As we’ve discussed in previous posts, by default, WordPress treats your website as a ‘blog’ and shows your most recent published entries on the home page, unless you set a fixed page as your home page.
In a previously published post, we also cover how to create a blog page to show your most recent published posts.
Whether you choose to have posts on your front page or your blog page, With WordPress you can set a specific number of posts to show up on these pages (e.g. ’2’, ’6’, ’12’ etc.)
Your website will then display posts on your blog page up to the maximum number of blog posts you have specified, even if your WP web site contains more blog posts than the number of items set to display …
Being able to set how many posts will display on your WordPress site can be useful.
For example, you can set your blog to display only the latest entry that you have published. This is handy for example, if you want to promote a weekly special, a ‘deal of the day’ type of offer, publish the latest results of a local sports competition, post an upcoming event, set up a weekly social page for updates and announcements, etc.
Or, you can use this great feature to fill an ugly space on your blog if your sidebar menu runs too long …
Whatever the reason may be, WordPress gives you the flexibility to set the number of blog posts that will display on your blog page.
In this tutorial, you are going to learn how to easily specify the number of blog posts to show up on your site’s blog page.
How To Set The Number Of Post Entries To Display On Your Blog Page
Through its content management system (CMS), WordPress allows you to specify how many published blog post entries you would like to show on the blog page of your website.
The number of blog posts you would like to display is entirely up to you. WordPress doesn’t limit this amount …
Note: Select a sensible setting that won’t overload your page as the content loads on your site. You can always raise or lower the amount of posts displayed on your blog page.
To set the number of blog posts you want to have displaying on the blog page of your WordPress web site, select Settings > Reading from your WP navigation menu …
Configure the options in the Reading Settings page as per the screenshot below:
Editing The Number Of Posts Showing On The Main Page
If you are using your WordPress site as a blog (i.e. the default installation option), where the home page shows your most recent 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 blog post items that you want to display – i.e. ‘1’, ‘3’, ‘7’, ’15’ etc.)
- Click on Save Changes when done…
Modifying The Number Of Posts Showing On Your Blog Page
If you are using your WordPress site as a website, where the main page is a fixed page and your latest post entries 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 blog posts you want displayed – e.g. ‘1’, ‘3’, ’10’, ’12’ etc.)
- Click on Save Changes when finished to update your settings …
Now, when visitors come to your website, they will see your most recently published articles showing either on your home 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 change the amount of blog post entries you want to have displaying on the blog page of your WordPress site.
Related Posts
If you are a WordPress newbie, you may also find the following topic-related posts useful:
- How To Make A Specific WordPress Page Be A Static Home Page
- How To Create A Blog Section In WordPress
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"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)