In Part 1 of this step-by-step tutorial series, we explained how to use WordPress widgets and in Part 2, you learned how to configure a text widget.
In this section you will learn how to configure other widgets.
Adding Categories
Now that you have configure a text widget containing a help button, let’s configure your Categories.
By default, the Categories widget already displays on your sidebar navigation menu. All you need to do, therefore, is place the widget wherever you want your post categories to display by clicking and dragging it in the sidebar area …
(WordPress Categories widget)
Before adding a Categories widget to the sidebar, we first recommend setting up your Post Categoriesfeature inside the WP dashboard …
(WordPress Post Categories Screen)
Note: We plan to provide a separate tutorial that explains how to configure post categories.
Let’s configure your categories settings as shown below:
- In Title: type something that blog readers will understand, like “Choose A Topic…” (1)
- If you plan to have many categories, check Display as dropdown (this significantly reduces the length of your widget content by displaying all categories in a drop-down menu). If you plan to publish posts under a few categories only, then leave the Display as dropdown box unchecked. (2)
- You can leave the remaining options unchecked, or see the additional notes on configuring this widget below.
- Click Save when finished …
(Categories widget settings)
Load the site in your web browser or reload your page to see how your content will display to your visitors …
(WordPress Categories widget added to sidebar navigation area)
Tips:
- Change the default Uncategorized post category to something more meaningful.
- If you use nested categories on your site, you may want to check the Show hierarchy option, otherwise leave this box unticked.
- To display the number of posts published in each category, tick the Show post counts check box …
(Category widget options – Post Count Enabled vs Post Count Disabled)
Add A Recent Posts Section To Your Sidebar
The Recent Posts widget typically appears on your sidebar by default. All you need to do is configure the widget.
Click on your Recent Posts widget title bar to configure its settings …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget)
There’s really very little to set up in this widget. You can add a title, select the number of posts to display and display post dates. If you’re happy to use the default Number of posts to show setting, then just leave the widget as is, otherwise enter a number of posts to show and click Save …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget settings)
The number of posts you have specified will now display to visitors on the sidebar section …
(Recent Posts widget added to sidebar)
Creating and editing WordPress Posts is explained here: How To Create A Post In WordPress
Adding A Pages Widget To The Blog Sidebar
Next, let’s add a widget to your sidebar to display page links.
Find a Pages widget in the Available Widgets section …
(WordPress Pages Widget)
Drag the Pages widget to your active widget section …
(Inserting a Pages widget into the sidebar area)
The Pages widget allows you to configure the following options:
- Title: Add a title to display above your links (e.g. “Useful Sections“) (1)
- Sort by: Sort how your pages display: by title (i.e. alphabetically), by page order, or page ID. (2)
- Exclude: Hide pages on your sidebar (3) …
(Pages Widget settings)
By default, pages will be listed by title in alphabetical order. If you want to display pages using another option, then select a different method in the Sort by: drop-down menu …
(Pages Widget settings – item sorting options)
To exclude pages from displaying in the sidebar, type in the Page Ids for all the pages you would like excluded separated by commas into the Exclude field of the Pages widget …
(Pages Widget settings – excluding pages by ID)
To learn how to find a WordPress post or page ID, see this step-by-step tutorial: How To Find The Post Or Page ID In WordPress
Click the Save button when done and click Close at the bottom of the widget box to minimize your widget.
Links to the site’s pages will now show in the sidebar …
(Pages Widget on blog sidebar)
Tip: You can add multiple Pages widgets to your sidebar section. This is handy if you need to display separate page groups on your sidebar (e.g. “Products”, “Legal Pages” etc.)
Add A Links Widget
Now, let’s add a widget that will display external links on the sidebar section.
Before adding a Links widget to your sidebar navigation area, we recommend first setting up your Links section inside your dashboard …
(WordPress Links screen)
Note: We are currently putting together tutorials on using the WordPress Links feature.
To add the widget, find a Links widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Links Widget)
Drag the widget to your sidebar area …
(Making Links Widget active)
The widget offers a number of configurable options, including the ability to specify what information to show about your links and how many links you want to display on your sidebar navigation area …
(Links Widget Settings)
You can add as many separate ‘Link Widgets’ to the sidebar as you want. As you will see in a moment, this lets you create and display specific lists of links on your site …
(Add Multiple Links Widgets To The Sidebar Menu)
You can sort links by Link title, Link rating, Link ID, or display links in Random order …
(Links widget: ‘Sort by:’ drop-down menu)
You can also create and display a list of items for a specific category, by selecting a link category from the ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu …
( WordPress Links widget: ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu)
When you have finished configuring your Links Widget, click the Save button …
(External links added to WordPress sidebar menu)
As the above example shows, you can display specific external links to your site visitors (e.g. a list for a specific link category only), and add multiple link lists to the sidebar area.
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This is the end of part three of this tutorial series on how to use WordPress widgets.
To view the rest of this tutorial, click here:
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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