The ability to easily add tables to your pages can be really handy. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to people in a way that makes your information easier to understand.
The WordPress visual editor is great, but there are some things that it doesn’t do by default, such as letting you easily create tables.
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 users, this is not a realistic option.
Fortunately, you can do just about anything you can imagine on a WordPress site with plugins, and inserting tables into your content is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to easily create and insert tables into your site’s pages with no coding skills required.
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How To Create And Add Tables Into Your Content With WordPress
Follow the tutorial below to learn how to easily add tables in WordPress using a FREE plugin called TablePress.
WP Plugin – TablePress
A very powerful and time-saving plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress is TablePress.
TablePress doesn’t require you to have any knowledge of HTML, CSS, etc. The plugin lets you easily edit your table data. Tables can contain any type of data, even formulas.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like pagination, sorting, filtering, and more for site users. You can insert tables into your posts and pages using shortcodes and display these inside text widgets.
A table can also be imported and exported from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON formats.
The plugin was developed by Tobias Bäthge and is licensed as Free Software under GNU General Public License 2 (GPL 2).
Using TablePress Plugin For WordPress – Tutorial
To create and manage tables in WordPress, first install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download this plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it directly from your WP Dashboard …
After installing and activating the plugin, you will see a new menu item has been added to your Dashboard menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and choose Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” section affects the plugin’s styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can modify the position of the TablePress menu entry in your admin menu.
By default, the menu entry appears somewhere near the middle of your menu column. If you plan to use this plugin a lot, then you can easily position the menu item close to the top of the menu by selecting “Top-level (middle)” on the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu entry will now appear near the top section of the menu …
You can also specify other settings in the “Plugin Options” area, like table formatting styles, default language, etc. Leave the default options as they are if you don’t need to change things in this area.
With TablePress, tables are created and modified within the plugin area. Tables are then placed via a shortcode into your text. The tables will then display after republishing or saving your pages or posts.
The great thing about working directly from the plugin is that you can easily update the data in your tables without having to manually edit your posts and pages. TablePress then updates all of your table data in all locations where the table has been added to your content.
To add a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Enter the name, a description (optional), and the number of rows and columns you would like for the 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 edit the name, description and size of any table you create at anytime…
Once the new table has been created, it will display in the “All Tables” list and be assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode allows you to easily add tables anywhere inside a post or page by simply inserting or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display a table …
Once a new table has been created, adding content to the table is really easy.
In the “Table Content” section, click in the cell and type or paste your content. You can add text, images and format your content (e.g. add bold text, insert links, etc …)
After your new table has been created, additional options appear that let you configure 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, make the background of consecutive rows alternate in colour, 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 information after creating it in the “Table Manipulation” subsection. You can perform various edits on your table, such as adding links or images, hiding, showing, inserting, deleting and cloning selected rows and columns, adding new rows and columns, 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, change the number of table rows displayed on your page (and let visitors specify the number of rows displayed), display table information, etc …
You can preview your table anytime, by clicking the Preview button …
A preview window will open on your screen allowing you to preview the table. Certain features like JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display when your table is published …
Click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to update your table information …
To view a list of all your tables TablePress > All Tables …
All the tables you have created are listed here. You can edit, see the shortcode, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
How To Use The TablePress Shortcode
You embed a table inside any page content with the TablePress shortcode.
Click on the Show Shortcode menu item under your table title to get the shortcode …
The plugin also adds a shortcode menu icon to your WordPress 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 your table to be inserted 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 WP editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress HTML Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon opens a window containing a list of all your tables.
Select the table you want to add to your post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be inserted …
Publish your post or page to display your table and table contents …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about TablePress is that you can change things after publishing the table without having to edit your post or page. Tweak the content in the plugin area, then save the new table settings and refresh your page to view the updated information.
Another great time-saving feature of this plugin, is that if you plan to keep adding new data to an existing table, just export your current table, then add new data, 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 a table, select TablePress > Export a Table in the admin 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 file to your hard drive …
After editing and resaving the table file, you can then easily re-import your table into WordPress.
To import a table, go to your admin menu and choose 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 format.
To import a table, select and enter the source in the “Import Tables” area. You can import multiple tables from ZIP files and select whether to import tables as a new table or replace an existing table.
For more information about using TablePress, including where to access 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 a very powerful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and insert tables into your page content.
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