Being able to provide visitors with tables on your website can be very useful. 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 offers many great features, but there are some things that the default editor won’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 many non-technical WordPress users, this is not a realistic option.
Fortunately, you can do almost anything you need done on a WordPress site with plugins, and creating tables is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to create and add tables easily into your pages and blog posts with no coding skills required.
Creating And Adding Tables Into Your Content Easily With WordPress
If you want to add tables to your WordPress posts or pages without touching code, the tutorial below will show you how to easily add tables into your WordPress posts and pages using a FREE WordPress plugin called TablePress.
WP Plugin – TablePress
TablePress is a powerful and time-saving plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress.
TablePress requires no knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. It provides a simple user interface that lets you easily edit table data. Tables can contain any type of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to add features like sorting, pagination, filtering, and more for visitors. You can easily insert tables into your page content using shortcodes and display tables inside text widgets.
You can also import and export a table from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON formats.
TablePress was developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
How To Use TablePress Plugin For WP – Step-By-Step Tutorial
To create and manage tables in WordPress posts and pages, install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download this plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from your own Dashboard …
Once you have installed and activated the plugin, you will see a new menu item added to your Dashboard menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the submenu list …
The “Plugin Options” area affects the plugin’s styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can modify where the TablePress menu entry appears on your Dashboard menu.
By default, the menu item displays somewhere in the middle of your menu column. If you plan to use this plugin a lot, then you can easily position the menu option near the top of your admin menu by choosing “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item will now display near the top of the menu …
You can also play with other options in the “Plugin Options” section, like table formatting styles, default language, etc. If you don’t need to modify this section, then just leave the options as the default.
With TablePress, you create edit and format your tables inside the plugin section. Tables are then inserted via a shortcode into your pages. The tables will then display after your post or page is saved.
The great thing about working directly from the plugin is that you can easily update the data inside your tables without having to open any of your pages. The plugin then updates all of your table information everywhere where the table has been added to your content.
To create a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Type in the name, a description (optional), and the number of rows and columns you would like for your 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 change the name, description and size of your table at anytime…
Once your new table is created, it will get added to the “All Tables” list and be assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode allows you to easily insert tables anywhere inside a post or page simply by typing or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display your table …
Once you have created a new table, adding content to the table is easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click in 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 …)
After your new table has been created, the plugin also displays additional options for configuring your table.
For example, in the “Table Options” section you can specify 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 visitors hover their mouse over the table, print the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also modify your table information after it has been created in the “Table Manipulation” section. You can perform various table operations, like inserting links and images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and cloning 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 visitors to sort, filter and search your table content, set the number of table rows showing on your post (and let users change 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 once your post or page is published …
Remember to click the Save Changes button when finished to update your table information …
Once you have created one or more tables, you can view a list of all your tables by clicking on TablePress > All Tables …
Your tables are listed here. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, delete, export and preview your tables …
Using The Shortcode
You embed a table inside page content with the TablePress shortcode.
Click on the Show Shortcode menu item below your table title to get the shortcode …
The plugin also adds a menu item to your WordPress content editor. This allows you to easily insert tables into your posts and pages while working on your content.
Place your mouse cursor where you want the table to show then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also add a table when working in the “Text” area of the editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon displays a list of all the available tables you have created.
Select the table you want to embed in the content and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be placed in the location you specified …
Publish your post or page to view your table contents …
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. Tweak the content in the plugin area, then save your new table settings and refresh your content to view the updated information.
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 an existing table, click on TablePress > Export a Table in the main menu …
In the “Export Tables” section, select the table(s) you want to export (tip: 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 re-import the 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, an HTML file, or its own format.
To import a table, select and enter the import source in the “Import Tables” section. You can import multiple tables from ZIP files and choose whether to import a table as a new table or write over an existing table.
To learn more about TablePress, including accessing the plugin documentation for additional features, or 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 quite a useful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and embed tables into your WordPress posts and pages.
***
"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