How to Run a Virtual Classroom Online with WordPress (Tools)

Do you want to run a virtual class online? Creating an online virtual classroom may sound too technical or expensive. Or maybe you just can’t imagine it working at all.

But you’d be surprised to hear how many types of classes could go virtual. You can run a yoga class, tutor maths, show people how to cook, or almost anything else you can think of.

Luckily, there are easy tools that allow you to run a virtual classroom online without any special technical skills. In this article, we’ll be showing you how to setup a virtual classroom and teach an online class with WordPress.

Can I Create a Virtual Classroom for My Business?

Almost anything can be taught online. Just type your class’s topic into YouTube’s search bar, and you’ll likely find hundreds or thousands of videos of people teaching that skill.

One great advantage of virtual classes is that you don’t have to teach them live. You can record videos in advance if you want. That way, it doesn’t matter if it takes you several attempts to explain or show something.

In the past few weeks, we’ve seen loads of formerly in-person classes go virtual. From a one-off virtual writing retreat to a Saturday morning kids’ soccer class, instructors have been getting online.

Taking your class online could be the best thing you’ve ever done for your business. It’ll let you reach people all around the world, and you won’t be limited by how many people can fit in your classroom or fitness studio.

This isn’t just for large classes, either. You might offer a one-to-one service, like math tutoring or career counseling. Much of what we cover will work for you, too.

You can create an online classroom without a lot of tech skills or expensive tools. Here’s what you’ll need.

What You’ll Need to Run Your Class Online (Virtual Classroom)

So where do you even begin to set up a virtual class? There are a few key things you need to get into place.

To run a class online, you’ll need these 3 things:

• A website or online platform for your class. This is a place where students can find and access the class content.
• A way for students to sign up for your class.
• A way to frequently communicate with your students by email.

You’ll also likely want some of these 4 things:

• A way for students to talk and interact with each other, such as an online group or forum.
• Members-only recorded content (such as video or audio seminars) that students can work through at their own pace.
• Live video content with features like interactive polls, audience feedback, screen sharing, and audience questions.
• An LMS or membership site plugin for managing repeat payments, creating members-only content, and creating different levels of your class.

Don’t worry if that sounds like a lot. We’ll help you decide the right tools and platforms for your virtual classroom. Here’s a quick outline that you can click to jump straight to a particular section in this article.

• Creating an Online Platform for Your Class
• Getting Students to Sign Up for Your Class
• Communicating With Your Students
• Providing Somewhere for Students to Talk and Interact
• Offering Pre-Recorded Content
• Offering Live Content
• Using an LMS or Membership Site Plugin
• Final Thoughts and Best Practices

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Creating an Online Platform for Your Class

It’s possible to run an online class through a private Facebook group or an email list where you link to videos you’ve posted on YouTube.

However, these aren’t great options. Not everyone uses Facebook, for instance. Also, Facebook or YouTube could decide to ban you without any fault of your own.

An alternative is to sign up for a site like Teachable. This is a popular option, but it’s definitely not free. The most basic Teachable package costs $29/month, and you’ll pay a 5% transaction fee for each student on top of that.

Instead of third-party platforms, we recommend that you create a website for your class. There are lots of ways you can do this, but the #1 website builder in the world is WordPress. Over 35% of the websites on the internet is powered by WordPress.

The best part about WordPress software is that it’s completely free. However, you’ll need a domain name and web hosting to build a website. This is required for making any type of website.

Bluehost, one of WordPress’s recommended hosting providers, is offering our readers a great deal. You can get a free domain name and web hosting for just $2.75/month for your first year. That’s over 60% off.

→ Click Here to Get This Exclusive Bluehost Deal ←

Note: If you are looking for a Bluehost alterantive, then you can also try SiteGround, another popular WordPress hosting company that’s offering a great discount for small business owners.

Once you have signed up, you will need to install WordPress. Bluehost does it automatically for you, and other hosting companies make it super easy with just a few clicks.

After you have installed WordPress, you will need to install few WordPress plugins to get your online classroom ready. Plugins are like apps for your WordPress site that lets you add essential features like contact forms, membership restrictions, etc.

