How to Build A WordPress PDF Library, The Simple Way

PDF files are an excellent way to deliver documents across the web. They’re often small in size with rich visuals that can match your desired tone and sentiment (as well as your branding). A WordPress PDF library lets visitors browse, view, and download those files with ease. Setting this up within WordPress is a straightforward process thanks to the Document Library Pro plugin.

This post will look at the entire process in detail, and pass on some hints to make the job smooth and efficient. In fact, you’ll spend around 15 minutes from start to finish, even if you’re not a ‘techie’. Let’s begin!

Why Document Library Pro Is the Best WordPress PDF Plugin

WordPress already has the functionality to let you upload PDFs to your site without a dedicated plugin. You’re able to do this through the native WordPress Media Library, in addition to images, audio, video, and other files. With the files in your Media Library, you can display them either by embedding them on a page using code or adding a File Block within the default WordPress Block Editor.

This approach is fine if you only plan to work with a handful of files. However, it can quickly turn into a nightmare as your library grows. This is where Document Library Pro comes to the rescue!

It’s a powerful WordPress PDF library plugin that lets you add, organize, and display PDF files on your website. It’s super simple to use – even if you’re not tech-savvy – and takes away the hassle of managing PDFs and other file types.

You’ll find a number of use cases for Document Library Pro. For instance, you can share reports, brochures, e-books, menus, or any other type of PDF files available to view or download from your document library.

How Document Library Pro Helps You Manage Your PDF (And Other) Files

Document Library Pro can work with Microsoft Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, images, audio, video, and more. However, using it as a PDF library plugin is an ideal use case, so this is our focus for this post.

The core functionality of the plugin has a lot of offer:

• You can upload PDFs in five ways: through the WordPress dashboard, dragging and dropping files into the Media Library, moving files between the Media Library and PDF library, bulk uploading using a CSV file, and even accepting PDF submissions on the front end.
• There’s the choice to host PDFs either on your site’s server or through external links. With the latter, you’ll embed the files from third-party services such as Google Drive, Dropbox, Microsoft One Drive, and more.
• You have a choice of two layouts for your file displays. There’s a table view, which is perfect for listing documents in a clean, easy-to-read format. You can also apply a grid view, which is an engaging and visual layout.

In addition, Document Library Pro offers search, sort, and filter options to make quick work of finding specific files within your WordPress PDF library. There’s keyword search too – handy for large libraries. Further sorting and filter options give you a way to arrange documents by name, tags, date, categories, file size, custom taxonomies, and more.

There is more advanced functionality available to help you develop the User Experience (UX) of your WordPress PDF library. For example, you can add custom text and icons to the download buttons or even make them clickable file type icons. You’re also able to add columns to display additional information about each PDF, and lightbox previews to offer an elegant way to preview content without downloading it.

You’ll see some of this in action in the next section. Ahead, you’ll begin to learn how to implement some of the Document Library Pro feature set through setting up your own library.

How to Create a WordPress PDF Library Using Document Library Pro

Building your WordPress PDF library with Document Library Pro is pretty straightforward. We’re going to run through the entire process here, but there’s also a companion video available if you prefer to see the steps in practice.

Regardless, before you begin, you’ll need to purchase a premium Document Library Pro plan, and install the plugin on your WordPress website. From here, you can head to the WordPress dashboard and build your document library.

1. Run Through the Setup Wizard to Configure Your WordPress PDF Library

The Documents > Settings > General screen within WordPress will start a setup wizard, where you should enter your license key and activate the plugin. Once you continue, select your preferred layout for the PDF library: either Table or Grid:

Here’s a quick rundown of which one to choose:

• The table view layout includes columns for the file name, description, and download link. It’s ideal for libraries, resource centers, or business document repositories that want to display additional information for each document.
• Grid view is suitable for sites where you want a more dynamic presentation for your documents. This uses ‘cards’ with featured images for a media-rich layout.

Both layouts are great, but table view is best if you have a lot of PDFs. You can always change this later. Continuing on, select Folders if you wish to display files using a hierarchical folder and sub-folder system. You can also set up lightbox previews through the Document Preview option here.

Moving onto the Tables section (if you selected this earlier), enter the columns you want, separated by commas without spaces. For example: title,content,doc_categories,link. The official documentation will tell you more about how to customize this further:

The Accessing Documents drop-down menu lets you setup access to the PDF files through links, multi-select boxes, or both. For the final option on this screen, the Lazy load box will load the document table one page at a time, which is perfect if you host a large number of files.

For the Filters settings, select Show based on columns in table from the drop-down menu, which is a recommended setting. On the Grid screen, select the content you want to display:

From here, click the Finish Setup button. You can now look to begin adding PDFs to your site.

2. Upload PDF Files to Your Site

There are a couple of ways to add PDF files. You can add individual PDFs on the Documents > Add New screen:

Here, enter a title and description for the file, along with information such as tags, categories, excerpts, or authors in the meta fields on the right-hand side of the page. You can upload or link to the PDF within the File metabox too. Once you hit Publish, you can repeat these steps for other PDFs.

If you have PDFs already in your WordPress Media Library, head to the Media screen and make sure you’re in List View:

Next, check the boxes next to the files you want to add to the PDF library, then choose Add to document library from the Bulk Actions drop-down menu. You’ll spot a link appear to view your PDFs. At this point, you can update the file name or other information about the file.

Finally, there are multiple ways to add PDFs to your library using Document Library Pro. Once you complete this step, you can look to display them on your site.

3. Display the PDF Files On The Front End of Your Site

You also have multiple options to showcase your PDF library on the front end. Document Library Pro creates a default page – Document Library – although you can also display tables anywhere with a shortcode.

The shortcodes have flexibility, and let you create multiple PDF libraries. There are a number of attributes you can add to add various content types:

[doc_library content="title,excerpt,doc_tags" doc_category="news"]

You’re able to embed them almost anywhere on your site, such as the sidebar, footer, or within an existing page. There are many other customization options available using shortcodes too. Once you finish the page, save your changes, then check out the WordPress PDF library on the front end!

Document Library Pro: the Best Way to Create a WordPress PDF Library!

The WordPress Media Library lets you upload PDF files, but if you need more functionality, you won’t find the required usability. While there are other PDF library plugins, Document Library Pro offers a unique blend of functionality, usability, value, and customer support. It’s an excellent way to manage, display, and organize PDF documents for your WordPress site.

Will a WordPress PDF library suit your site, and could Document Library Pro bring it to life? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments section below!