Event timelines are an impactful design element that can make historical and chronological information easier to digest on WordPress sites. When done well, they also have strong visual appeal.
In this extensive guide, we’ll share insider techniques for creating sleek, modern vertical timelines to showcase company histories, personal stories, photographic journeys or any series of dated events on a WordPress website.
Why Add Event Timelines in WordPress?
Here are five of the most popular use cases for adding timelines in WordPress:
1. Company History Timelines
One of the most common reasons sites use timelines is to communicate their origins story and milestones in an engaging way.
For example, hosting company WP Engine creatively showcases their growth from founding to present day using a bold, graphic-led timeline:
Visually mapping out major company events — like founding dates, funding rounds, product launches, accomplishments, etc — allows visitors to better understand your past and current position.
75% of consumers said understanding a company’s history impacts their purchasing decisions [1]. Timelines bring these important events to life.
2. Personal History Timelines
Your WordPress site doesn’t have to be a business to benefit from a timeline. They can work beautifully to share your own autobiography and experiences.
Photographer Sam Hurd uses a clean monochrome timeline to map out his varied world travels, bringing unique personality to his site:
Documenting your background through timeline visuals and key dates makes storytelling more memorable. Consider both professional and personal events.
3. Photographic Journeys
Similar to the last point, timelines are perfect for travel bloggers, landscape photographers and adventurers to creatively map their exciting journeys across states, countries and continents.
Watch this journey come to life in Kien Lam’s slick vertical travel timeline showing 200,000 miles traveled to inspiring photographic spots:
Pairing images from highlighted destinations with dates keeps visitors engaged as you recount your exciting discoveries.
4. Product Development Timelines
SaaS companies, tech startups and other product-led businesses can use timelines to communicate their iterative growth and key software releases over time.
This helps put groundbreaking new features into historical perspective and spotlights your product evolution:
Even minor releases can be impactful for some users, so documenting everything in one place paints a clear picture.
5. Projects Showcase
Web design agencies, creative studios and freelancers often house numerous projects in their portfolio. While filtering by categories helps, a chronological projects timeline can add refreshed context.
This presents visitors with an at-a-glance overview they can scroll through, sparking further exploration by year or project type:
The goal here is enticing visitors to dig deeper into your best work based on visually grouped release dates & descriptions.
There are limitless use cases for timelines on WordPress sites both big and small. While history mapping is most common, get creative with other applications too.
Step 1: Install the Cool Timelines Plugin
Now that we’ve covered why you might add event timelines, let’s explore how to actually create them in WordPress.
For both ease of use and customization options, we recommend using Cool Timelines — one of the leading vertical timeline plugins with over 8,000 site installations.
First, login to your WordPress dashboard and navigate to Plugins > Add New. Then search for “Cool Timelines” and install the plugin by Tech Laboratories. Activate it.
You’ll now see a new Timeline Addons menu in your admin sidebar for managing stories.
Before creating your timeline display though, some advance planning is recommended…
Step 2: Plan Your Timeline Stories & Visuals
Hopping straight into the plugin timeline builder is tempting. But taking a step back to strategically plan the arc of your timeline pays dividends.
Here are our top tips for planning:
- Brainstorm historic events / releases / journeys to highlight important milestones. Aim for 4 to 8 stories to start.
- Research exact dates & details so content is accurate. This validity builds trust.
- Consider imagery like photos, videos, illustrations or icons that will make the entry visually interesting.
- Decide on a color palette early so timeline customizations align with brand tones.
- Sketch ideas for the overarching timeline design and layout based on website location.
Advance planning gives a cohesive edge to your timeline stories, ensuring nothing relevant is missed.
With your storyline, images and design direction decided, now the exciting part begins…
Step 3: Add Your Timeline Stories
In the Timeline Addons menu, click Add New Story to build your first entry:
For each event, you’ll add:
- A title
- A text-based description
- A featured image like a photo, icon or emblem
- The date the entry occurred on
Additional options per entry include:
- Full or thumbnail image sizing
- Left or right timeline placement
- Entry category tagging
- Typography customizations
Hit publish then repeat the process for all milestone moments identified earlier.
Take time crafting content for maximum impact. With entries added, now we customize the timeline display itself.
Step 4: Customize Your Timeline Design
Navigate to Timeline Addons > Timeline Settings to centralize visual options in one dashboard:
Fine-tune aspects like:
- General: Title, logo, date labels, typography, word count
- Style: Backgrounds, color schemes, shapes, spacing
- Filtering: Categories, search
- Advanced: Animation, visibility, custom CSS
Utilize the live preview pane to visually test changes until it aligns with your brand style. Match corresponding colors.
This customization stage is crucial for polished presentation. Don’t overlook seemingly minor details — the devil is in the details with timelines.
Step 5: Display Your Timeline
The finishing touch is placing your new interactive timeline onto a live page.
Simply embed the [ct_timeline] shortcode onto any post or page.
Additional code tweaks like CSS may be required depending on your specific theme structure. Adjust page width for full bleed timelines.
Now witness your strategic planning come to life! Timelines evolve over time, so revisit to add new entries as more milestones are met.
Recap & Top Considerations
That wraps up our complete guide to creating sleek, modern timelines in WordPress using Cool Timelines.
To recap key points to produce engaging, on-brand timelines:
- Brainstorm timeline stories early with a lean 8 event maximum
- Source quality images and videos to supplement entries
- Choose an easy-to-follow color palette that matches branding
- Use both full bleed and thumbnail images for visual variety
- Add custom icons for extra flair next to dark/light dates
- Align typography scales between image sizes
- Animate subtle interactions only when appropriate
- Test extensively on mobile resolutions
Lastly, take a user-centric approach by conveying information clearly. Well planned timelines make digesting histories effortless!
Over to you now. Which Cool Timelines features will you utilize on your next WordPress timeline project? Let us know if you have any questions.
