The ability to easily add tables to your pages can be really handy. Tables help you sort and present data to visitors in a way that makes your information easier to understand.
The WordPress visual editor offers many great features, but there are some things that it won’t let you do by default, such as letting you create tables without having to learn code.
Although you can create tables manually in WordPress if you know HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), for many non-technical WordPress users, this is not a practical option.
Fortunately, you can do almost anything you can imagine on a WordPress site with plugins, and adding tables to your content is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to easily create and insert tables into your pages and blog posts with no coding skills required.
How To Create And Add Tables To WordPress Pages And Posts
To create and add tables to your WordPress posts or pages with no coding skills required, we’ll use a FREE plugin called TablePress.
TablePress – WP Plugin
A powerful and time-saving WordPress plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress is TablePress.
TablePress requires no knowledge of HTML, CSS, etc. It lets you easily edit table data. Tables can contain any kind of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to add features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for your visitors. You can easily insert tables into your page content using shortcodes and even display tables using text widgets.
You can also import and export a table from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON formats.
The plugin was developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
Using TablePress Plugin For WordPress – Tutorial
To create and add tables to WordPress posts and pages, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
You can download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from your Dashboard …
After the plugin has been installed and activated, a new menu item will be added to your main menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and choose Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” screen affects the plugin’s styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can specify the position of the TablePress menu entry in your Dashboard menu.
Normally, the menu item displays somewhere near the middle of your menu bar. If you plan to use this plugin a lot, then you can easily position the menu item towards the top of your menu by specifying “Top-level (middle)” in the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu entry will now appear closer towards the top section of your menu …
You can also specify other plugin options in the “Plugin Options” screen, such as formatting styles for your tables, default language, and so on. Leave all default options as they are if you don’t need to change things in this area.
With TablePress, you create edit and format tables within the plugin screen. Tables are then placed via a shortcode into your posts. Your tables will then display when saving your content.
The great thing about doing this is that you can easily change the data in your tables without having to touch your pages. The plugin then updates all of your table information inside all posts and pages where the table has been added to your content.
To add a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Enter the table name, an optional description, and the number of rows and columns you would like for the 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 edit the name, description and size of your table at anytime…
Once the new table has been created, it will be listed in the “All Tables” list and get assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode allows you to easily add tables anywhere in your content simply by inserting or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want your table to display …
Once a new table has been created, adding content to it is really easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click inside the cell and type or paste the content you want to display. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. add bold text, insert links, etc …)
Once your new table is created, the plugin also displays additional options for configuring your table.
For example, in the “Table Options” area you can specify the first row of your table to be the table header or the last row of the table to be the table footer, make the background of consecutive rows alternate in colour, highlight rows when visitors hover their mouse over the table, display the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also edit your table after creating it in the “Table Manipulation” area. You can perform various table edits, such as adding links and images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and duplicating selected columns and rows, adding new rows and columns, combining cells, etc …
You can also enable JavaScript library features in your tables that will allow your site users to sort, filter and search your table content, change the number of table rows displayed on your posts (and let visitors specify the number of rows displayed), display table information, etc …
You can see how your table looks anytime, by clicking on the Preview button …
A preview window will open displaying the table. Certain features such as the JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display when your table is published …
Click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to update your new table data …
After you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by going to TablePress > All Tables …
All your tables are listed here. You can edit, see the shortcode, copy, export, delete and preview tables …
How To Use The TablePress Shortcode To Insert Tables Into Your Pages And Blog Posts
You can embed tables into any pages and blog posts with a shortcode.
You can get the shortcode for your tables by clicking on the Show Shortcode menu item under the table title to get the shortcode …
The plugin also adds a menu item to your WordPress editor. This allows you to easily insert tables into your posts and pages while working on your content.
Place your cursor where you want your table to be inserted then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also add a table when working in the “Text” area of the editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of all your available tables.
Select the table you want to embed into the post or page 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 TablePress is that you can edit information after publishing the table without having to edit your post or page. Edit the content in the plugin area, then save your 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 data to an existing table, just export your current table, then add new items, 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 the admin menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select the table(s) you want to export (you can 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 table file to your hard drive …
After editing and resaving your table file, you can then easily re-import your table into WordPress.
To import a table, go to the menu and select TablePress > Import a Table …
TablePress can import tables from existing data, such as CSV file data, from a spreadsheet application, an HTML file resembling a webpage, or its own format. You can also import existing tables from the WP-Table Reloaded plugin
To import a table, select and enter the source in the “Import Tables” section. You can also import multiple tables from compressed (ZIP) files and choose whether to import tables as a new table or to replace an existing table.
To learn more about the plugin, including accessing documentation about additional features, or get plugin support, contact the plugin author, etc., click on the “About Tab” in the plugin admin section, or select TablePress > About TablePress …
As you can see, TablePress is an extremely useful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and insert tables into your WordPress posts and pages.
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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