How To Edit And Delete WordPress Posts

In other tutorials, we explain the differences between Posts and Pages and show you how to create a new WordPress post.

In WordPress, editing post content and deleting posts is simple.

In this tutorial, you will learn how to edit and delete a single WordPress post. This tutorial also explains to use the WordPress Posts Table for performing single and bulk edits and post deletions and provides additional tips that will help you save time working with WordPress.

Parts One and Two of this tutorial cover the following:

• How To Use The Table Of Posts
  • WordPress Table of Posts – Screen Options
  • WordPress Table Of Posts – Filtering And Sorting
• Editing Posts In WordPress
  • Editing Single Posts In WordPress
  • How To Edit Multiple Posts
• How To Delete Posts In WordPress
  • How To Delete An Individual Post In WordPress
  • How To Delete Bulk Posts In WordPress
• Editing And Deleting Posts In WordPress – Useful Information

The WordPress Posts Panel

Log into your administration area and select Posts > All Posts …

(Posts – All Posts)

This brings up the Posts area …

(WordPress Posts section)

Here you can add, edit, and delete posts …

(Add, edit, and delete posts in the WordPress Posts page)

For more information about creating a new post in WordPress, go here: How To Create A WP Post

The Table Of Posts Explained

The Table of Posts includes your published posts, posts scheduled for publishing, sticky posts, private posts, draft posts (not yet published), and posts that need to be approved by an administrator or editor before being published (pending posts).

Here are the main features of the WordPress Table of Posts:

The Table of Posts displays a list of all your posts with your newest posts displayed at the top of the list …

(WordPress posts display in reverse chronological order)

Posts can be selected for bulk processing by clicking on the check box next to each post (see Part 2 of this tutorial to learn more about bulk editing posts) …

(Select checkboxes in the WordPress Table of Posts to bulk edit posts)

WordPress Table Of Posts – Columns

Title Column

The title of each post is displayed in this column as a clickable link. Clicking on the post title lets you edit the post …

(Posts Table – Title column)

Hover over the post title to access action links that allow you to further manage the post …

(Hover over post title area to view options)

The following post management tasks are available:

• Edit takes you to the Post Edit screen. You can also arrive at the Post Edit screen if you click on the title of the post.
• Quick Edit lets you update your post metadata. For a step-by-step tutorial on using the Quick editor function, go here: How To Use The Quick Edit Function In WordPress
• Trash removes your posts from the list of posts and places them in the trash. From there you can permanently delete them.
• Preview shows you what your draft posts will look like when they are published. ‘View’ will take you to the live site to view the posts. Which link displays here will depend on the status of your posts.

Indicators next to your post title let you see if posts have been saved as Draft, Pending Post, Password Protected Post, etc …

(Post Status indicator)

Post Author Column

Posts authors are listed in the ‘Author’ column …

(Post Author)

If your site contains multiple authors, click on an author name …

(Table of Posts – Post author column)

This will display a list of all posts that have been authored by that user …

(You can display a list of all posts authored by the same user)

Post Categories Column

This column lists your post categories.

Click on any category …

(Categories column)

And only posts which include that category will appear in the Table of Posts …

(List of posts sorted by category)

Post Tags

This column displays post tags.

Click on a specific tag …

(Tag links are clickable)

And all posts including that tag will appear in your Table of Posts …

(List of posts displayed by tag)

Comments

The column with the “commenting bubble” shows the number of comments associated with your posts. The number of comments left on a post appears in the comment bubble next to each post.

You can view the comments by clicking on the bubble …

(View any comments by simply clicking on the icon)

If any posts have comments that need to be approved by an administrator before they can be made public, these will show alongside the bubble graphic for that post …

(Post comments column)

The number of approved comments is displayed inside the post’s comment bubble …

(Comments)

Note: Clicking on the comments icon takes you to the Comments section where you can moderate comments left by visitors and users …

(Manage comments left on your posts by visitors and users in the Comments panel)

Post Date

The ‘Date’ column shows the dates for posts as follows:

• The Published date for published posts,
• The Last Modified date for all unpublished posts (e.g. draft posts), and
• The Scheduled date for any posts scheduled for publishing in the future …

(Table of Posts – Post date)

In addition to listing posts using the default ‘List’ view, you can also display your posts in the Table of Posts using ‘Excerpt’ view …

(Excerpts View – Table of Posts)

To display posts in the Table of Posts in Excerpt view, see the section below.

