How to use this Page

The beginning of a new year is an opportunity to start things afresh — why should your blog not benefit as well? Here are six things you can do to start your blogging in 2015 energized, recharged, and focused.

Explore your new dashboard

We introduced several major upgrades to the WordPress.com dashboard right before the end of last year, including updated Stats and navigation and the ability to manage and edit all your content across sites from one central hub.

Now is the perfect time to get familiar with some of these new features for a smoother blogging experience. Whether it’s from your computer, tablet, or smartphone, you can check out which posts generated the most likes and comments (and much more) on your Stats page, browse through all your posts and pages, and easily tweak your account settings, review your billing history, and visit your trophy case from My Profile.

Sign up for a blogging course

Our free Blogging U. courses are a great way to get you closer to meeting your blogging goals — whatever those might be — while being part of a supportive, engaged community.

Our next Blogging 101 course starts January 5, and is geared toward new bloggers (you can read more about it, and sign up for it, here), but throughout the year we’ll be offering courses that target different levels, and focus on topics like writing, photoblogging, and more. Be sure to follow announcements from The Daily Post to stay up to date on upcoming courses.

Spruce up your site

Bloggers who love their site’s design publish more. Make sure your site’s look matches the quality of your posts with a few easy tweaks, like switching themes (there are some gorgeous new ones in our Showcase, from our annual default theme, Twenty Fifteen, to recent favorites Editor and Plane). Or just customize your current theme to meet your needs — a few simple touches, like a custom header image or personalized image widgets, can give your site a distinct look with very little work. (Need inspiration? Check out our customization and Early Theme Adopters posts.)

Join a blogging event

Becoming active in the blogging community (or at least in a blogging community) can make all the difference between posting sporadically on a near-dormant blog and keeping yourself energized and your audience engaged. There’s so much to choose from: browse our searchable event listings to find one that’s up your alley, or share your work on our weekly photo challenges and Community Pool posts.

Feeling more adventurous? Consider attending a blogging confernece or creating your own blogging workshop.

Create an editorial calendar

Whether your vision for your blog is to publish once a month or twice a day, your chances of sticking with a regular publication pace increase if you make concrete, sustainable plans. Devoting a little time every few weeks to sketch out an editorial calendar for your blog will help you allocate time, decide on your priorities, and give you the flexibility you need in case unexpected developments keep you away from your blog for a while.

Download our mobile app

Being on the move should never prevent you from publishing a post, engaging in conversations and moderating comments, or keeping up with the latest from your favorite bloggers. With our mobile apps — available for iOS and Android — you can do all of those things wherever you are. You no longer need to wait to get back home to make your voice heard.

Happy 2015 from the entire WordPress.com team! May it be a wonderful year for you and your sites.

Emoji? What are they?

“Emoji” is a japanese term meaning “picture character.” It’s a standard for showing smileys and other little symbols inside text. But unlike traditional smileys that are made up of a sequence of letters like :), every emoji has its own letter.

🌷 🌹 🌺 🌻 🌼

Emoji blossomed on smartphones, where quickly picking out an emoji is often faster than typing out a long sentence.

Today we’re rolling out hundreds and hundreds of emoji across WordPress.com — 872 to be exact.

Do they look familiar? That’s because Twitter has graciously decided to open-source their entire set, allowing anyone to use them. We’re already busy preparing to add these to Jetpack, so WordPress.org users can join in the fun too.

Before today, emoji you inserted into your posts on the go wouldn’t always show properly for all your visitors. While the nice little bunny (🐰) would show up fine when seen on your iPhone or Android, desktop visitors might just see a nondescript square: 

Today’s launch means emoji will now show up properly on every device, no matter if it’s a smartphone, desktop, or tablet. Thanks, Twitter, we appreciate it! 💗

How do I use them?

Inserting emoji in your posts is most easily done on a smartphone or tablet, though it varies how smartphones let you do it. Here are instructions for Android and iOS.

