In Part One of this tutorial series, we explained how to use widgets in WordPress and in Part 2, you learned how to configure text widgets.
In this section you are going to learn how to configure other frequently-used WordPress blog widgets.
Adding Categories To The Sidebar
Now that you have configure a text widget containing a clickable support button, let’s configure a widget to display Post Categories on your sidebar.
The Categories widget already displays on your sidebar by default. All you need to do, therefore, is place this widget wherever you want your categories to display by clicking and dragging it in your sidebar area …
(WordPress Categories widget)
your post categories …
(WordPress Post Categories Screen)
Note: We are currently putting together tutorials on how to use post categories in WordPress.
Let’s configure your Categories widget settings as shown below:
- In Title: type something that blog readers will understand, like “Choose A Topic…” (1)
- Check Display as dropdown if you plan to have several categories (this significantly reduces the length of your widget content by displaying all categories in a drop-down menu). Leave the box unticked if you want a list of all categories to display on your sidebar. (2)
- Leave the other options as the default, or see the additional notes on configuring the Categories widget below.
- Click Save when done …
(Categories widget settings)
Click Visit Site or reload your page to see how your Categories widget will look to visitors …
(WordPress Categories widget added to sidebar menu)
Tips:
- Change the default Uncategorized post category to something more meaningful.
- If you use nested categories on your site, you may want to check the Show hierarchy box, otherwise leave this box unchecked.
- To display the number of posts published in each category on your site, enable the Show post counts check box …
(Category widget options – Post Count Enabled vs Post Count Disabled)
Add Recent Posts
The Recent Posts widget normally displays in the sidebar by default. All you need to do is configure this widget.
Click on the Recent Posts widget title bar to configure its settings …
(Recent Posts widget)
There is really not much to set up. You can add a title, select the number of posts to display and display post dates. If you’re happy to use the default setting for Number of posts to show, then just leave the widget as is, otherwise enter a number of posts to show and click Save when done …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget settings)
The number of posts you’ve specified will appear on your sidebar navigation menu …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget displayed on blog sidebar)
A step-by-step tutorial is provided on how to create and edit a post in WordPress here: How To Create A WordPress Post
Adding A Pages Widget
Next, we’ll add a widget to your sidebar menu for listing pages.
Find a Pages widget in the Available Widgets section …
(WordPress Pages Widget)
Drag the Pages widget to your sidebar widget area …
(Adding a Pages widget to your sidebar menu)
The Pages widget allows you to configure the following options:
- Title: Add a title to the widget (e.g. “Site Information“) (1)
- Sort by: Sort how your pages display: by title (i.e. alphabetically), by page order, or by page ID. (2)
- Exclude: Prevent pages from displaying on your sidebar navigation area (3) …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings)
By default, pages will be listed by title in alphabetical order. If you want to display pages using one of the other options, then select a different method in the Sort by: drop-down menu …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings – sorting options)
To prevent certain pages from displaying to visitors, type or paste in their Page Ids separated by commas into the Exclude field of the Pages widget …
(Pages Widget settings – excluding pages by ID)
Finding a page ID in WordPress is covered here: How To Find The WordPress Post Or Page ID
Click the Save button when finished and then click Close at the bottom of the widget box to minimize your widget.
Links to the site’s main pages will now show in your sidebar navigation area …
(WordPress Pages Widget on blog sidebar)
Tip: You can add multiple Pages widgets to your sidebar. This is handy if you want to display separate groups of pages on your sidebar (e.g. “Products”, “Legal Pages” etc.)
Display Links On Your Sidebar
Now, let’s add a Links widget to your sidebar navigation menu.
Before adding the Links widget to your sidebar, you will first need to configure your Links section inside the WordPress dashboard …
(WordPress Links section)
Note: How to set up and use WordPress Links will be covered in other tutorials.
To add the widget, find a Links widget in the Available Widgets section …
(WordPress Links Widget)
Drag the widget to your active area …
(Making Links Widget active)
The widget offers a number of configurable options, including the ability to specify what information to show about your links and how many links you want to display on the sidebar area …
(Links Widget Settings)
You can add as many separate ‘Link Widgets’ to the sidebar menu as you want. As you will see in a moment, this lets you create and display specific lists of links on your site …
(Add Multiple Links Widgets To Your Sidebar Navigation Menu)
You can sort links by Link title, Link rating, Link ID, or display links in Random order …
(Links widget: ‘Sort by:’ drop-down menu)
You can also create and display a list of items for a specific category, by selecting a link category from the ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu …
( WordPress Links widget: ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu)
When you have finished configuring your Links Widget, click the Save button. Your widget will display immediately on your site …
(External links added to WordPress sidebar)
As the above example shows, you can display specific links to your site visitors (e.g. a list for a specific link category only), and add multiple lists of links to the sidebar.
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This is the end of part 3 of this tutorial series on using Widgets.
To view the rest of this tutorial series, click this link:
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum