55+ Most Wanted WordPress Tips, Tricks, and Hacks

Ever wondered what WordPress tips, tricks, and hacks most popular WordPress sites are using? In this article, we will share some of the most wanted WordPress tips, tricks, and hacks that will help you use WordPress like a pro.

Most wanted WordPress tips, tricks, and hacks

1. Use a Custom Homepage

By default, WordPress shows your latest posts on the homepage of your website. You can change that and use any page as your site’s homepage.

First you need to create a new page in WordPress, and you can name this page home. Next, you will need to create another page and let’s call this page blog as you will use it to display your blog posts.

Now go to Settings » Reading page in your WordPress admin and under ‘Front page displays’ option and switch to ‘A static page’. After that you will be able to select the pages you just created as your home and blog pages.

Static Front Page

You can also create a custom homepage template to use for your home page. Simply create a new file on your computer using a plain text editor and add this code at the top of it.

1 <?php /* Template Name: Custom Homepage */ ?>

Save this file as custom-homepage.php on your desktop.

Next, you need to connect to your website using an FTP client and go to /wp-content/themes/your-current-theme/ folder. Now upload the file you created earlier to your theme folder.

Return back to the WordPress admin area and edit your home page. You will be able to select your custom homepage template under the page attributes metabox.

Custom home page template

For more details see our guide on how to create a custom page template in WordPress.

Now this page will be completely empty and it will not show anything at all. You can use custom HTML/CSS and WordPress template tags to build your own page layout. You can also use a page builder plugin to easily create one using drag and drop tools.

2. Install Google Analytics in WordPress

Google Analytics is one of the must have tools for WordPress site owners. It allows you to see where your users are coming from and what they are doing on your website.

The best way to install Google Analytics is by using the MonsterInsights plugin. You can insert Google Analytics code into your theme files, but this code will disappear when you update or switch your theme.

For detailed instructions see our step by step guide on how to install Google Analytics in WordPress.

3. Password Protect WordPress Admin Directory

WordPress admin directory is where you perform all administrative tasks on your website. It is already password protected as users are required to enter username and password before they can access the admin area.

However by adding another layer of authentication, you can make it difficult for hackers to gain access to your WordPress site.

Here is how to enable password protection for your WordPress admin directory.

Login to cPanel dashboard of your WordPress hosting account. Under the security section, you need to click on ‘Password Protect Directories’ icon.

Password protect directories

Next, you will be asked to select the directories you want to protect. Select /wp-admin/ folder and next create a username and password.

Security settings

That is it. Now when you try to access your wp-admin directory, you should see an authentication required box like this:

Password protected directory

For alternate method and more detailed instructions see our guide on how to password protect your WordPress admin directory.

4. Show Images in Rows and Columns

Display photos in rows and columns

By default, when you add multiple images to a WordPress post, they would appear right next to each other or on top of each other. This does not look very good because your users will have to scroll a lot to see all of them.

This can be solved by displaying thumbnail images in a grid layout. This gives your website a more compact look and improves user experience.

For complete step by step instructions, see our guide on how to display WordPress photos in rows and columns.

5. Allow users to Subscribe to Comments

Comment subscription checkbox

Normally when users leave a comment on your website, they will have to manually visit the same article again to see if you or other users replied to comments.

Wouldn’t it be better if users were able to get email notifications about new comments on your posts? Here is how to add this feature to your website.

Simply install and activate the Subscribe to Comments Reloaded plugin. Upon activation, you need to visit Settings » Subscribe to Comments to configure the plugin settings.

For detailed instructions see our guide on how to allow users to subscribe to comments in WordPress.

6. Limit login attempts

Locked out login

By default, a WordPress user can make unlimited number of attempts to login to a WordPress site. This allows anyone to try guessing your password until they get it right.

To control this, you need to install and activate the Login LockDown plugin. It allows you to set limits on the number of failed attempts a user can make to login.

For detailed setup instructions see our guide on how to limit login attempts in WordPress.

7. Display Excerpt (Post Summary) on Home and Archive Pages

Post excerpts

You may have noticed that all popular blogs show article summary instead of full article on their home and archive pages. It makes those pages load faster, increases page views, and avoids duplicate content across your website.

For more on this topic, see our article on excerpt (summary) vs full posts in WordPress archive pages.

Many premium and free WordPress themes already use excerpts on home and archive pages. However, if your theme doesn’t display excerpts, then see our guide on how to display post excerpts in WordPress themes.

8. Add Custom Default Gravatar Image

WordPress uses Gravatar to display user profile photos in WordPress. If a user does not have a gravatar, then WordPress uses a default image which is called ‘Mystery Person’.

This default gravatar image will appear many times in your WordPress comments area simply because a lot of users do not have a gravatar image associated with their email address.

You can easily replace this default gravatar with your own custom default gravatar image.

First you will need to upload the image you want to use as your default gravatar image to your WordPress media library.

Next, you need to copy the image file URL.

Copy file URL

Now you need to add the following code to your theme’s functions.php file or a site-specific plugin.

1 add_filter( 'avatar_defaults', 'wpb_new_gravatar' );
2 function wpb_new_gravatar ($avatar_defaults) {
3 $myavatar = 'http://example.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/wpb-default-gravatar.png';
4 $avatar_defaults[$myavatar] = "Default Gravatar";
5 return $avatar_defaults;
6 }

Don’t forget to replace $myavatar value with the URL of the custom gravatar image you uploaded earlier.

You can now visit Settings » Discussion page, and you will notice your custom default avatar added to default avatar choices.

For detailed instructions check out our tutorial on how to add change the default gravatar in WordPress.

9. Adding custom CSS to a WordPress Theme

As a WordPress site owner, sometimes you may need to add custom CSS to your site. CSS allows you to change the appearance of things on your WordPress site like colors, margins, font sizes, etc.

The easiest way to add custom CSS to any WordPress theme is by visiting the Appearance » Customize page in your WordPress admin. This will launch the WordPress theme customizer, and you will see your website’s preview in the right panel.

Now click on the ‘Additional CSS’ menu in the left panel to expand it.

Additional CSS in theme customizer

You will see a plain text box where you can add your custom CSS. As soon as you add a valid CSS rule, you will be able to see it applied on your website’s live preview pane.

Custom CSS code and preview

Don’t forget to click on the ‘Save & Publish’ button on the top when you are finished.

For alternate methods and more detailed instructions check out our beginner’s guide on how to add custom CSS in WordPress.

10. Using Inspect Element Tool to Customize WordPress

Adding custom CSS sounds great, but how do you know which CSS classes to edit? How do you debug it without actually having to write CSS?

Using Inspect Element tool, you can edit HTML, CSS, or JavaScript code for any webpage and see your changes live (only on your computer).

For a DIY website owner, these tools can help you preview how a site design would look without actually making the changes for everyone.

Simply point and right click on any element on a page, then select ‘Inspect’ from your browser’s menu.

Opening Inspect Element or developer tools in your browser

This will split your browser window, and you will be able to see the HTML and CSS source code of the page.

HTML and CSS panels in Inspect tool

Any changes you make here will be immediately visible on the page above. However, keep in mind that these changes are only happening in your browser and you are not actually editing the page.

This allows you to figure out what you need to edit and how. After that you can go ahead and change your actual theme files or custom CSS code.

For more on this topic, see our article on basics of Inspect element and customizing WordPress as DIY user.

11. Add a Facebook Thumbnail Image

Facebook can automatically pick up an image from your articles when they are shared by you or anyone else. Usually it picks the featured image of an article. However, sometimes it may pick a random image from the article that may not be suitable.

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