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There is one thing that every single website has in common. They all have a homepage.
Your homepage is also arguably the most important page of your website. It’s the page that will get the most traffic in almost all cases, and it’s the page that sets the tone of your entire site. It’s the first impression that visitors get and it’s your chance to ensure these visitors that they’re in the right place.
When you think of it this way, it’s not overly surprising that the homepage of your site might be handled differently to other content within your site. Just as every theme has its unique qualities, the way your homepage functions and can be setup offers some unique options as well.
In this lesson, we dig into the details regarding your Homepage. Since there is also often a relationship between the homepage of a site and the Posts Page, we cover this important page as well.
Note:
If you’re an existing or past user of WordPress and are familiar with the way things used to be, our best recommendation is to let go of what you think you already know, and focus on the information we’re providing here as to how things are now. It’s much easier than trying to reconcile between the old and new way of doing things. For this lesson, we focus on how the homepage functions for a Block theme, which is different to Classic themes.
Pro-tip:
For a consistent and straightforward website design experience we recommend using the Default Homepage (the content will be built in a single-use template) and creating a Custom Posts Page (the content will be built in a regular page and paired with a multi-use template).
There are two base scenarios when it comes to the homepage of any site using a Block theme within WordPress.com:
Default Homepage: The content is built in a specific template as set by the theme. Under Settings > Reading↗︎ the Homepage option is set to: – Default –
Custom Homepage: The content is built in a regular page, it will be assigned a multi-use template (for a new page, it will be assigned the Pages template automatically), and the page needs to be assigned as the homepage under Settings > Reading↗︎. (A Custom Homepage is the same as any other regular page.)
Note:
An available template means one that you can see in the Page Editor in the Template section. Not all templates can be assigned to a page.
When you activate a new Block theme it will always default to using the Default Homepage provided by the theme. You can either edit this template, or you can choose to create a Custom Homepage.
The Default Homepage of any theme will only ever use one of three possible templates:
- Index
- Blog Home (aka Home)
- Front Page
These are special templates that work in a hierarchy. All themes must include the Index template and you will always find this template in your list of Templates under Appearance > Editor > Templates. However, it may not always be in use.
If your theme also has the Blog Home (sometimes just called Home) template, then this template will override the Index template and the Index template will effectively become dormant.
For now, let’s focus on these two templates, because they work the same way, whereas the Front Page template works a bit differently.
Whether your theme is actively using the Index or Blog Home template, the designer of your theme has built out a Default Homepage design in the template. This template displays as the homepage of your website automatically and the content is managed directly within the template through the Site Editor.
To edit the content of a Default Homepage you go to Appearance > Editor. The preview that displays is your homepage, click it to edit it. You can also access this special homepage template from your main dashboard↗︎ in the Pages↗︎ section. It will be listed at the top.
Depending on which theme you chose, this template may be designed to look like a blog page or like a static website homepage. You can modify this template however you like. You can keep it looking similar to the design provided and just update parts of it, or you can completely overhaul the template with entirely different patterns of your choosing.
The key things to remember with the Index and Blog Home templates are:
- Under Settings > Reading↗︎ you need the Homepage setting assigned to: – Default –
- The content that will display as your homepage is added directly into the template (you don’t pair the template with a regular page).
- You edit these templates under Appearance > Editor > Templates or you can access it directly from the Pages section in your main dashboard (it will be at the top of the list slightly separated from the rest of your pages).
- This template does not need the Content block and this block won’t serve any purpose in either of these two specific templates.
- If you want posts to display on your homepage (in any manner) you need to include the Query Loop block (or other dynamic blocks of your choice).
- You cannot set a custom featured image or excerpt for either of these templates (often used for social shares). But if you have a plugin enabled plan, you can use Yoast to set these pieces for your homepage instead.
- If you have the Blog Home template, you cannot use the Index template for anything.
Pro-tip:
Whenever you’re editing a template, page, or post, open the List View in the left sidebar to see exactly what pieces you’re working with. When editing a template, don’t add regular content inside the Header or Footer template parts, these will display in multiple areas throughout your site.
Now let’s take a look at the Front Page template. Many newer themes are being designed using this template, it’s also a template that you can add to any theme. It’s unique and it’s also much more versatile.
The Front Page template is a bit more opinionated than other templates, in that no matter what other settings you change, the Front Page template will always be your site’s homepage. This means that under Settings > Reading↗︎ whether you set the Homepage to – Default – or you assign a published page, the content within the Front Page template is what will display as your website’s homepage.
When you activate a theme that uses the Front Page template, it will have a unique design as decided by the theme designer, and that content will be in the template. It won’t be paired with a regular page. Just like with the Index or Blog Home templates, you can edit the content within this template however you like from minor adjustments to a full overhaul with new patterns.
If you add the Front Page template to a theme, you can design it however you like using individual blocks, or pre-designed patterns and it will become your homepage.
One of the unique aspects of the Front Page template is that you can pair it with a regular page if desired. You do this simply by assigning a published regular page as the Homepage under Settings > Reading↗︎. This regular page will automatically attach to the Front Page template, and you can’t change the template that this regular page is using (unless you unassign it as the Homepage).
