The ability to easily add tables to your website can be really handy. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to visitors in a format that can make your information easier to understand.
The WordPress visual editor is great, but there are some things that the default editor doesn’t let you do, such as giving you the option to create tables without having to learn code.
Although you can add tables manually to your content in WordPress if you know HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), for most non-technical WordPress users, this is simply not a practical option.
Fortunately, you can do just about anything you can imagine on a WordPress site with plugins, and inserting tables into your content with the click of a mouse is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to easily create and insert tables into your WordPress posts and pages without requiring knowledge of HTML or CSS or coding skills.
How To Add Tables In Pages And Posts With WordPress
Follow the step-by-step tutorial below to learn how to add tables in WordPress using a FREE plugin called TablePress.
TablePress – WP Plugin
A powerful and time-saving WordPress plugin that makes creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress simple and easy is TablePress.
TablePress doesn’t require you to have any knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. The plugin provides a simple user interface that lets you easily edit table data. You can add any type of data to tables.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like pagination, sorting, filtering, and more for your visitors. You can insert tables into your pages and blog posts using shortcodes and even display these inside text widgets.
You can also import and export tables from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON.
TablePress was created by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
How To Use TablePress Plugin For WordPress – Tutorial
To create and add tables to WordPress, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
You can download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from within your WP Dashboard …
Once you have installed and activated the plugin, a new menu item will appear on your WordPress admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the submenu list …
The “Plugin Options” page affects the plugin’s behavior in different areas of your site …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can change the position of the TablePress menu entry in your admin menu.
Normally, the menu item displays around the middle of your menu bar. If you plan to use this plugin a lot, then you can easily position the menu option towards the top of your admin menu by selecting “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item will now appear at the top of your menu list …
You can also specify other settings in the “Plugin Options” screen, such as table formatting styles, default language, and so on. Leave all options as they are if you don’t need to change things in this section.
With TablePress, tables are created and modified within the plugin area. Tables are then added via a shortcode into your WordPress posts and pages. The tables will then display or update when your post or page is saved.
The great thing about doing this is that you can easily modify the information in your tables without having to manually edit your posts and pages. TablePress then updates all of your table data in all instances where the table has been added to your content.
To create a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Enter a table name, an optional description, and the number of rows and columns you want for your new table into the “Add New Table” form in the Add New tab, and click on the Add Table button to create your new table. You can change the name, description and size of any tables you create at anytime…
Once the new table is created, it will be added to the “All Tables” list and be assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode lets you easily add tables anywhere in your content by simply typing or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want your tables to be displayed …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to it is easy.
In the “Table Content” section, just click inside the cell and either type or paste the content you want to display. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. bold or italicize words, insert hyperlinks, etc …)
After your new table has been created, additional options appear that let you configure your table.
For example, in the “Table Options” area you can select the first row of your table to be the table header and the last row of the table to be the table footer, display alternate background colours on consecutive rows, highlight a row when a visitor hovers their mouse over the table, show the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also edit your table content after it has been created in the “Table Manipulation” subsection. You can perform a number of manipulations on your table, such as adding links and images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and duplicating selected columns and rows, adding new columns and rows, combining cells, etc …
You can also enable JavaScript library features in your tables that will allow visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, set the number of table rows showing on your posts (and also allow users to change the number of rows displayed), display table information, etc …
You can see how your table looks anytime, by clicking 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 once your table is published …
Remember to click the Save Changes button when finished to update your table data …
Once you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by going to TablePress > All Tables …
Your tables are displayed in this section. You can edit, see the shortcode, copy, export, delete and preview tables …
Using The Shortcode To Embed Tables Into Your Pages And Blog Posts
You can insert a table inside content with a shortcode.
Click on the Show Shortcode menu item below the table title to get the shortcode …
The plugin also adds a shortcode menu icon to your WordPress content editor. This allows you to easily insert tables into your posts and pages while working on your content.
Place your cursor where you want the 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 inside the “Text” area of the WP editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of all the available tables you have created.
Select the table you want to embed into your post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be added to your content …
Publish your post or page to display your table …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about this plugin is that you can edit data after publishing the table without having to edit your post or page. Just tweak the content in the plugin area, then save the new table settings and refresh your post to view the updated content.
Another great time-saving feature of the TablePress 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 table file with the news changes and your table content will be automatically updated throughout your site.
To export a table, select TablePress > Export a Table in the main menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select the table(s) you would like 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 making changes and resaving your table file, you can then easily reimport your table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress from your hard drive, select TablePress > Import a Table …
TablePress can import tables from existing data, such as CSV file data, from a spreadsheet application (e.g. Excel), an HTML file resembling a webpage, or its own JSON format. You can also import existing tables from the WP-Table Reloaded plugin
To import a table, select and enter the import source in the “Import Tables” section. You can import multiple tables from a ZIP file and choose whether to import tables as a new table or replace an existing table.
For more information about using TablePress, including accessing documentation about additional features, get plugin support, contact the plugin developer, etc., click on the “About Tab” in the plugin admin section, or select TablePress > About TablePress …
As you can see, TablePress is a very powerful and feature-rich plugin that is free and will help you easily create and insert tables into your site content.
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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