This article may be outdated and contain information pertaining to WordPress 2.6. Please take caution when following the procedure, as many things may have changed. For WordPress 6.7.1, see Administration > Posts > Categories SubPanel.

Manage → Categories

Each post in WordPress is filed under one or more Categories. This aids in navigation and allows posts and to be grouped with others of similar content.

Each Category may be assigned to a Category Parent so that you may set up a hierarchy within the Category structure. In creating Categories, recognize that each Category Name must be unique. Thus, even if two Categories have two different Parents, they must still have different names.

Links to your Categories are, by default, shown in two different places on your blog (assuming you are using the WordPress Default 1.6 Theme "Kubrik" theme). First, WordPress lists these Category as links in your sidebar. Second, WordPress shows all the Categories to which a given post belongs under that post. When someone viewing your blog clicks on one of these Category links, an archive page with all the posts belonging to that Category, will be displayed.

This SubPanel allows you to create new Categories, edit or delete existing ones, and organize your Categories hierarchically.

Back to Administration Panels.

Manage Categories

Next to the Manage Categories text at the top of this panel is an (add new) link to jump to the bottom of this panel to begin adding new Categories. To the right is a search box where you can enter a word, or series of words, and click the "Search Tags" button to search and display all the Categories meeting your search words.

Table of Categories

This table lists all of your categories by row. Categories are displayed hierarchically and alphabetically; subcategories are displayed beneath their parents and are prefaced by long dashes. These dashed are not part of a category's name; they are there only to show hierarchy.

At the top of the table is the Delete button. Any Category that has the checkbox set will be deleted when the Delete button is clicked. Deleting a category does not delete the posts in that category. Instead, posts that were only assigned to the deleted category are set to the default Post Category (see Administration > Settings > Writing) . When the Categories are deleted, a splash message will appear at the top of the screen saying "Categories deleted."

The table of categories contains the following columns:

• [ ] - A checkbox that when clicked (checked), 'selects' that particular Category to be deleted when the Delete button is clicked.
• Name - The name of the Category. Remember each Name must be unique. Click on the Category's Name to edit the Category.
• Description - Categories may have an optional description. By default, the description is shown to viewers when they hover over the category's link.
• Posts - The number of posts which are members of the category.

Add Category

This part of the SubPanel, which is conveniently linked to from the top of the Table of Categories, allows you to create a new Category. There are four pieces of information associated with each new Category: the name, slug, category parent, and description.

Category Name

To reiterate, the Category Name must be unique.

Category Slug

The Category slug must be unique. The Category Slug is used in the URL. For example, setting a Category Name of "Recipes" and a Category Slug of "food" would show all "Recipes" posts with a URL like example.com/blog/food/.

Category Parent

Use this drop-down if you want to make this Category a sub-Category; you will select the sub-Category's Parent here. For example, you may have a Category called "Photos" but want to add further clarification about the subject of a particular "Photos" post. You could add "Oregon Coast" and "Ice Storm" as sub-Categories to the "Photos" Category; "Photos" would be the Parent of these two new sub-Categories.

Sub-Categories show up on your blog's page just like Categories, except they will typically be nested under their Parent Categories. When someone visits your site and clicks the "Photos" Category link, all posts in "Photos" and all its sub-Categories will be displayed. Clicking the "Oregon Coast" Category link only displays those post in that sub-Category. If you assign a post to a sub-Category (e.g. "Oregon Coast"), you can choose to assign that post to the sub-Category's parent ("Photos") or not. Either way, all "Oregon Coast" posts will show up in the "Photos" Category page. The only difference is that the list of Categories of which a particular post is actually a member. In the WordPress Default 1.6 Theme (Kubrick), this list is shown below the text of each post.

Description

Category Descriptions are optional. Some themes take advantage of Category Descriptions, others do not, so having Descriptions may or may not modify the way Categories are displayed for your site. Even if they are not used by your site's theme, you may still find them useful from an administration point of view.

Add Category

The most important part of the Add New Category box. Once you've entered in all the information about your new Category, use this button to save it.

Edit Category

This part of the SubPanel only displays when you click on a Categories' Name in the Table of Categories. It is possible to edit four pieces of information associated with each Category: the name, the slug, the parent, and the description.

Category name

To reiterate, the Category name must be unique.

Category Slug

Again, the Category slug must be unique.

Category Parent

Use this drop-down if you want to make this Category a sub-Category; you will select the sub-Category's Parent here. For example, you may have a Category called "Photos" but want to add further clarification about the subject of a particular "Photos" post. You could add "Oregon Coast" and "Ice Storm" as sub-Categories to the "Photos" Category; "Photos" would be the parent of these two new sub-Categories.

Description

Category descriptions are optional. Some themes take advantage of Category descriptions, others do not, so having Descriptions may or may not modify the way Categories are displayed for your site.

Edit Category

Once you've changed the Category information, use this button to save the changes.

Back to Administration Panels.