Quick Start
Note: Some of the instructions from this guide are referring to the WP Admin dashboard. You can get to this dashboard by adding
/wp-adminto the end of your site’s url (e.g.: example.wordpress.com/wp-admin)
This guide will take you through five quick steps to get your WordPress.com site up and running.
Welcome to WordPress.com!
The best way to get familiar with the features and options for your new site is to just dive in and start using it. These five quick steps will get you on your way. Let’s get started!
Publish a post
Publishing your first post on WordPress.com is a snap. Just head to your WordPress.com homepage, Blog Posts → Add, write something, and click Publish Post
Congratulations! You’re a published author. Not sure what to write about? Try one of our prompts or challenges, or browse the WordPress.com topic pages for some inspiration.
Looking for a little more help? Here are some other great resources for drafting and publishing new blog posts:
- Learn WordPress.com’s Get Published guide
- Support documentation for creating new posts
- Guide to the Visual Editor toolbar buttons
- Explanation of the differences between a post and a page
Find a theme
WordPress.com offers over 300 themes! To pick one, head over to the Theme Showcase and click Use this Theme for whichever theme you like.
Hungry for more info about themes? Check out these resources:
- Theme Showcase
- How I Chose My Theme: Bloggers Chime In
- Let’s Talk About Themes, Shall We?
- Premium Theme support forums — get help from the theme authors of your premium theme
- Theme Thursdays on the WordPress.com blog — new themes announced every Thursday!
Customize your theme
Now that you have a theme, it’s time to dress it up. WordPress.com offers many ways to customize your theme.
Want to tweak your theme even further? Check out these resources:
- Make the Most of Your Customizer: Three Neat Features to Try
- What a Difference a Header Makes! Three Theme Transformations
- Customizing Bueno: Mi Piace Kate
- One Theme, Three Ways: Customizing Coraline
Add widgets
Widgets are tools that let you add all kinds of awesome functionality to your site. To add some widgets, go to your Customizer → Widgets in your homepage, and search any available widget into your widget area to see what it does.
Ready to get even more out of your widgets? Check out these resources:
- Use Visibility Settings to show/hide widgets on various pages.
- Get the most out of our Image Widgets to add beauty and interest to your site.
- Find the right widgets to build a great community of followers.
- Use these cool widgets to quickly customize and add functionality to your site.
- Not using a mouse? You’ll want to know about enabling Accessibility Mode.
Create a menu
Creating a menu is the easiest way to organize your pages for your readers. This is especially key if you would like a website-style layout. To set up a menu, head to My Site → Menus in your homepage.
As cool as custom menus are, this just covers the basics. To learn about all the things you can do with custom menus, check out these resources:
- Go beyond the basics of custom menus with these advanced menu settings.
- Display a custom menu (practically) anywhere you want Custom Menu Widget.
- Learn more about working with custom menus.
Next steps
Hopefully, this guide has given you a quick introduction to the various areas of WordPress.com. But this is just the beginning! Here are some other resources to help you become a WordPress.com power user:
- Our new user’s guide, Learn WordPress.com, is a great introduction for new users.
- Our Support site has step-by-step guides for all of our features.
- The WordPress.com forums are an active community of staff, volunteers, and fellow users.
- Our staff blogs, Hot Off the Press and The Daily Post, contain a wealth of tutorials, posting challenges, inspiration, and news.
- Finally, friendly Happiness Engineers (WordPress.com support staff) are standing by to answer any additional questions you have! Contact us here.
