Duplicating existing WordPress posts, pages or custom post type posts can speed up creating new posts significantly. This tutorial explains step by step how to set things up so you can duplicate posts and pages with one quick click.
What is covered
First: Backup
Before you do anything, make sure you backup your WordPress website so you can revert to the current version of your website should something go wrong. With that said, here we go:
Install Duplication Plugin
To get started, we have to install a plugin to help us with cloning/copying posts and pages. Go to Plugins / Add New Plugin and search for yoast duplicate. This plugin has been around for many years and was originally created by Enrico Battocchi. Yoast later bought it and is now running it together with Enrico. So you get the peace of mind of knowing a bigger player is backing the development while having access to a plugin that’s been around for years.
Click on Install Now.
Next click on Activate Plugin.
And that’s it, you should now be able to duplicate posts and pages.
How to Duplicate a Page in WordPress
To duplicate a WordPress page, go to Pages, hover over the page you want to duplicate and click Clone. Depending on the settings, the plugin will then create a new draft version of that very page for you to start working with.
How to Duplicate a Post in WordPress
To duplicate a WordPress post, go to Posts, hover over the post you want to duplicate and click Clone. Depending on the settings, the plugin will then create a new draft version of that very post for you to start working with.
Plugin Settings
To get to the plugin settings, click on Settings / Duplicate Post.
In the first tab you can pick what parts you want to copy over into the new page/post.
In tab 2 you can pick who is allowed to copy posts and pages and what post types you want to make available to copy.
In the final tab you can set what options to show when hovering over an existing post or page.
How to Copy Custom Post Type Posts
If you are using custom post types, go to Settings / Duplicate Post and click on Permissions. There make sure that the custom post type is ticked and click on Save changes.
That done, you can then go to your custom post type section, hover over a post and click on Clone.
That’s all there is to know really. You can, of course, also use any of the other available plugins. I personally got to like the Yoast plugin, so I stick to this one.