If you’re antsy to insert new emoji from the comfort of your desktop, here are a couple of tricks:

• Mac users on Mavericks or newer can insert emoji by tapping Command + Control + Space while in a text editor.
• Windows users on version 8 or newer have a special touch keyboard with emoji support (see instructions with pictures).
• Windows users on version 7 and below can copy/paste emoji from this cheat sheet.

Have fun with the new emoji!

🐵 🐶 🐷 🐸 🐹

Emoji? What are they?

“Emoji” is a Japanese term meaning “picture character.” It’s a standard for showing smileys and other little symbols inside text. But unlike traditional smileys that are made up of a sequence of letters like :), every emoji has its own letter.

🌷 🌹 🌺 🌻 🌼

Emoji blossomed on smartphones, where quickly picking out an emoji is often faster than typing out a long sentence.

Today we’re rolling out hundreds and hundreds of emoji across WordPress.com — 872 to be exact.

Do they look familiar? That’s because Twitter has graciously decided to open-source their entire set, allowing anyone to use them. We’re already busy preparing to add these to Jetpack, so WordPress.org users can join in the fun too.

Before today, emoji you inserted into your posts on the go wouldn’t always show properly for all your visitors. While the nice little bunny (🐰) would show up fine when seen on your iPhone or Android, desktop visitors might just see a nondescript square: 

Today’s launch means emoji will now show up properly on every device, no matter if it’s a smartphone, desktop, or tablet. Thanks, Twitter, we appreciate it! 💗

How do I use them?

Inserting emoji in your posts is most easily done on a smartphone or tablet, though it varies how smartphones let you do it. Here are instructions for Android and iOS.

If you’re antsy to insert new emoji from the comfort of your desktop, here are a couple of tricks:

• Mac users on Mavericks or newer can insert emoji by tapping Command + Control + Space while in a text editor.
• Windows users on version 8 or newer have a special touch keyboard with emoji support (see instructions with pictures).
• Windows users on version 7 and below can copy/paste emoji from this cheat sheet.

Have fun with the new emoji!

🐵 🐶 🐷 🐸 🐹

Blogging 201: Branding and Growth starts Monday, October 20. If you’re a recent alum of Blogging 101 looking to build on the skills you’ve developed so far, or a blogger looking for new ways to grow your site and its audience, this is the course for you.

What will Blogging 201 cover? We’ll introduce tools to increase your traffic within WordPress.com as well as through other platforms, discuss ways to develop a coherent, effective brand for your blog, and show how to use your archives and your site’s stats to build your readership.

During this two-week course we’ll give you a daily task and provide you with all the necessary resources and information to complete it (there will be no new tasks on weekends, to give you time to explore more on your own, or just publish a post or two). You’ll also have access to The Commons, a private, staff-moderated space where you can chat with other participants, ask questions, and give feedback.

Ending right before NaNoWriMo and NaBloPoMo kick off in November, Blogging 201: Branding and Growth will help you get your site ready for a new wave of viewers — as well as to keep them coming after their first visit.

Like all Blogging U. courses, there are no prerequisites for Blogging 201 (if you’d like to follow the courses in sequence, though, that’s fine: Blogging 101: Zero to Hero will be back in November!). Self-hosted blogs and blogs from other platforms are just as welcome to participate.

If this sounds like something you’d be interested in trying, sign up for Blogging 201: Branding and Growth using this form:

Blogging 201: Branding and Growth starts Monday, October 20. If you’re a recent alum of Blogging 101 looking to build on the skills you’ve developed so far, or a blogger looking for new ways to grow your site and its audience, this is the course for you.

What will Blogging 201 cover? We’ll introduce tools to increase your traffic within WordPress.com as well as through other platforms, discuss ways to develop a coherent, effective brand for your blog, and show how to use your archives and your site’s stats to build your readership.