Why might you want to do this? So that you can set a featured image and/or excerpt for your Homepage, when you don’t have a plugin enabled plan. Beyond setting the featured image and excerpt, you don’t need to do anything else with this regular page and you can leave it blank of content. By default, any content in this regular page won’t show up in the Front Page template or on the front end of your site.
Here’s how to set this up:
- Confirm Front Page template is active under Appearance > Editor > Templates
- Build content “in” the template
- Create a regular page called Home
- Add a featured image and excerpt as desired
- Leave the page editor blank
- Publish the page
- Under Settings > Reading↗︎ assign the page as the Homepage
- Access the Front Page template under Appearance > Editor > Templates for future content edits
Note:
When you pair the Front Page template to a regular page, the Site Editor will default to the assigned page and it may seem like you can’t edit it. In the sidebar on the right, click on the template name “Front Page” and select Edit template. Then you can proceed to edit the content in the Front Page template. Alternatively, when you go to the Site Editor, click on Templates in the left panel and select the Front Page template to edit it.
Advanced Front Page template scenario
There is another unique aspect of the Front Page template, and that is that you can add the Content block to it when you have assigned it to a regular page. When you do this, any content you add to the regular page will also display on the homepage of your site based on the location of where you placed the Content block in the template, along with any other content located in the Front Page template. This means that you could have a unique combination of some content stored in the regular page and some in the template.
Why might you want to do this? Maybe you offer a special during the first week of every month. You can set up the blocks for this special in the regular page, then add the Content block to the template where you want this special offer to display. To stop sharing the special offer, you can just remove the Content block from the Front Page template without losing the set up for the special offer and without having to rearrange your entire homepage. This also allows you to pre-setup your next month’s special offer in advance without it displaying on your homepage, until you add the Content block back into the Front Page template. (This is just one example. There are many other unique situations where this could be very handy. There are also other ways to achieve this example using saved patterns, this is just one option.)
You could also remove all the other content type blocks from the Front Page template and just keep: Header, Content, and Footer. This effectively transforms your site from using the Default Homepage to using a Custom Homepage. Your content would then be managed in the page and the Front Page template would behave the same as a multi-use template that merges with the content.As you can see, the deeper we go with the possible scenarios, the more complex the setup can become. For beginners, we recommend keeping it simple. Use the Default Homepage, whatever template that may be for your active theme, and build your homepage content directly in this template.
At its base functionality, the Default Homepage is a situation of a specific template being used as the homepage for your site. It’s a single-use template and the content is managed directly within the template.
A Custom Homepage is really nothing more than a regular page paired with a multi-use template.
Provided your theme is not using the Front Page template, to use a Custom Homepage, you’ll create a new page which will use the default Pages template and assign it as the Homepage under Settings > Reading↗︎.
You would then build this page the same way as you would any other regular page in your site.
As with all things WordPress, there are ways you can change the default behavior, including creating a custom template that you then assign to your regular Home page.
And remember, the Front Page template is unique as detailed above.
With new Block themes, it’s pretty rare to work with a Custom Homepage. The standard practice is to use the Default Homepage and build your content in the template. However, working with a Custom Homepage is a situation that users familiar with Classic themes often prefer, and it’s also an easy way to manage the Featured Image and Excerpt for your homepage. It’s a perfectly acceptable option and is your choice to make.
The purpose of this lesson is to demonstrate that there is a simplified, straightforward way to manage your homepage, and there are endless opportunities for how you can customize the experience.
For beginners, we recommend keeping it simple. Use whatever Default Homepage template is provided by the theme you choose, and edit the homepage content directly in the template. When choosing the theme you want to use, pick one that has a Default Homepage that most closely matches the layout you like best, then edit as desired.
You can confirm if you’re using the Default Homepage or a Custom Homepage by checking under Settings > Reading↗︎.
You can see the name of the template your Default Homepage is using either through your list of pages from the main dashboard↗︎ or, when you go to Appearance > Editor the initial preview is your Homepage and when you edit it you’ll see the name of the template in purple at the top of the screen.
You can see the name of the template your Custom Homepage is using either by opening the editor for the page through your list of pages from the main dashboard↗︎ or, when you go to Appearance > Editor the initial preview is your Homepage and when you edit it you’ll see the page name at the top, the editor will contain the page content, and the name of the template is shown in the Settings sidebar on the right.
If at any time you decide to switch themes, we highly recommend reviewing our Switching Themes lesson first. Remember, content added directly within a template doesn’t transfer between themes, but you can save template content as a pattern.
To create a homepage that stands out, we recommend reviewing our Plan Your Homepage lesson and our Compelling Homepages webinar. For a lightning fast way to launch a new site and homepage, we recommend our Quick Launch course.
WP Admin or Classic View
If you’re not using the Default WordPress.com view for the Settings > Reading↗︎ page, things will look a bit different. Below are screenshots that will correlate the settings between the two different views.
Default Homepage:
Custom Homepage:
Blog or website
So how does all this affect whether your site is a “blog” or a “website”? Simply from the type of content you place within the template of the Default Homepage or within the regular page of a Custom Homepage.
