The ability to easily add tables to your pages can be very useful. Tables are great for sorting and presenting data to people in a format that can make your information easier to understand.
WordPress provides users with a feature-rich visual editor, but there are some things that it doesn’t let you do by default, like being able to easily create tables.
Although you can add tables manually to your content in WordPress if you have knowledge of HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), for many non-technical users, this is simply not a realistic option.
Fortunately, WordPress plugins let you do almost anything you can imagine, and adding tables to your content with the click of a mouse is no exception.
In this tutorial you will learn how to create and add tables easily into your WordPress posts and pages with no coding skills required.
How To Easily Create And Add Tables Into WordPress Posts And Pages With No Programming Skills Required
Follow the step-by-step tutorial below to learn how to add tables into your WordPress posts and pages using a FREE plugin called TablePress.
TablePress – WordPress Plugin
TablePress is a great plugin for creating, editing and managing tables in WordPress.
TablePress doesn’t require you to have any knowledge or skills coding HTML, CSS, etc. It lets you easily edit table data. You can add any kind of data to your tables.
An additional JavaScript library can be used to include features like pagination, sorting, filtering, and more for your visitors. You can include the tables into your post content using shortcodes and display these using text widgets.
You can also import and export a table from/to CSV files (e.g. from Excel), HTML files, and JSON.
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 with TablePress, install and activate the TablePress plugin.
Download the plugin here:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress
Or install it from your own WP Dashboard …
After installing and activating the plugin, a new menu item will display on your WordPress admin menu called TablePress …
Click on TablePress and select Plugin Options from the list of submenus …
The “Plugin Options” area controls your plugin styling and display settings …
For example, in the “User Options” section, you can change where the TablePress menu entry appears on your Dashboard menu.
Normally, the menu entry appears somewhere near the middle of your menu bar. If you plan to use this plugin a lot, then you can easily position the menu option near the top of your Dashboard menu by selecting “Top-level (middle)” in the User Options > Admin menu entry dropdown menu …
The TablePress menu item will now appear at the top area of the admin menu …
You can also play with other settings in the “Plugin Options” tab, like table formatting styles, default language, etc. Leave all settings as they are if you don’t need to change things in this area.
With TablePress, tables are created and formatted inside the plugin area. Tables are then inserted via a shortcode into your posts. The table will then display when republishing or saving your pages or posts.
The great thing about working directly from the plugin is that you can easily update the information in your tables without having to manually edit your pages. TablePress then updates all of your table data in all instances where the table has been added to your content.
To add a new table select TablePress > Add New Table …
Enter a 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 edit the name, description and size of your table at anytime…
Once your new table is created, it will appear in the “All Tables” list and be assigned a unique Shortcode ID …
The TablePress shortcode lets you easily add tables anywhere inside a post or page simply by inserting or copying and pasting the shortcode wherever you want to display a table …
Once a new table has been created, adding content to it is really easy.
In the “Table Content” section, just click in the cell and either type or paste your content. You can add text, images and HTML formatting to your content (e.g. bold or italicize words, 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” area 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 color, highlight rows when visitors hover their mouse over the table, display the table name and description above or below the table, and more …
You can also edit your table after creating it in the “Table Manipulation” area. You can add images or links, hide, show, insert, delete and duplicate selected rows and columns, add new columns and rows, combine 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 displayed on your page (and let users change 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 in your web browser displaying your table. Certain features such as the JavaScript options are disabled in preview mode, but will display when your post or page is published …
Click the Save Changes button after you are done editing to save your new table data …
After 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 a list. You can edit, see shortcodes, copy, delete, export and preview tables …
Using The TablePress Shortcode To Embed Tables Into Your Content
You insert 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 appear then click the TablePress menu icon …
TablePress Menu Icon In Visual Editor Screen
Note: You can also add a table when working inside the “Text” area of the WordPress editor …
TablePress Menu Icon In WordPress Text Editor Screen
Clicking on the menu icon brings up a list of all tables.
Select the table you want to insert into the post or page and click Insert Shortcode …
Your TablePress shortcode will be inserted …
The table and table contents will display as soon as you publish your post or page …
As stated earlier, one of the great things about TablePress is that you can change the contents of your table after publishing the table without having to open 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 new data to an existing table, you can simply 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, select TablePress > Export a Table in your WP 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 table file to your hard drive …
After editing and resaving your file, you can then re-import the table into WordPress.
To import a table into WordPress, 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.
To import a table, select and enter the source in the “Import Tables” section. You can import multiple tables from compressed (ZIP) files and select whether to import a table as a new table or replace an existing table.
To learn more about using TablePress, including accessing the plugin documentation for extra features, get technical 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 an extremely useful and feature-rich free plugin will help you easily create and embed tables into your page content.
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