We’re going to take a look at some important plugins to help you run your online class.

Getting Students to Sign Up for Your Class

You’ll need a way for students to register for your class. Even if you’re not charging for the class, you’ll want to know how many people are planning to attend. You may also want to get some information from them beforehand.

We recommend using the WPForms plugin for WordPress. It lets you create registration forms simply and easily. The lite version of WPForms is totally free, but you may want to pay for the Pro version of WPForms, so you can integrate payments with your form.

Once you’ve installed and activated either version of the WPForms plugin, you can follow WPForms’ instructions to create an event registration form.

You can modify the event registration form template as much as you want. Here’s how a very simple registration form for a free class could look:

Communicating With Your Students in a Virtual Classroom

Whatever type of online class you’re running, you’ll need a way to communicate with your students.

Even if you’re just running a one-off class, you’ll still want to be able to remind students that it’s happening. You’ll also want a way to follow up, so you can let them know if you create another class.

There are lots of possible ways you could communicate with your students. You could send them messages on Facebook or WhatsApp, for instance. However, we strongly recommend using email.

Why? Because virtually everyone has email. Also, most people are used to giving out their email address when signing up for things online. Asking them for their mobile number or Facebook details will put many students off from registering.

It’s important to use a reputable email marketing service to communicate with your students. That way, you can be confident that your messages will get through to them. Also, you won’t fall foul of any anti-spam laws.

We recommend using Constant Contact. They offer a free trial and excellent support.

If you’re creating a membership site, we recommend using either ConvertKit or Drip for your email service. These tools have advanced marketing automation features that you will likely find helpful.

If you’re on a very tight budget and need a free email marketing service, that’s possible too. We recommend looking at SendinBlue or MailerLite.

All of these options are good, reliable solutions for sending bulk personalized emails to your students.

If you’re using WPForms to take class sign-ups, you can even integrate your form with your email marketing service. This means that students will be automatically added to your chosen email list when they sign up.

WPForms Lite works with Constant Contact, and if you pay for WPForms Pro, then you can choose from many other email marketing integrations as well.

Student Collaboration and Group Interactions in Virtual Classroom

Do you want your students to be able to interact with one another? If so, you’ll need to provide a straightforward and accessible way for them to do so.

There are lots of possible options here. If most or all of your students are on Facebook, then a private Facebook group could be a good option. Alternatively, you might want to create a forum on your website. We recommend using the bbPress plugin for this.

Another option is to create a private Slack channel for your students.

If you’d like students to be able to interact with one another live, you’ll want to look at how you deliver your classes. Zoom, which we’ll cover in a moment, is a great tool for interactive live video classes.

Important: If you’re running a class aimed at children, it’s definitely not a good idea to allow them to contact one another. This could create serious legal issues. You could, however, provide a space where parents of your students can interact.

Offering Pre-Recorded Content for Online Classrooms

One way to run an online class is to record content ahead of time and add it to your site. This is a good option if you’re feeling nervous or unsure about the technology involved.

You’ll need a webcam if you’re recording a video of yourself. You’ll also need a microphone. You can find our microphone recommendations in our article about how to start a podcast.

If you’re on a really tight budget, you could use your computer’s built-in microphone and webcam. However, higher quality equipment will definitely help you produce a more professional class recording.

You may also want to record your screen, perhaps to show PowerPoint slides. You can do this using specialist screen recorder software, or you could run a Zoom call and record it. We’ll cover more on Zoom in a moment.

Pre-recorded content is a great option for a class that you want to run over and over again. You can create it once and sell it an unlimited number of times. Students can easily take the course at their own pace.

When you put your content on your website, it’s very important not to host your videos yourself. If hundreds of students want to watch it at once, then this might slow down or even crash your website.

Instead, you should use one of our recommended free video hosting sites. That way, you can simply embed the video on your site, so students can watch it there without taking up your site’s valuable resources.

If you want to password protect your content or restrict it to members only, then we recommend creating a membership site. This also lets you charge different amounts for different levels of access.

Offering Live Content in Online Classrooms

You may want to teach your class live. This could work really well for a class that you used to teach in-person and are now taking online.

For live classes, we strongly recommend Zoom. It’s a tool that lets you host video calls with as many people as you want. The free plan gives you access to loads of features, with the one key restriction that your calls can’t be longer than 40 minutes.

You can schedule meetings in advance and send out an invite to your students. They can click a special link to sign in on their computer, or they can use the Zoom app on their phone.

Zoom has lots of useful options. For instance, you can use it to share your screen with students. This means you can show PowerPoint slides or demonstrate an online process.

You can even use Zoom to present using an iPad, and then you can combine with the Notability app to create visual notes as you go along.

Zoom lets you see your students, too. They can dial in with their cameras on, if you want. They can also talk to you live, though you can mute them!

We recommend that you mute everyone by default while you’re teaching your class. You can let students ask questions at the end.

There’s also a text chat feature in Zoom, which students can use to interact with one another while you’re teaching. You can even poll your students to find out what key topics they most want you to cover.

You can also record Zoom calls. This means you can run a live class plus recordings that you offer for students who can’t attend live.

The paid version of Zoom lets you run webinars, too. You can integrate your WPForms registration form and Zoom using Zapier. This lets you automatically sign people up for the webinar when they register for your class.

Using an LMS or Membership Site Plugin

Do you want to turn your website into a virtual classroom? Or perhaps you want to lock content to make sure that only paid-up members can access it?

You’ll need to pay for this functionality, but it could well be worth it if you’re running a series of classes. Using your site as a learning platform works well for classes that last more than a few weeks.

For instance, you might be running a 12 week class. Students need an easy way to refer back to the earlier weeks’ material, and that will be tricky if you simply send out all the content by email.

With an LMS (Learning Management System) solution, you can even offer quizzes and grade students’ performance. You’ll need an LMS plugin for WordPress.

Our top recommendation here is LearnDash. It lets you create as many different courses as you like, with lessons, topics, quizzes, and categories. You can schedule lessons to be released over time, if you want.

With LearnDash, you can also offer quizzes and tests for your students. You can even set assignments that you can approve and comment on. It also lets you create course-specific forums where your students can interact.

For more details, see our guide on how to create an online course with WordPress.

What if you don’t want a whole learning environment, but instead you want to lock content on your site? You can do that with a membership site plugin.

We recommend using MemberPress as your membership site plugin. It’s easy to set up and has powerful access controls. You can restrict access not only to posts and pages but also to specific categories, tags, files, and more.

You can use MemberPress to “drip” content to your students. This means they only get access to certain content after they’ve been a member for a specified period of time. You can even integrate it with LearnDash if you want.

For more details, see our ultimate guide on how to create a membership site.

Final Thoughts and Best Practices

We know there’s a lot to consider when setting up a virtual class. You can set up a simple class for free on your WordPress site. You’ll only need to pay for your website domain name and web hosting, which doesn’t need to cost much.

Make sure you use a reputable email marketing service to contact your students. We recommend Constant Contact, which has a free trial. If you want a fully free solution, try SendinBlue or MailerLite. You can even use email as a simple way to deliver class content.

If you want to teach on live video or through screen sharing, then Zoom is a great option. The free level offers a really generous set of features.

To run an ongoing class through your website, you’ll want an LMS or membership site plugin. We recommend LearnDash as the best LMS plugin, and MemberPress as the best membership site plugin.

We hope this article helped you learn how to run a virtual classroom with WordPress. You may also want to see our guide on the must have WordPress plugins for all websites.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Run a Virtual Classroom Online with WordPress (Tools) appeared first on WPBeginner.

April 02, 2020 at 03:00PM

How Personal Trainers Can Offer Online Workouts with WordPress

Are you a personal trainer looking to take your workouts online and offer your services to more people?

Putting your workouts online isn’t hard. You can learn how to use these simple, but powerful tools quickly in your spare time.

In this article, we’ll show you how personal trainers can offer online workouts with WordPress.

