Updating to WooCommerce Product Table 4.0
Version 4.0 of WooCommerce Product Table is being released in August 2024. This is a big update which changes the way that product tables are stored and created. This article explains what existing users need to know when updating to version 4.0.
What are the main changes?
New table builder
The most significant change that you need to be aware of is that we have added a new table builder. This allows you to pre-build tables and then display them on your site.
The table builder is much more user-friendly than the previous method of creating shortcodes because you can configure an entire table without needing to work with shortcodes. Once you have finished, a simple shortcode is automatically created allowing you to insert the table anywhere on your site (or you can insert the table using the new 'Product Table' Gutenberg block).
Moved settings pages
We have also moved the plugin settings pages. You can now find them under Products → Settings → Product Tables (rather than WooCommerce → Settings → Products → Product tables where they were before). There is now a main 'Product Tables' page listing your pre-built tables, and a 'Settings' tab which lets you manage your license key and the global settings which will affect all your tables.
For full details of all the changes, see the plugin changelog.
How to update
You can update to version 4.0 in the usual way, from Dashboard → Updates in the WordPress admin. Also see our separate articles on How to Update Manually and Update Problems.
Once you have done the update, a notice saying "WooCommerce Product Table database update required" will appear at the top of the WordPress dashboard. You must click the "Update Database" button to complete the update. This will copy your settings from the old plugin settings page into a new default table in the table builder so that you don't lose any of your existing settings.
What will happen to my existing tables?
After updating to version 4.0, the tables that you configured using the old [product_table] shortcode will continue working as usual. While using this shortcode is no longer the easiest way to create tables, it is still fully functional and we have no plans to remove it from the plugin.
However, the way that you edit some of the settings in your tables has changed.
The settings for your existing tables which are not set directly in the shortcode will be migrated to the new table builder as follows:
- Settings which can be configured per-table have been removed from the settings page and moved to the new table builder. When you clicked "Update Database" after updating to version 4.0, this automatically created a new default table containing all the settings which have been removed from the settings page. Your existing tables will use the settings from this default table, which you can edit via Products → Product Tables.
- Settings which can only be set globally remain on the plugin settings page. You can edit these at Products → Product Tables → Settings.