How to Edit Categories in WordPress?

In WordPress, the best way to organize WordPress posts is to use categories; you should add categories to keep track of your posts. There are two pre-defined taxonomies: Categories and Tags. Tags, in addition to categories, are important for keeping track of postings. At times we need to add or edit categories in WordPress. In this article, we are just going to learn how to do that properly.

What Are WordPress Categories?

Categories mean sorting similar material into classes or divisions; think of them as labels. For example, you could have some posts about news and others that are all tutorials. Two categories you might use to identify these categories are “news” and “tutorials.”

WordPress allows you to sort your articles into categories and tags. You can also classify your categories into sub-categories to further organize your information. It’s important to use categories and sub-categories properly to help users navigate and find resources on your website. Content categorization will help search engines better crawl your website pages as well.

Parent and Sub-category Pages in WordPress

Parent Categories are used in WordPress to create this hierarchy. We can opt to assign a category a parent category when we create it. For example, we might create a new category for “Tutorial” and “Code.” Here “Tutorial”  is a parent category of “Code,” and Code is a sub-category of Tutorial.

• The post belonging to the sub-category will automatically fall under Category, and on the website, it would appear on the “Tutorial” archive and the “Code” archive page.
• You add a post to the parent category, the post will not fall under the sub-category, and on the website, it would appear only on the Tutorial archive page but not in code or other subcategories.
• Let’s say you add another subcategory “graphic design” under tutorial and select this category for a post. Then, the post will be shown on the archive page of graphic design, and tutorial but not in Code.

Similarly, if you are doing articles on marketing; Marketing would be the parent category, and SEO, SEM SMM, etc., would be the sub-categories.

Now that you have a grasp on WordPress category pages, let’s move on to “how to add categories and sub-categories in WordPress” step by step.

How to add and edit categories in WordPress?

When you open the Posts list in the WordPress admin, you’ll see that Categories is one of the columns used. WordPress comes with one type by default (there must always be one), which is “Uncategorized” in this case. So this first post, titled “Hello world!” falls under the Category of uncategorized.

You can add, edit and update WordPress category pages in various ways:

Method 1: Adding  or editing category pages from the post pages

Step I: Go To Admin Dashboard -> Posts

Step II: Click on the post title you want to categorize or edit

Once you are on the post editor after clicking “Hello world!.” You will see the “Categories” option on the right sidebar; the selected post’s active ‘category’ is marked as checked.

Step III: to create and edit a new category, click on “Add New Category”

The categories and sub-categories (if previously added) are shown here.

• Case I:
  If there aren’t any categories made, you can click on “Add new category” to create a new category and name it accordingly.
• Case II:
  If there are categories made previously, you can pick the relevant category for the given post. Consequently, you can also edit the Category of an individual post in a similar fashion.

Step IV: Update the post

Method 2: Adding editing and updating categories through the category page

It can be confusing to edit, rename, or adjust the settings of a category. However, with little assistance, this would be easy. When editing it, you can quickly modify the name, slug, and even the parent category of an existing category.

Step I:  Go to Admin Dashboard-> Posts -> Categories

On the category section, you will see the list of all categories.

Here you can:

• add or create a new category
• add, edit and update: the name, slug, description of the category
• Specify parent and subcategories
• See the count of posts on a particular category
• Delete unused category pages
• Restructure category hierarchy 

Step II: Creating a new category and editing the existing category pages

To add a new category

Simply fill in the details of name, slug, parent category, and description on the respective text boxes and hit ” Add New Category”

Note: Leave parent category to ‘none’, if the category you are going to add is itself a parent. Else choose the parent category page from the drop-down menu.

To Edit and update categories

You can edit categories in WordPress using the quick edit or edit option.

• The Quick Edit option: To quickly edit the name and slug of the category page
  You’ll see a menu choice to edit the slug, as well as the name. You should go ahead and change the details that need to be changed. When you are done click Update Category.

• Edit Option: To edit any information regarding a particular category.
  With the Edit option, you can edit all of the Category’s information here, including the name, slug, and parent category, as well as the description.
  Once you’ve finished editing the category, click ‘Update‘ to save your updates.

Now you know how to edit categories in WordPress. Let’s move on to how to delete single or multiple category pages in WordPress.

How To Delete Categories in WordPress?

You can remove each group from the list by hovering over it and pressing the Delete link that appears. Alternatively, you can use the checkboxes to pick multiple categories and perform a bulk action, such as:

Deleting a Single Category

You can delete a particular Category by pressing Delete.

Deleting multiple Categories at once

• If you want to delete multiple categories, then select the categories you want to delete. All the checked categories will be affected so make sure you are selecting the right categories to delete.
• Then click on bulk action.
• Then, click delete and click apply.
• The categories you selected will get removed when you do so.

Note: Be cautious when you are deleting the parent category, as the sub-categories under it will be moved up a level.

That’s how you can add, create, remove, and edit categories in WordPress.

Conclusion

The Category is a useful element for guiding users around the website. You may create as many categories as you like, but keep in mind that your website should not become cluttered. Be orderly, and remove any categories you don’t want.

Also, remember that WordPress includes various taxonomies that are similar such as tags, and themes frequently utilize their own custom taxonomies as well. The method for adding, editing, and removing them is similar to what we just stated.

Now you know how to add, delete and edit categories in WordPress. Do check out our next blog that explains How to change fonts in WordPress.