If you want to take your workouts online, you need a simple and effective website with a few tools to make your job quick and easy.

To make the process run smoothly, you need to:

• Gather important information about your client’s needs
• Take payment online
• Be able to meet with them virtually
• Deliver their workouts

First, you need a website to handle the processes above. WordPress is the best option because it’s easy to use. And the site you’re reading right now is built with WordPress.

Now, we’ll walk you through each step from start to finish. By the time you’re done with this article, you know exactly how to offer online workouts to your clients.

What is WordPress?

WordPress is a powerful website software that allows you to publish content quickly and easily. We have a simple guide to help you set it up: How to Make a WordPress Website.

With WordPress, you can publish educational articles, how-to guides, and you can even embed workout videos and demonstrations.

You can create a fully functional website with unique content, an about page, a contact form, and much more.

So how will you build your website and offer online workouts with WordPress?

For a little context, a website consists of 2 parts:

• A domain name
• Web hosting

The domain name is the unique address people type into the browser URL to visit your website.

Hosting is where your website lives on the internet. And it contains all of the workouts, articles, images, and other files you have on your website.

A simple analogy goes like this: your domain name is the address and hosting is your house. When someone enters your domain name into their web browser, it takes them straight to your virtual house.

For more in-depth advice, see our guide for how to choose the best domain name.

WordPress Hosting and Domain Name

Choosing WordPress hosting for your website is very important, but it can get complicated fast. To make things easy on you, we prefer Bluehost.

Bluehost is an official WordPress recommended hosting provider. And when you choose them to host your site, you get a free domain name with your account.

Note: At WPBeginner, we are fully transparent. If you choose Bluehost with our referral link, we earn a small commission. It’s at no cost to you and it will save you money in the long run because you’ll get the hosting and domain name all in one.

If you’d like to skip the process of setting up your domain and hosting yourself, you can have us do it for you. Check out our free WordPress blog setup service.

Now that you know how to set up your website, we’ll show you how to set up your first page, plus our favorite tools.

WordPress Themes, Pages, Plugins, and Tools

After you’ve set up your website, your login information is emailed to you.

When you first log in to your WordPress site, you’ll see a screen like this:

This is known as your dashboard. It’s where you’ll access everything you need to customize your site in the future. From here, you want to look for Appearance » Themes.

You’ll see this screen:

Here, we have the Twenty Twenty theme active. This theme comes stock with all WordPress sites. For our example, we’ll leave this theme as-is.

You can change your theme at any time to your liking. You can learn more about changing your theme with our guide: What Is A WordPress Theme?

Now, let’s set up your first page.

Step 1: Setting Up A Client Information Page

Since you want to gather important information about your customers, we will set up a client information page. You can create as many pages as you’d like. To make a page, you simply go to Pages » Add New in your dashboard:

Next, you’ll see this screen:

See where it reads “add title”? That’s where the name to your page goes. For this example, we’ll name it “Client Information.”

There’s nothing else you need to add to this page right now.

And we’ll use this page later in this tutorial to show you how to add a custom form.

For the next step, look in the upper right-hand corner. You’ll see the “Publish…” button. Click that and it publishes your page.

Now that your page is published, you can view it by clicking the “View Page” link at the top of your screen.

Congrats! You’ve created your first page. You can learn more about how to use pages in WordPress.

Right now you might be wondering… “Do I need any more pages?”

Since you’re a personal trainer offering workouts online, your potential customers will want to know more about your expertise.

While we’re only covering how to create ‘client information’ and ‘payment’ pages, you will want to consider adding an about page.

You’ll probably want to create a ‘products and services’ page to list what workouts you’re offering online.

For more information on the pages you might need, see our guide: 11 Important Pages that Every WordPress Blog Should Have.

Now, we’ll show you how to create a form using one of our plugins, WPForms.

Step 2: Create Your Client Inquiry Form

To gather information, you need a form your client can fill out. The easiest way to achieve this is by building a form using a plugin.

We recommend the WPForms plugin. It has many features, but we want to show you how easy it is to build a form you can send to your clients.

