How to Edit CSS in WordPress

A theme is the selling point of any WordPress website. It offers the front end look to your WordPress site and the right theme can make your WordPress site stand out from the rest of hundreds of thousands of websites on the Internet. Sometimes, you might want to make at least a few custom changes to your theme just to ensure everything works alright. In order to do so, you don’t have to hire a professional and pay a lot of money. It is easy to do, just follow the instructions about how to edit CSS in WordPress carefully and you’d be fine.

Mostly, you can customize your theme by customizing the CSS (cascading Style Sheets). However, there are other methods as well to achieve the same objective. If you are not familiar with coding, you can go for other methods and can easily add your own CSS tweaks. I am going to explain three different methods in this guide. Therefore, you can work with any of the given methods you are more comfortable with. Let’s get started!

Before getting into CSS, let’s talk about HTML (Hypertext Markup Language). It is the primary language used to create a WordPress website and is descriptive in nature. HTML code defines web browsers about the various elements, like the tags will tell which part is the header or footer, etc. you can use HTML to style your WordPress site. However, this can be an unwieldy way to do so. For instance, if you want to make all your heading Pink in color, you will have to add HTML code containing the same instruction to every heading individually.

Therefore, CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) is used. You can just dictate the various styling elements of your site within a few lines of code and can just add it to your WordPress site. Moreover, it keeps the structure and style separate, which gives you complete control over the appearance of your site and lets you easily make changes whenever you want. Furthermore, you can also start using some basic CSS in WordPress, even if you are not familiar with HTML.

As we mentioned before, there are more than one way to edit CSS in WordPress. In this guide, I will explain three different methods to edit and optimize CSS. Let’s get started.

Method 1: Edit CSS in WordPress using a Plugin (Advanced CSS Editor)

Editing CSS using a plugin is the easiest way to do it. As we know, WordPress offers thousands of free and paid plugins to use. The difficult thing is to choose the right plugin. For a quick recommendation, I’d like to suggest Advanced CSS Editor. It offers easy CSS customization for phones, tablets, and desktops. You can fine-tune the way your website looks using any device.

Pros

It offers a full control over how your website looks across all devices
It lets you edit your theme through the customizer

Cons

Adding custom CSS for multiple types of devices can be a lot of work.
Offers a handful of features only.

Steps to edit CSS in WordPress

Step 1: Download and install WordPress plugin. Go to the Appearance> Customizer tab in your WordPress dashboard. You will see a new Advanced CSS Editor option with access to various editors for different types of devices.

Advanced CSS Editor

Step 2: Now all you need to do is add the custom code you want to add and then test your site to ensure you added it correctly and works fine. Don’t forget to save the changes you just made.

Method 2: Edit CSS IN WordPress with Theme Customizer

Another way to tweak CSS is by using Theme Customizer. It comes built-in with every WordPress theme. Just navigate to the Appearance> Customize section of your WordPress dashboard, scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the Additional CSS option.

Additional CSS

Now, you will see an in-built tool that will allow you to add any CSS code. It lets you use and view both mobile and tablet versions of your WordPress site.

Mobile and Tablet Versions

After making the changes, click on the ‘Save & Publish’ button on the top.

That’s it, you’ve successfully added custom CSS in WordPress.

Method 3: Edit CSS in WordPress using a Child Theme

Another way to customize your CSS is by creating a WordPress child theme that allows you to make edits in the parent theme, without risking any issue in your live site. Basically, you can test your custom CSS out on the child theme first to ensure that the changes you’ve made serves the intended purpose. That way, you can carry out other risky experiments as well without breaking your live site. you can also check out how to install WordPress.