During this two-week course we’ll give you a daily task and provide you with all the necessary resources and information to complete it (there will be no new tasks on weekends, to give you time to explore more on your own, or just publish a post or two). You’ll also have access to The Commons, a private, staff-moderated space where you can chat with other participants, ask questions, and give feedback.

Ending right before NaNoWriMo and NaBloPoMo kick off in November, Blogging 201: Branding and Growth will help you get your site ready for a new wave of viewers — as well as to keep them coming after their first visit.

Like all Blogging U. courses, there are no prerequisites for Blogging 201 (if you’d like to follow the courses in sequence, though, that’s fine: Blogging 101: Zero to Hero will be back in November!). Self-hosted blogs and blogs from other platforms are just as welcome to participate.

If this sounds like something you’d be interested in trying, sign up for Blogging 201: Branding and Growth using this form:

Whether you're a spreadsheet enthusiast or allergic to numbers, digging into your site's stats can help you better engage with your audience. Let's take a look at three stats that can make a difference beyond page views.

From your sidebar to your comments section, these tips will help you clean up your blog in just a few minutes.

At WordPress.com our raison d’être is to do everything we can to help you make your blog the very best it can be. Over at The Daily Post we’ve got daily writing prompts to give your muse a friendly nudge, we publish articles on how to grow your traffic and community, as well as tips and advice on how to take great photos, no matter which gear you choose.

We’ve compiled a ton of great material into three new ebooks, made with love, for you. And, they’re free. They come in three fetching formats so we’ve got you covered no matter whether .pdf, .epub (iBooks), or .mobi (Kindle) is your jam.

365 Writing Prompts

So you want to write but you have trouble getting started? Writers’ block a perpetual, unwelcome guest? With 365 Writing Prompts we’ve got a different writing prompt to jumpstart your muse each and every day of the year. Looking for more writing inspiration and practice? Be sure to check out our weekly writing challenges.

Photography 101

Chock-full of inspiration, technical tips, and practical ideas you can apply right away, Photography 101: The basics of photography and the power of visual storytelling will help you take and make beautiful photographs and school you on post-processing so that your work can shine, no matter whether you’ve got a monster-sized DSLR or a trusty cameraphone in your pocket. If you’d like more practice with your camera, c’mon over to The Daily Post and participate in our weekly photo challenges. We provide the theme each week, you interpret it with your camera as you see fit.

Grow Your Traffic, Build Your Blog

Most of us write, shoot, and blog for the love of it, though it’s always a great feeling to get a Like or a comment, or participate in a great conversation with someone who shares your interests. If you’d like to attract more traffic and nurture a community around your site, take Grow Your Traffic, Build Your Blog: Tips and Tricks for the Tenacious Blogger for a spin.

Most bloggers display their latest posts first — reverse chronological order is the classic blog format, after all. Many WordPress.com users, however, choose to build a static front page — a homepage — that creates a website feel and brings your long-term content to the front.

A well-designed homepage has always been a staple of major websites, like The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation — a WordPress.com VIP partner. You don’t have to be a large company or non-profit organization to see the advantages of a homepage, though. Artists and other creative professionals enjoy the benefits of portfolio sites and personal pages to showcase their talents. Increasingly, so do personal bloggers across a wide variety of niches. To give you a taste of what a homepage can do for your blog, here are some sites that use this option in a smart, creative way.

Groovy Bow Sequence

Claire, the Seoul-based kindergarten teacher behind Groovy Bow Sequence, put together a sleek-looking homepage for her travel-focused personal blog. 

She uses Moka to great effect. The theme offers the option of adding a splashy post slider to the homepage, enticing visitors to click on Claire’s striking landscape images and read her posts, while still maintaining the easy navigation and streamlined look of a fixed front page. While sites with a homepage often still feature a blog section, Claire has opted to forego one altogether, presenting some recent posts on the homepage itself, and letting the rest be easily accessible through the sidebar menu.