By the way, when you sign up for hosting with Bluehost, the WPForms Lite plugin will come installed automatically.

Let’s set up your first form.

First, go to WPForms » Add New. Here’s what you’ll see on your screen:

Next, you’ll see that it’s time to name your form and select a template.

With this plugin installed, you can choose from a handful of templates. But if you want access to hundreds of form templates, you’ll want to go with the premium version of WPForms.

And since you’ll be setting up a payment form, you’ll need to upgrade to PRO to unlock the payment integrations. We’ll cover payments in a later step.

After you’ve upgraded to Pro, you’ll have access to your license key in your WPForms account. You’ll want to go to WPForms » Settings and then to the ‘General’ tab.

Copy your license key into the are below:

Now, you’re ready to set up your first Addon.

From here, you will go to WPForms » Addons and scroll until you see the ‘Form Templates Pack Addon’ on the page. Click the ‘Install Addon’ button and it will read: Status: Active.

Once this is done, we can set up the perfect form for your personal training client to fill out.

Now, go to WPForms » Add New and you’ll see this page:

Make sure you enter a name for your form. We’ll use ‘Client Info’ but you can name it whatever you’d like.

Now, scroll down until you see this screen:

From here, type ‘Personal’ into the box, and you will see a template option for ‘Personal Trainer Sign-Up Form.’

Click that area to create the form.

Now, it’s time to customize your form, any way you want to.

Here’s what the next page will look like:

On the left side of your screen, you’ll see ‘Standard Fields’ on the top with a bunch of options you can choose from below in blue. On the right, you have a preview of the form you’re creating.

You can drag anything you want into this form and rearrange it to any area on the form you want.

This form comes stock with most of the information you would want. Things like your client’s name, email, phone number, address, how many days they want to work out, and more.

And if you want more fields to choose from, you can scroll down to see even more.

Note: When you’re done creating your form, make sure you click the big orange ‘Save’ button at the top.

Next we’ll show you how to configure the right settings to make sure the form response goes to your email inbox.

In the same area, click on ‘Settings’ and then the ‘Confirmations’ link. You’ll see this screen:

From there, you’ll see the ‘Confirmation Type’ is a message. You can now edit the message you want people to see as soon as they finish filling out your form.

We will leave it as “Thanks for contacting us! We will be in touch with you shortly” but you can change it to anything you want.

If you make any changes, be sure you hit the ‘Save’ button.

Next, you’ll select the ‘Notifications’ link right above ‘Confirmations.’

There are 2 places you want to pay attention to:

1. Make sure the notifications are turned on.
2. In the ‘Send To Email Address’ field, you will see ‘{admin_email}’

Having notifications turned on means you will receive an email notification every time this form is filled out.

The ‘{admin_email}’ is known as a ‘Smart Tag.’ You can edit this field and put any email address in it that you want to be notified with.

The ‘Smart Tag’ for ‘{admin_email}’ means you will get an email notification to the email associated with your WordPress profile.

To see your admin email, go to your dashboard and then select Users » Your Profile. It will look like this:

If you want to change your admin email, that’s where you can do so.

Note: Due to the way WordPress works with sending emails from your hosting account, sometimes they’re not delivered.

To ensure your email confirmations are sent to your inbox every time, we have a tutorial on how to fix WordPress not sending emails.

That’s it. Hit ‘Save’ at the top and your form is ready to place into a page.

Step 3: Embed your Client Information Form into a Page

This next part is really simple. First, go to Pages » All Pages. From there, you’ll see a list of your pages:

Hover your mouse over your page name and click on ‘Edit.’ This will take you to your page editor. Now you’ll see a page you can edit like this:

Notice the small circle with a plus sign inside in the screenshot above. Click that, and you’ll see the following dropdown:

Select the widgets link, and then you’ll see a list of options:

Click on the WPForms link. Then you can select your form in the next step:

After you select the form, it will automatically embed into your page.

Next, click the ‘Update’ button at the top of your screen and your form is now saved on your page.

Now you know how to install, customize, and embed a form into your WordPress page. Next, we will show you how to take payment with WPForms.