If you want a homepage that looks like a traditional blog (or maybe a news style site), focus on using the Query Loop block (or other dynamic blocks). Or choose a theme that provides a Default Homepage with the blog style look that you want. You won’t need a separate Posts page in this case.
If you want a homepage that looks like a static website, remove or minimize the presence of dynamic blocks. Instead, you might consider using the Cover block and column patterns with static images and text that you manually add to the template. Or choose a theme that provides a Default Homepage with the type of static layout you’re looking for.
If you don’t want to include a blog component within your site, then you don’t need to create a Posts page and you don’t need to publish posts. You can simply work with pages.
However, if you want a static website style homepage and you want to also include a blog component, then you’ll also need to create a Posts page (also called a Blog page) to display your posts within your site.
For the sake of simplicity and to avoid confusion, our recommendation is to work with a Custom Posts Page on any site using a Block theme.
Taking this approach ensures that your site set up will work as expected for any Block theme, even if you switch themes, and eliminates the need for understanding a range of special use cases and what if scenarios.
To set up a Custom Posts Page:
- create a new regular page
- add the desired page layout or block patterns (ensuring to include dynamic blocks that will display posts)
- use the default Pages template
You can then add this page to your menu the same as any other regular page.
Under Settings > Reading↗︎ make sure that you do not have any specific published page assigned as the Posts Page. In the default WordPress.com view, this is achieved by leaving the drop down box as – None –.
You can also review our support guide: Create a Separate Page for Blog Posts and our webinar: Custom Blog Pages for more information and inspiration.
Now that you have a Posts Page to display all of your posts, you can head the main dashboard and click on Posts↗︎ to see your existing posts and to add new ones. Your newly published posts will then display on your Posts Page.
Creating a Custom Posts Page has always been a common approach with a WordPress site, because with Classic themes you cannot edit or control the layout of the Default Posts Page provided by the theme, because you never had access to the templates. So whatever the theme provided is what you got, as is. With a Custom Posts Page, you have complete control over the layout of the page. And with the ability to now create custom templates, you have more control than ever to make your Posts page look exactly the way you want.
But you may be wondering why there is an option to assign a Default Posts Page if we’re recommending that you don’t use it.
With the release of the Site Editor, the access it provides to Templates, and the overall changes that have surfaced as a result, WordPress is in a bit of a flux state at the moment in regards to how to handle the Posts page of a site.
If you’re familiar with older versions of WordPress, this situation may have tripped you up. If you’re new to WordPress you may have run into some confusion around the availability of this setting.
In general, the way it used to be is that a site would either be set up to display your latest posts (aka the default) on the homepage, or it would be assigned a static homepage and use the theme’s dedicated posts page (aka the default). This configuration works well for Classic themes because the option to display latest posts on the homepage and the dedicated posts page option uses the exact same template and you could only configure the site one way or the other.
The way it is now is that it’s possible to assign a Default Homepage and the theme’s Default Posts Page and end up with the two being identical — because they still both use the exact same template — or, because of iterations that are taking place to refine this setting, it might simply not do what you expect at all.
There are also certain use cases where it can be fine to assign a Posts Page without running into problems, which is why the setting is still available.
But as mentioned, for a consistent experience, we recommend following the steps above to create a Custom Posts Page.
Advanced users: When to use the Default Posts Page
One of the biggest benefits of the WordPress software is its flexibility. The power it provides to do whatever you want, if you know how. If you prefer assigning a Posts Page and want to control your Posts Page content within a template, you can still do so. Just remember that there are situations when you could end up with your Homepage and your Posts page being identical, or that the Posts page setting will be ignored.
Assigning a Posts page and building the content in the template works best in two scenarios:
- When you assign a Custom Homepage (so you’re not building your Homepage content in a template, you’re pairing a regular page with a multi-use template of your choice) and your theme is not using the Front Page template. In this situation, the Blog Home or Index template will become your Posts Page. Keep this in mind if you’ve activated a theme whose Default Homepage doesn’t look anything like a Posts page, you’ll need to redesign the template layout.
- When your theme is using the Front Page template (either by default or because you added it), using the Default Homepage will use the Front Page template, and assigning the Posts Page will use either the Blog Home or Index template.
As the Site Editor and themes evolve it is possible that you’ll encounter some unexpected outcomes. Be sure to thoroughly explore your theme, pages, and templates to fully understand what is happening.
Also understand that the options under Settings > Reading↗︎ in the WP Admin (Classic) view are not necessarily intuitive since the release of Block themes. The option to display your latest posts is the equivalent of the Default Homepage (which may or may not look like a posts page). If you want to use the Default Homepage (such as with the Front Page template) and assign a Posts Page, you need to set the Static Homepage option to – Select – and then assign a page as the Posts Page.
Pro tip:
If you want to be crystal clear on exactly which templates are being used for specific pieces throughout your site, take a moment to temporarily add the name of the template as text within each template, save the changes, then browse through the front end of the site to see which template names are showing up on various content. Then go back and remove this text from your templates.
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