As we’ve discussed in other posts, in a default installation, WordPress treats your website as a ‘blog’ and shows your newest posts on the front page, unless you fix a page as a front page.
In a previous post, we have also addressed how to create a WordPress blog page to display your latest published articles.
Regardless of your choice to make your blog posts on your home page or your blog page, With WordPress you can specify the number of blog posts to show up on these pages (i.e. ‘1’, ’4’, ‘9’ etc.)
Your WP website will then display your most recently published articles on your blog page up to the maximum number of items you have set, even if your web site contains more posts than the number of posts set to display …
The ability to specify the number of blog post items will display on your blog page can be useful.
For example, you can display only the latest post you have published. This can be handy for example, if you are promoting a weekly special, a ‘deal of the day’ type of offer, publish the latest results of a local sports competition, post upcoming events, set up a monthly office page for announcements, etc.
You can also use this feature to fill an ugly space on your blog page if your sidebar menu is too long …
Whatever the reason, WordPress gives you the flexibility to specify the number of posts that will display on main blog page.
In this tutorial, you are going to learn how to specify the number of posts will show up on your site’s blog page.
Setting The Number Of Blog Posts Displayed On Your Blog
Through its content management system (CMS), WordPress lets you specify how many published blog post entries you want to have showing on your site’s blog page.
The number of blog posts you want displayed is completely up to you. WordPress doesn’t limit this amount …
Note: Pick a sensible setting that won’t slow down your page as the content loads on your site. You can always increase or decrease the number of items displayed on your blog page.
To specify the number of published posts you want to have displaying on the blog page of your site, go to your WP dashboard menu and select Settings > Reading …
Configure the settings in the Reading Settings page as per the screenshot below:
How To Change The Number Of Posts Displayed On Your Home Page
If you are using your WordPress site as a blog (i.e. the default WordPress option), where the main page displays your latest post entries, 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 blog post entries that you want to show – e.g. ‘1’, ‘3’, ’10’, ’12’ etc.)
- Click the Save Changes button when finished…
How To Specify The Number Of Posts Displayed On Your Blog Page
If you are using your WordPress site as a website, where the home page is a fixed page and your most recent blog posts display 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 entries that you want to show – i.e. ‘1’, ’5’, ’10’, ’12’ etc.)
- Click on Save Changes when finished …
Now, when visitors land on your website, they will see blog post entries showing either on your main page or blog page, as per the settings 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 published posts you would like to show on your WP site’s blog page.
Related Posts
If you are a new WordPress user, you may also find the following posts useful:
- How To Display A WordPress Page As The Home Page
- How To Create A Blog Page To Display Your Latest 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