Step 4: How To Take Payment with WPForms

Taking payments with WPForms is easy. All your customers need is a credit/debit card or a PayPal account.

Since this is the final step you’ll take before working with your client, it’s important to make another page.

We cover this in step 5 to help you set up a payment page.

Here’s how to configure your form.

First, from your dashboard, you will go to WPForms » Add New to create a new form. Then you’ll see this screen again:

We’ll call this form ‘Order Form,’ but you can name it whatever you like. Make sure you choose the Billing / Order Form option.

Note: You will get a prompt reminding you to configure your payment provider:

Click on ‘Close’ and then go to the ‘Payments’ button on the far left. You’ll see that it’s time to install a payment integration. This is where you hook up your preferred payment processor.

Click on the link for the Addons page. For our example, we’ll use the Stripe Addon:

Click the ‘Install Addon’ button. You’ll see the ‘Status: Active’ message.

Now, you have to connect your Stripe account to WPForms.

On that same screen, go to ‘Settings’ and then ‘Payment’ at the top:

From there, select the currency you want to accept payment in using the dropdown menu.

Then click on the blue Connect With Stripe button.

The next screen you’ll see is as follows:

On this screen, you will need to sync up your existing Stripe account by signing in using the link in the top right. Or you’ll need to set up a new account using the form on this page.

Once you’ve logged into your Stripe account, you’ll see the next screen prompting you to connect your account to WPForms.

From there, click on the blue ‘Connect my Stripe account’ button. Now, you’re connected. Here’s what the next screen looks like:

You’ll now need to go to the ‘Payments’ link on the left. Then click on the Stripe link at the top:

There are 2 steps here:

1. Make sure you check the ‘Enable Stripe Payments’ box.
2. Select ‘email’ in Stripe Payment Receipt if you want an automated email receipt to be sent to your customer.

Click the big ‘Save’ button at the top of your screen.

Note: for Stripe payments to work, you need to enable AJAX form submission.

To do this, go to Settings » General and check Enable AJAX form submission.

Click the ‘Save’ button at the top of your screen.

At this point, you’re ready to start taking payments. Now we need to go back to your order form link to edit.

From this screen, click the big ‘X’ at the top to exit. Then, on the left, click ‘All Forms’ and then click the ‘Order Form’ to edit.

To be able to take payments, you have to add a credit card field to your form. Drag the blue ‘Stripe Credit Card’ link to your form. We put it right below the Phone field.

For the sake of this tutorial, we also removed some of the standard fields to keep the order form shorter.

Since a personal trainer wouldn’t be shipping anything, there is no need for extra information like the ‘address’ or ‘comment or message’ fields.

Now you will need to add items for purchase.

Below, we added 2 options, but you can add as many or as few as you’d like:

Hit ‘Save’ at the top and click the ‘X’ to head back to your WordPress dashboard.

Step 5: Embed Your Payment Form into Your Payment Page

Go to Pages » Add New and title this page ‘Payment.’ Then embed your brand new form into this page (just like you did the contact form earlier), like this:

Hit the ‘Publish’ button when you’re finished. Then open your new page and you’ll see you’re ready to take payment:

Now that you know how to use WPForms to take payment, how will you easily interact with your clients?

Video chat with Zoom.

Use Zoom to Work with Your Clients

Since you won’t be in the gym with your client, you need the next best thing: video chat.

We really like Zoom because it’s easy to use, and the free version is well suited for most people.

Once you sign up for the free version, you’ll have access to an account. From there, you’ll be given a unique link to share with your customers.

After your client has paid you through the payment form, you can send them a unique link and time to meet you on video.

Setting Zoom up is easy for you and for your client. They walk you through every step of the process when you sign up.

Finally, we wanted to show you one more way you can deliver workouts to your clients using WordPress.

Bonus: Deliver Content to Your Clients with MemberPress

If you want some more advanced features and ways to deliver workouts, we recommend the MemberPress plugin.