Alexandra Corinth

Writer-blogger Alexandra Corinth deploys a homepage — and especially her site’s primary menu — to direct readers to her various writing projects, from her young-adult books, to her multi-genre portfolio, to her personal blog.

She chose the clean, easy-to-navigate Suits, and kept most of the theme’s out-of-the-box look. The focus here is on her content, and her homepage is a distraction-free zone — visitors will only find an author’s portrait, along with a short bio tucked into a Text Widget in the sidebar. They can then quickly decide which section of the site to explore first.

redstuffdan

Dan, the blogger behind redstuffdan, is a retired expat living in the southwest of France. His blog is mostly about his art — a mixture of photography, digital art, and painting — and he’s opted for a homepage to showcase his creations. Right beneath a short introductory text to his site, visitors quickly plunge into a colorful tiled gallery full of Dan’s art. The gallery’s composition can be modified whenever new material is uploaded — just because the page is “static” doesn’t mean it can’t be updated and refreshed.

For the rest of the content on redstuffdan, the sidebar gives visitors easy access to the site’s top posts and pages, most recent posts, as well as to older content through monthly archives.

Up From The Deep

Up From The Deep is the labor of love of Mark Ellinger, a musician-turned-photographer who chronicles the gentrifying streets of San Francisco’s grittiest neighborhoods. Creating a homepage allowed him to highlight the different types of writing on his site: a blog to which he uploads new photos regularly, as well as long-term project pages, like the ones on the Tenderloin and Mid-Market neighborhoods.

The homepage layout features a selection of images that whet the visitor’s appetite, and its primary menu leads not only to the site’s main content, but also to an extensive bibliography page and a Prints page, where interested readers can order copies of images from Mark’s website.

Creating a homepage

If you’d like to try out a front page that isn’t populated by your latest posts, setting one up is a breeze. Go to the Settings → Reading tab in your dashboard, and select “a static page.” Then, choose your desired page from the “Front page” drop menu, and you’re set. If you wish to add an optional blog section to your site as well — where your posts will be displayed in reverse chronological order — specify a separate “Posts page” in the second drop menu. Note that you can also set up a homepage from the Customizer, where you’ll need to go to the “Front” panel.

Looking for more ideas for your homepage? Here are a few more examples to inspire you:

• Haley the Wonder Dog, a resource site for owners of dogs diagnosed with cancer.
• The Lovecraft eZine, a popular horror fiction ezine that puts Oxygen‘s Showcase Page template to excellent use.
• H. G. Robert, a minimalist site showcasing the work of a soon-to-be-published author.

It’s just a few days until November, and you know what that means: National Novel Writing Month, better known ’round these parts as NaNoWriMo, is near. Have you always wanted to write a novel? We know some of you have been waiting all year for this month! For those of …

For us, WordPress.com is our labor of love — we’re continually releasing new themes, upgrades, and features to help you create the best website and/or blog you can. In addition to great tools, we publish articles, prompts, and writing and photo challenges to inspire you to start posting and keep posting. While we’re never, ever done making WordPress.com better, we wanted to look back at some of the goodies we brought you in 2012.

We’ve got the look: 65+ new themes in 2012

We released themes at a rate of more than one a week in 2012. These beautiful themes look great no matter which device your visitors use to see your content. What’s more, if you’re a musician, restaurateur, bride-or-groom-to-be, or a civil servant looking for a simple way to share information with your audience, we’ve got you covered.

Tae Phoenix is a Seattle-based singer-songwriter who recently released her first album, Rise. Her site takes full advantage of everything WordPress.com and the Soundcheck theme have to offer, with embedded audio and video, a tour calendar, her Twitter feed, links to her new album, and press mentions.

Custom Design puts you in charge

Have design chops or an eye for contrast, color, and composition? With the Custom Design upgrade, you can tinker with your site’s CSS, compose a unique color palette for your site, and choose from among some awesome Typekit fonts to create the specific look you desire for your online home on the web.

