Responsive WordPress tables

Video versionA video overview of responsive tables in wpDataTables

Responsive Tables with wpDataTables pluginHow does our plugin provide Responsive Design functionality for tables

Responsiveness (in web design) is a feature that allows presenting the same content differently depending on the display size of device that is used to view it. In other words, the same website can be presented differently on a laptop, mobile phone or a tablet.

Any wpDataTable can be responsive, it doesn’t matter which data source do you use – MySQL, Excel, or any other. In this WordPress responsive table plugin you can choose which columns do you want to be visible or hidden on tablets and/or mobiles. The hidden columns data will be still available for the users that would like to see it in a dropdown; it will collapse under an expandable block in the first visible column. Let’s go through the process of creating a responsive wpDataTable:

Create a wpDataTable and enable responsivenessCreate a table manually, or from a data source, and enable the Responsive switch

First, create a wpDataTable using any of the available input sources using the Table Creation Wizard. You can refer to this or this documentation see how to do this.

enable-responsiveness

After the table is created, open the configuration page, go to the “Display” tab, find the “Responsiveness” switch, and enable it.

Then click the “Apply” button.

For each column, define whether it will be hidden on mobiles and tablets.Collapsing on different device types is configured individually for each column.

hide-on-mobiles-tablets

In the column properties for each column you will see two switches:

  • Hide on tablets”: Enabling this switch will mean that the cells of this column won’t be visible on tablets; and the corresponding data will be available only after clicking on the “+” button which appears on the first visible column of each row.
  • Hide on mobiles”: Enabling this switch will make the cells from this column invisible on mobile phone screens, but the data will be available after clicking on the “+” button which will be on the first visible column of each row.

You can also access the Hide on Mobile/Tablet options by clicking on the yellow icon in the table settings.

Column list button

The editor will indicate where you can select which one will be displayed/hidden on smart phone or tablets.

column-list-menu

Do not forget to leave at least one column visible both for mobiles and tablets!

When you configure which columns will be visible, and which will be hidden on different types of devices, you can save the table, publish the shortcode on a post or page, and open the page in your site front-end. Then, you can resize your browser’s window to see the responsive mode in action:

Full-size (Desktop):

responsive-full-size

Tablet size: note that some of the cells are hidden, but are available in a dropdown when we click on the expand button

responsive-tablet

Mobile size: note that only some of the cells are visible for all the rows, but all the others are available in a dropdown when we click on the expand button

mobile-size

From version 4.4 you can change the responsive action. This refers to the manner in which the hidden columns (rows) are expanded. Previously, only the +/- button was available but we also included the “Row click” and the “Cell click”. This can be configured in the Display tab above the table, once you enable the “Responsiveness” feature.

responsive-action