With MemberPress, you can:

• Sell subscriptions (monthly workouts, personal training packages)
• Deliver digital downloads (like workouts, or guides)
• Restrict access to certain content you only want your customers to see

We hope this article helped you learn How Personal Trainers Can Offer Online Workouts with WordPress. You may want to check out our Ultimate Guide to Creating a WordPress Membership Site.

Using MemberPress opens up the possibility of offering your training programs and workouts to clients who want to work out on their own without 1-on-1 video guidance.

As a result, you can serve more clients and make more money without having to work more hours during the day.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How Personal Trainers Can Offer Online Workouts with WordPress appeared first on WPBeginner.

April 02, 2020 at 02:56AM

How to Disable Fullscreen Editor in WordPress

Do you want to disable the fullscreen editor in WordPress?

After the update, WordPress 5.4 now opens the post and page editor in fullscreen mode by default. While this distraction-free mode offers a clean and easy to use experience, some users may want to go back to the regular compact view.

In this article, we’ll show you how to easily disable the fullscreen editor in WordPress.

Why WordPress Switched to Fullscreen Mode for The Editor?

WordPress introduced a new editor called The Block Editor (aka Gutenberg) in WordPress 5.0. This new editor allow users to use blocks for common elements and create beautiful content layouts.

It also mimics how your article or pages will look by using the same fonts and colors as your WordPress theme.

However, an admin menu on the left and one on top made it look a bit cluttered. There were just too many options on the screen, which you don’t need if you are focusing on writing content.

To deal with this, the WordPress core team decided to make the editor fullscreen by default, so users can have a distraction-free writing experience.

Now, it’s important to note that this fullscreen mode is nothing new. It was already there, and users were able to turn it on / off.

What’s changed now is that the fullscreen mode will now be the default view when writing posts in WordPress.

How to Disable The Fullscreen Mode for WordPress Editor (Easy Way)

It is super easy to turn off the fullscreen mode for block editor in WordPress.

Simply edit a post or page and click on the three-dot menu on the top-right corner of the screen. This will display the settings menu for the post editor.

From here, you simply need to click on the ‘Fullscreen Mode’ to turn it off.

Post editor will instantly exit the fullscreen mode, and it will start showing the admin sidebar and the top toolbar.

WordPress will store your fullscreen mode preference in your browser’s temporary storage.

However if you switched to a different browser, used incognito mode, or accessed the admin area from a different device, then you’ll again see the fullscreen editor.

If you use multiple devices, user accounts, or browsers to access your WordPress admin area, then this may be a little annoying to switch it back every time.

This next method helps you fix that, permanently.

Permanently Disable Fullscreen Mode in WordPress (Snippet)

This method requires you to manually add code to your WordPress site. If you have not done this before, then see our guide on how to easily add code snippets in WordPress.

You’ll need to simply enter the following code in your WordPress theme’s functions.php file, or in a site-specific plugin. You can also use the custom code snippets plugin to add this code to your site without conflicts.

if (is_admin()) { 
        function jba_disable_editor_fullscreen_by_default() {
        $script = "jQuery( window ).load(function() { const isFullscreenMode = wp.data.select( 'core/edit-post' ).isFeatureActive( 'fullscreenMode' ); if ( isFullscreenMode ) { wp.data.dispatch( 'core/edit-post' ).toggleFeature( 'fullscreenMode' ); } });";
        wp_add_inline_script( 'wp-blocks', $script );
}
add_action( 'enqueue_block_editor_assets', 'jba_disable_editor_fullscreen_by_default' );
}

This code first checks if a user is viewing an admin area page. If they are, then it checks the status of the fullscreen editor.

If the fullscreen editor is enabled, then it simply turns it off.

You can still manually turn-on the fullscreen mode from the post edit screen, and your post editor would work just fine.

However, if you return back, then it will automatically turn it off. This behavior applies to all users who can access the post editor on your website.

We hope this article helped you learn how to disable the fullscreen mode in WordPress post editor. For more productivity tips, see our tips for mastering the WordPress content editor.

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The post How to Disable Fullscreen Editor in WordPress appeared first on WPBeginner.

April 01, 2020 at 05:35PM