Commonly used by creative professionals, portfolios on WordPress are a great way to promote your work. This guide will show you how to create and showcase projects on a professional-looking portfolio site.
In this guide
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There are two ways to activate portfolios, depending on what type of theme your site uses. On sites using block themes, you will create a dedicated post category. On sites using classic themes, you will activate a custom post type.
To determine which type of theme you’re using, visit Appearance. If you see Editor you are using a block theme. Otherwise, you are using a classic theme.
Select the appropriate tab for the type of theme your site uses:
On sites using block themes, you’ll create a dedicated post category for your portfolio projects. Follow these steps to create the post category:
- Visit your site’s dashboard.
- Navigate to Posts → Categories.
- Under “Add New Category” name your category something like “Portfolios”
- Click the “Add New Category” button to create the new category.
If you want to further categorize your projects, you can create new categories and select the portfolio category you created as the “Parent Category.”
Next, you will learn how to create your first portfolio project.
Now that you have activated portfolios on your site, it’s time to create your first portfolio project. A project is an individual piece of work you wish to showcase. Together, your projects make up your portfolio.
Select the appropriate tab below based on which method you used to activate portfolios.
On sites using block themes, you will create your first project as a “Post” and assign the post to the portfolio category you created in the first step.
Follow these steps to create your first portfolio project:
- Visit your dashboard.
- Click on Posts on the left side.
- Click on the “Add new post” button to create your first project.
- Give your project a title by replacing “Add title” at the top of the post and add project details in the editor.
- Open the post settings sidebar.
If you do not have the sidebar on the right, click the Settings icon in the top-right corner to bring up the settings. This icon looks like a square with two uneven columns:
- In the “Categories” section, check the box next to the portfolio category you created in the first step.
- Optionally, adjust the remaining project settings in the post settings sidebar.
- Click the “Publish” button to publish your new project.
Although all WordPress.com themes will display your projects, a few themes have been designed with portfolios in mind. These themes will have specific styles for projects and may provide specially designed layouts to display your portfolio in other ways.
Now that you have created your portfolio and added projects to it, you will want to decide how you want to display it on your website.
