The footer is the area at the bottom of every page of your site. Footers are often used to share contact information, social media profiles, and copyright information. This guide will show you how to edit the footer on your website.
In this guide
If your site uses a theme that supports the site editor, you can change your site’s footer using this method. A quick way to determine if your site uses the site editor is to check under Appearance in your dashboard. If you see Editor here, you can change your site’s footer by following these steps:
- Visit your dashboard.
- Navigate to Appearance → Editor to open the Site Editor.
- Scroll down to the bottom of the right side of the screen and click anywhere in the footer area to start editing.
- Alternatively, you can click Patterns and select the template part labeled with the word “footer”. This will focus the editor on the footer area instead of showing the entire front page. Note that your theme may include more than one footer design.
- Click on any block in the footer to edit it, or add a new block by clicking on the + block inserter icon (learn how to use the WordPress editor here!)
- Tip: Use List View by clicking the three horizontal lines icon at the top of your screen. This is helpful to see a list of all blocks in your footer to see how everything is laid out. Using List View, you can move, remove, and add new blocks as needed.
- Once you have finalized your changes, click Save.
The most common types of content you may wish to add to your site’s footer include:
- Contact Info block – include an email address, phone number, and physical location linking to Google Maps.
- Social Icons block – display links to your social media profiles.
- Paragraph block – type any regular text, including symbols like © for copyright information.
The above steps are demonstrated in this video:
Choose a premade footer block pattern to quickly insert a beautiful and professionally designed footer layout. The following video demonstrates the process of editing the footer and inserting a block pattern:
You may wish to display different footer content on one page (such as the homepage) compared to other pages. Here’s how:
- Visit your dashboard.
- Navigate to Appearance → Editor to open the Site Editor.
- Click Patterns to view your site’s template parts – small pieces of content that can be reused across your site.
- Click the + icon next to Patterns to create a new template part.
- Type a name for your new footer that describes what it’s for.
- Select Footer as the area.
- Click Create.
- Click the + block inserter icon to insert any blocks or patterns you wish to use.
- Once you have finalized your new footer design, click Save.
- Edit any page or template on your site where you wish to display this new footer.
- Click the + block inserter and search for the name of the new footer you created in step 4. Click to add it to your site.
In classic WordPress themes, you can add content to your footer using Widgets. A quick way to check if your site has a classic theme is to look under Appearance in your dashboard. If you see Widgets here, you can edit your site’s footer by following these steps:
- Visit your site’s dashboard.
- Navigate to Appearance → Widgets.
- Scroll down to the Footer widget area. Depending on your theme, you may see multiple footer widget areas, as shown here:
- Click a widget area to expand it. This will reveal any existing blocks in your footer, and a + block inserter icon to add new blocks:
- Add and edit the blocks in your footer. The most common types of content you may wish to add here include:
- Contact Info block – include an email address, phone number, and physical location linking to Google Maps.
- Social Icons block – display links to your social media profiles.
- Paragraph block – type any regular text, including symbols like © for copyright information.
- Click Update in the top right corner to save your changes.
To learn more about using widgets, including moving, removing, or displaying them on specific pages, see our full guide to Widgets.
If you wish to make changes to your footer beyond what you can achieve with widgets, we recommend switching to a block theme for full control over your site’s appearance.
The footer credit is the line at the bottom of the footer identifying your site as a WordPress.com site. All WordPress.com users can choose from several options for the footer credit, from a minimalist WordPress.com logo to text options such as “A WordPress.com Website” or “Website Powered by WordPress.com.”
You can remove the footer credit altogether if you have a Creator or Entrepreneur plan. Otherwise, you may choose from one of the alternate wordings or the WordPress icon. Visit our Footer Credit guide to learn how.
