget management – configure widgets on the fly!)
After saving changes, your site will automatically update the widget settings and display your latest changes to your site visitors.
Because the WordPress theme you use determines how elements display on your site, we recommend installing the theme first before configuring widgets on the sidebar menu.
Also, remember to use the Customizer feature to preview all 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, let’s configure a number of commonly-used WordPress sidebar widgets.
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This is the end of section one of this tutorial on using WordPress widgets.
Click on this link to continue reading:
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