How To Add An Image To A Post Or The Sidebar

Adding images in WordPress can really spice up your website, and add some visual flavour. Images can also help break up large blocks of text making reading your content easier, so lets go through how to add an image to a post or the sidebar

Find and Upload

The first thing you need to do is find an image. You may already have one on your own pc that you took or made yourself. If not you can check out some stock image sites to find one.

Once you have the image on your PC, go to the Media menu on the left and click Add New. (Note: if you are just wanting to add to a post/page, you can do this directly from the post/page edit screen, see “In a Post/Page” below).

How to add an image - media library uploader

Here you can either drag and drop the image from your computer to the browser or click the Select files button and upload it that way.

Once the file has been uploaded it will show a screen where you can add some extra info such as the image title, alternative text (for when images are turned off) and a description. Try and make all of these descriptive and if possible, with a keyword in them.

Below these is a line that says File URL. CLick it and press CTRL-A and then CTRL-C on your keyboard. This will highlight the text and copy it.

How to add an image - image details

Click Save all changes.

In a Post/Page

To add an image to a post or page you need to start a new one or edit an existing one. Click the the content box (where you write) where you want to it to go and then click the Upload/Insert link above the toolbar.

It will open a pop up which will allow you to add a new image form your computer or select one that you have already uploaded to your site. If you have already uploaded it, go to the Media Library tab, other wise add a new image.

How to add an image - image details in a post

On the Media Library tab, find the image you uploaded, click show, check the settings (Alignment and Size) and then click Insert Into Post near the bottom.

Done.

Extra. Want to make the image a link? Simply click the image you have inserted into your post/page and then click the Insert/edit link button on the toolbar (looks like a chain), add the URL and click OK.

How to add an image - insert media link

In a Sidebar.

OK, hopefully you copied the images URL when you uploaded it. If not or if you have copied something else since, no problem, simply go to Media, Library, find the image you upload and click Edit. The URL line is there.

Once you have the URL, go to Appearance, Widgets and drag a text widget into a widget area on your sidebar.

How to add an image - widgets section

Now you will need to type some code in to display the image:

You may have guessed already but where it says PASTEYOURURLHERE, you replace that with the image URL you just copied. The width number can also be changed as it depends on the width of your sidebar, so you may need to play around with that.

Then click save and your image will appear in the sidebar.

How to add an image - image showing in sidebar

In order to make this image into a link you need to add more code.

So here we add a link that wraps around the image making it a click-able link.