Posts vs. Pages: What’s the Difference?

A beginner-level workshop that details the difference between dynamic posts and static pages so that new users know when to use each.

Learning outcomes

• Differentiate between static pages and dynamic posts
• Decide when to use posts and when to use pages on your own website

Comprehension questions

1. In what ways are posts and pages different from one another?
2. Why are posts considered ‘dynamic’?
3. Why is a page considered ‘static’?

Transcript

Welcome to Learn WordPress: Posts versus Pages: What’s the difference? By the end of this quick workshop, you’ll be able to differentiate between static pages and dynamic posts, and decide when to use posts and when to use pages on your website. Let’s get started. When you first start out with WordPress, the difference between posts and pages can seem minimal. When you click into the editor, the posts and pages Block Editor looks almost identical. From the front of the website, they look similar too. By default, they have the same headings colors and style thanks to WordPress themes that help every post or page on your website visually flow together. Both posts and pages can be linked to on a menu with very little difference, except for the website address itself. As you compare the two, you might wonder, why do posts include a date that is attached to their URL?

Also, why is a page’s URL the title of the page? With so many similarities, why does it matter which one you use? Well, as you experiment and start to look at the differences for each of these in the Block Editor, you’ll discover that there are actually many different options. Why? Posts and pages do different things. Now, when you use pages, these are a little more permanent in that they don’t change places. Unlike a dynamic post, which updates your website with each new one, a page is static, meaning that once you make it, the page stays in one spot with the same information until you physically change it. Your page’s URL is also based on your page title, not a date. Check out your publishing options on this page. Since it won’t automatically post your website when you publish it, in many cases, you will also need to create a link to a page before it will show up on your website, either in a navigation menu or on a post or a page itself. By default, some themes will automatically add pages to a menu for you. But this isn’t always the case. So it’s important to know in case you’re making a big website and don’t want to show every page. Or conversely, if you aren’t sure why it’s not automatically showing up. Now, if you make a page, it will stay wherever you put it until you move it. That’s the main way it’s different from a post. A page is static. It does not include a date, and it doesn’t change or move on you automatically when you create additional pages, so it’s a little more permanent. Here are some popular uses for pages: a home page, a contact page, an about page, or a 404 page. Get blogging with posts. Where have you seen posts before? If you’ve ever read a blog, or an online news source, you’ve definitely seen blog posts in action. You can publish a post immediately, schedule a post, or even password protect a post. If you only want part of your post showing on social media or on your main blog page, you can also use the “more” tag as you edit your post. Posts can also appear on something known as a category or tag page. Unlike pages, posts include categories and tags, which allow you to group your posts in different ways. For example, on a travel blog, you might have a category for different continents. It’s usually recommended that you only use one, maybe two categories per post, as they’re usually meant to separate ideas. Meanwhile, tags are for smaller ideas that posts might have in common, such as places with mountains, places with rivers, or places with plateaus. These are all great examples of tags. Most often, newly published posts appear at the top of a page set to display blog posts, either as the full article, or sometimes as just a title and an excerpt depending on your theme. Every time you publish a new post, it automatically appears on a set blog page. Your posts will have a unique URL based on the date of this posted. This will help to determine where a post will appear on a page. You can change it to show an earlier date or even schedule a post to be published at a date in the future. Compare this post title to a page title. Do you see the difference? This means that they are dynamic, which means that it can be used and shown in many different ways that you can set up before you start posting. If you’re writing a news article, announcements for your business, or a new update to your blog, you will want to use a post not a page. There you have it that’s the difference between dynamic posts and static pages