As we’ve discussed in previous posts, by default, WordPress treats your website as a ‘blog’ and shows your latest posts on the main page, unless you set a fixed page as your home page.
In a separate tutorial, we’ve also explained how to create a blog page to show your most recent published posts.
Regardless of your choice to have your most recent published articles on your front page or your blog page, With WordPress you can specify the number of published blog post entries to show up on these pages (i.e. ’2’, ’4’, ‘9’ etc.)
Your site will then display blog posts on your blog page up to the maximum number of posts you have set, even if your website contains more blog posts than the number of items you have set to display …
The ability to set how many post items display on your web site has a number of practical applications.
For example, you can set your blog to display only the latest single blog post item you have published. This can be handy for example, if you are promoting a different time-sensitive offer each month, a ‘deal of the day’ type of offer, publish the latest results of a local sports competition, post upcoming events, set up a weekly social page for announcements, etc.
Or, you can use this great feature to fill an empty space on your blog if your sidebar menu is too long …
Whatever the reason, WordPress gives you the flexibility to specify the number of posts that you want to display on your blog page.
In this step-by-step tutorial, you are going to learn how to change the number of blog post entries to display on your WordPress blog.
How To Set The Number Of Posts Displayed On Your WordPress Blog
Through its content management system (CMS), WordPress allows you to choose how many blog post entries you would like to have showing on the blog page.
The number of posts you would like displayed is completely up to you. WordPress doesn’t limit this amount …
Note: We suggest selecting a sensible setting that won’t overload your page as the entries load on your site. You can always increase or decrease the number of posts displayed.
To specify the number of published posts you would like to show on the blog page of your site, select Settings > Reading from your WP navigation menu …
Configure the settings in the Reading Settings section as shown below:
Specifying The Number Of Posts Showing On The Main Page
If you are using your site as a blog (i.e. the default WordPress option), where the home page shows your newest post entries, then edit your settings as described below:
- Front page displays: Set this to Your latest posts
- Blog pages show at most: X posts (where ‘X’ is the number of entries you want showing – i.e. ‘1’, ’5’, ‘7’, ’12’ etc.)
- Click the Save Changes button when finished to update your settings…
How To Modify The Number Of Posts Showing On Your Blog Page
If you are using your WordPress site as a website, where the front page displays a fixed page and your newest post entries display on a separate blog page, then edit your settings as shown below:
- Front page displays: Set this to A static page, then select Posts page: > your Blog Page from the drop down menu
- Blog pages show at most: X posts X posts (where ‘X’ is the number of posts that you want showing – i.e. ‘1’, ‘3’, ‘7’, ’15’ etc.)
- Click on Save Changes when finished …
Now, when visitors come to your website, they will see your latest blog posts showing either on your home page or blog page, as per the settings you have specified …
To learn how to change the length of your post excerpts, see the tutorial below:
Congratulations! Now you know how to change the amount of published blog posts you want to have displaying on the blog page of your site.
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