Posts Table – Screen Options

To view Table of Posts options, click on the ‘Screen Options’ tab at the top of your screen …

(WordPress Posts Table – ‘Screen Options’ tab)

The top section of your screen expands and reveals a number of options for configuring your Table of Posts …

(Table of Posts options)

Options are divided into the following sections

• Columns – This section lets you enable/disable.
• Pagination – Enter the number of items to display on each page of your Table of Posts. For example, “100”.
• View Mode – Select whether items should display in ‘List View’ (default), or ‘Excerpt View’.

Remember to click ‘Apply’ to update your settings when finished …

(Save Posts options)

Table Of Posts – Filtering Menus

WordPress offers various options to filter and display selected posts. Depending on the status of your posts, you will see the following Post menu links and the amount of posts with that status:

(WordPress Table of Posts – Menu filters)

• All – The ‘All’ filter lists all posts.
• Mine – Click on this link to list only posts authored by you.
• Published – The ‘Published’ menu filter lists all posts set to ‘published’ status.
• Scheduled – Click on this menu link to show all posts set to ‘scheduled’ status.
• Draft – Clicking this menu filter lists all posts set to ‘draft’ status.
• Pending – Clicking this menu filter lists all posts set to ‘pending’ status. (Posts marked as ‘pending’ need to be reviewed and approved by Editors or Administrators before publishing.)
• Private – Click on this menu link to bring up a list of all posts set to ‘private’ status.
• Trash – Clicking this menu filter returns all deleted posts

Clicking on any of these links displays only the posts for that status in the Table of Posts …

(Post Management Screen – Click menu links to view by status)

Below the menu links and next to the ‘Bulk Actions’ drop menu and ‘Apply’ button are two additional filtering options:

Post Filter – All Dates/Months

In the Table of Posts, you can filter posts by months. By default, Show all dates is selected and displays all posts.

To filter posts by date, select a specific time period from the ‘All dates’ drop menu and click the ‘Filter’ button …

(Filter Posts – All Dates/Months)

View Posts By Category

The Posts table also lets you filter posts by category. By default, All Categories is selected and all of your posts are displayed.

To filter posts by category, select an option from the Posts > ‘All Categories’ drop menu and click the ‘Filter’ button …

(View Posts by Categories)

If there is a large number of posts spanning across many pages, you can use the Search feature to filter and display only posts that contain the search words you have entered into the search field …

(Search Posts function – Table of Posts)

To remove the results of the search filter and display all posts again in the Table of Posts, click the ‘All’ posts filter above the table …

(Clear the results of the search filter by clicking ’All’)

The search filter results will be cleared and all of your posts will be listed once again in the Table of Posts …

(WordPress Posts screen – Table of Posts)

Next Step …

Now that you know a little more about what all the different functions of the WordPress Table of Posts are and how they work, the next step is to learn how to edit and delete your posts in WordPress.

This is the end of section one of this tutorial.

To view the rest of this tutorial, click the link below:

Editing And Deleting Posts In WordPress – Part Two

Related WordPress Tutorials And Articles

The tutorials and articles below will help you better understand the features discussed above and how to use WordPress posts:

• WordPress Posts & Pages
• How To Create A Post In WordPress
• How To Use The Inline Editor In WordPress To Edit Your Pages And Posts
• How To Schedule WordPress Posts
• What Is A Sticky WordPress Post?
• How To Password-Protect Content On WP Posts And Pages
• WordPress Web Traffic Blueprint Part 4 – Learn How To Create An Automated Web Traffic Generating Machine With WordPress
• Changing Post Authors
• Configuring Categories
• How To Add, Edit, And Delete Tags In Posts

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