As we’ve discussed in previous posts, by default, WordPress treats your site as a ‘blog’ and displays your newest posts on the home page, unless you set a fixed page as the main page.
In a previous tutorial, we also cover how to create a WordPress blog page to show your most recent published articles.
Whether you choose to have blog post entries on your front page or your blog page, WordPress lets you set a specific number of blog post entries to display on these pages (i.e. ’2’, ’7’, ‘9’ etc.)
Your WordPress website will then display recently published content on your blog page up to the maximum number of items you have set, even if your WP website contains more blog posts than the number of items you have set to display …
Having the ability to specify the number of entries will display on your blog page can be very useful.
For example, you can set your blog to display only the latest blog post you have published. This is useful for example, if you promote a different time-sensitive offer each week, a ‘deal of the day’ type of offer, publish the latest results of a local sports competition, post an upcoming event, set up a quarterly social page for announcements, etc.
Or, you can use this great feature to fill an empty space on your blog if your sidebar menu runs too long …
Whatever the reason, WordPress gives you the flexibility to specify the number of posts to show on your blog page.
In this tutorial, you are going to learn how to specify the number of blog posts to show up on your blog.
Changing The Number Of Posts Displayed On Your WordPress Blog Page
Through its content management system (CMS), WordPress allows you to specify how many published blog posts you want to have displaying on the blog page of your web site.
How many blog posts you would like to display is completely up to you. WordPress doesn’t limit this number …
Note: Pick a sensible setting that won’t slow down your page as the entries load on your site. You can always raise or lower the number of posts displayed on your blog page.
To specify how many blog posts you want to display on the blog page of your site, go to the WordPress dashboard menu and choose Settings > Reading …
Configure your settings in the Reading Settings panel as shown in the screenshot below:
How To Edit The Number Of Posts Showing On Your Front Page
If you are using your site as a blog (i.e. the default installation option), where the main page shows your latest blog posts, then edit your settings as described below:
- Front page displays: Set this to Your latest posts
- Blog pages show at most: X posts (where ‘X’ is the number of entries that you want displayed – i.e. ‘1’, ’5’, ’10’, ’12’ etc.)
- Click on Save Changes when finished…
Editing The Number Of Posts Displayed On The Blog Page
If you are using your WP site as a website, where the home page shows a fixed page and your most recent blog posts show up on a separate blog page, then set your options as shown below:
- Front page displays: Set this to A static page, then select Posts page: > your Blog Page from the drop down menu
- Blog pages show at most: X posts X posts (where ‘X’ is the number of items that you want displayed – e.g. ‘1’, ’5’, ’10’, ’12’ etc.)
- Click on Save Changes when done …
Now, when visitors come to your website, they will see blog post entries showing either on your front page or blog page, up to the maximum number of posts you have specified …
To learn how to change the length of your post excerpts, see the tutorial below:
Congratulations! Now you know how to set the number of blog posts you would like to have showing on the blog page of your web site.
Related Posts
If you are a WordPress newbie, you may also find the following posts useful:
- How To Create A Static Homepage In WordPress
- How To Create A Blog Page To Display Your Latest Blog Posts In WordPress
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"Wow! I never knew there's so much to learn about WordPress! I bought one of the WordPress for Dummies three years ago, such authors need to be on this course!" - Rich Law, Create A Blog Now