As we discuss in this article, one of the many benefits of choosing the WordPress web publishing software to manage and grow your website or blog is that WordPress makes it very easy to add content, enhance your website, or rearrange the layout of your site without the need to have web coding skills and knowledge.
WordPress lets you quickly and easily add, remove, and rearrange various blocks of content on your website’s sidebar (and header and footer sections too, depending on what theme you have installed) using widgets.
Once you know how to use widgets, you can easily add things to your site’s sidebar area (plus headers and footers and other areas, depending on the WordPress theme you have installed) like:
- index of pages
- blog post categories
- blog post archive
- custom menus
- links to external sites
- most read posts
- recent comments
- image banners
- user testimonials
- surveys
- RSS content excerpts
- newsletter subscription form
- product catalog images
- social media sharing buttons
- add widgets from external sites (e.g. StumbleUpon)
- administrative forms (e.g. login, register, etc.)
(Widgets help make managing and using WordPress easier)
To learn more about what widgets are, how widgets work and why widgets can make managing your site easier, go here:
In this step-by-step tutorial we are going to show you how to use and configure various commonly-used widgets in WordPress.
How To Use Widgets
The Basics
Before we explain how to configure widgets, let’s make sure that you understand some of the basic concepts of using widgets:
Most WordPress Themes Support Widgetized Areas
Most WordPress themes support widgets and provide sections in your theme’s layout where you can add widgets, such as the sidebar section, header area, and footer sections. Depending on the theme, widgets can also be added inside the content area …
(Many WordPress themes provide a number of widget-enabled areas)
These widget-ready areas correspond to a feature inside the Widget administration panel called “Widget Areas” …
(Widget Areas)
Widgets Screen
The Widgets section displays all the widgets that you currently have available.
On the right-hand side of the window, you can see your “active” widgets …
(Activate or deactivate widgets with drag and drop ease)
Available widgets can be activated or deactivated by dragging-and-dropping items to different areas of the widgets panel.
Widgets dragged from the Available Widgets section to widget areas like the sidebar, footer, etc. become immediately activated for use on your site.
In addition, your Widgets panel includes an Inactive Widgets section that lets you remove widgets that you no longer want to use on your website. Inactive widgets do not lose their pre-configured settings.
Rearrange WordPress Widgets With Drag & Drop
You can easily add, activate, deactivate, rearrange and delete things using widgets just by dragging and dropping items from the Widgets section …
(Rearrange widgets using drag and drop)
You can also easily reorder the layout of your website’s widget-ready areas with drag and drop ease.
For example, in the image below, the widgets have already been configured to display things on your site like:
- An opt-in form,
- A contact support button, and
- ’Click to call’ buttons from a widgetized plugin (i.e. a WordPress plugin that adds an accompanying widget to your site) …
(Widgets control how certain features appear on your site)
If we were to peek inside the Widget area, you would see that the front end features display on the site in exactly the same order as their corresponding widgets were arranged in the back-end widget section …
If we reorganize the above widgets in the Active Widget Area by dragging & dropping some of these elements around …
(Drag and drop widgets in the widget area to rearrange their order)
The widget features have now been reorganized in your sidebar …
This instantly reorganizes the order of items in the site’s sidebar.
Rearranging sidebar elements using widgets can help to improve your site’s user experience.
Note in the screenshot below that the ‘click to call’ function (3) is now first the sidebar, and the ‘contact us’ image button (2) is now located above the newsletter sign-up form (1) …
(Rearranging sidebar layout with widgets can improve visitor experience)
Deleting Widgets From The Sidebar
Removing widgets from the sidebar is very easy.
For example, let’s delete the Search widget from the sidebar …
(Search widget)
To remove a widget from an active Widget area, you can either expand the widget settings and click the Delete link …
(How to delete your widgets)
Or just drag the widget out of the Active Widgets section and into the Inactive Widgets area …
(How to remove your WP widgets)
Repeat this process for all widgets you want to remove from your sidebar. You can always reinstate a widget by dragging it back into the active widgets area.
Widget Settings
Many widgets provide a number of options that allow you to further configure your site features. This includes making certain types of information hidden to visitors but visible to registered users, displaying additional forms, fields, or information, specifying dimensions of sidebar images, videos, etc.
Click on the little triangle in the corner of a widget to display the widget’s settings …
(Toggles expand/collapse widget settings)
When the widget expands, you can change and save your settings, remove the widget from the “Active Widgets” section, close the widget, or click on the triangle to collapse the widget settings …
(Widget settings)
Some widgets may require or offer no customization, or they may only allow you to add an optional title …
(Some widgets give you little to no configuration options)
Customize Widgets Section
Depending upon which WP theme you have installed, you’re also able to preview any changes live without making actual changes to your site. This way, you can be sure that you like your customizations before committing anything live to your website.
The ability to manage widgets inside your dashboard is a valuable feature of WordPress. You can work in preview mode inside the WordPress Theme Customizer screen (Appearance > Customize) and see how your widget content will appear prior to publishing any changes (to avoid making errors), or change your widgets on the fly using the Widget editor screen.
(preview widget changes live in the Customize feature)
Wherever you are on the front-end just calick the Customize link in the toolbar …
(Customize link in the toolbar)
This brings you to the Customizer section in the back-end.
You can do plenty of edits and adjustments to the widgets in preview mode (like inserting, removing and reorganizing your widgets), and see all changes in real time. If you like what you have done, click the “Save and Publish” button and your changes will instantly become available on your site to visitors.
(Widget management – configure widgets on the fly!)
After saving changes, all changes made to widgets will be automatically updated.
Since WordPress Themes can display elements differently on your site, we recommend installing your theme first before configuring widgets.
Also, remember to use the WordPress Customizer to preview your changes. This will save you from having to keep two browsers open while you work through this tutorial.
Now that you know the basics of using widgets, let’s configure a number of frequently-used WordPress sidebar widgets.
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This is the end of section 1 of this series of tutorials about how to use Widgets.
To continue, click here:
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