New and improved for 2012

No matter whether you’re just starting to blog or are a seasoned web designer, here’s a sampling of how we made WordPress.com better for you in 2012:

• We doubled the space we offer in the space upgrade.
• We introduced SASS and LESS for those who’ve got the Custom CSS upgrade.
• We added unique visitors and countries to all WordPress.com stats pages.
• We created importers to help you bring your Tumblr blog or your Splinder site to WordPress.com.
• We released tiled galleries that allow you to get creative with photos on your blog.

We made a lot of progress in 2012 and we’re already working on bringing you more awesome in 2013. Happy New Year from WordPress.com!

At the end of November, we gave shout-outs to bloggers and artists who participated in month-long projects like NaBloPoMo and NaNoDrawMo. As 2012 comes to a close, we also want to highlight writers and photographers who challenged themselves all year — who posted each day or each week, or have established an ongoing project on their sites.

These bloggers caught our attention:

Jump For Joy!

JUMP FOR JOY! Photo Project

An inspiring international project focused on play, fun, and the positive in our lives, JUMP FOR JOY! presents Eyoälha Baker’s vision of a world united by our expression of joy. Eyoälha has taken nearly all the images on her blog — with the exception of the photos of her. Her jumping subjects are captured in locations around the world: at the beach in Kauai, at a park in Vancouver, or even between city skyscrapers . . . while holding a ninja sword! We love how she showcases the beauty of the human spirit — in mid-air.

A Year of Reading the World

In 2012, writer and editor Ann Morgan planned to read her way around as many of the globe’s 196 independent countries as she could, sampling one book from every nation. The result? Her thoughtful, sophisticated blog, A Year of Reading the World. In each post, she focuses on a particular book and digs into the country’s history and culture. Recent places included Ethiopia, Guinea-Bissau, and the Maldives.

Hope Street

Hope Street

Kurt Blumenau’s grandfather kept month-to-month calendars — 15 years’ worth! — on which he recorded significant events that affected him, such as the flight of Apollo 17.

These calendars remain in Kurt’s family, and each Monday on his blog, Hope Street, Kurt picks an interesting calendar entry and writes something about it. ”It might be a reflection on my grandfather’s life,” writes Kurt, “or my family’s history and tradition . . . or American life of the 1960s and 1970s . . . or my own life today.”

The blog celebrates his grandfather and family and is a unique, thoughtful project of personal and American history.

Sketches From Memory

We admire the sketch-a-day regimen of comic artist Chuck Cottrell. Chuck posts simple sketches to mini comic strips, mostly in black and white (with some random yet effective bursts of color). We recommend you dive in, as he lets readers in to his personal world — including sharing stories of married life — in a fun, candid way.

Ian Spagnolo Photography

Outdoor landscapes. Dramatic long exposure shots of the sea. Light painting sessions. Follow photographer Ian Spagnolo‘s “365 Project” to sample his work, especially if you enjoy seeing a photographer play around with exposure, light, and other elements. Ian is from Coffs Harbour, a coastal city in New South Wales, Australia, which means he certainly won’t run out of stunning subject matter to shoot.

52 Brand New

52 Brand New

For 2012, the personable blogger behind 52 Brand New promised to try 52 new experiences with her children, from tasting new cuisines to attending a family yoga class to collecting rocks. In each “new experience,” she includes playful Polaroid-style images and links to other experiences her family has undertaken, as well as external resources offering ideas for family activities. 52 Brand New is a fresh, creative take on a parenting blog.

Instamatic Gratification

A daily photoblog, Instamatic Gratification succeeds because of its simple and focused approach: one image per day. (We also love the daily quotes that accompany each photograph.) In January 2010, Caryn launched the blog and successfully posted 365 images in that first year. In 2011, she wasn’t quite as diligent, so this year, she decided to challenge herself once again. She writes: “I’ve come to realize that, for me anyway, quantity (or rather the consistency of daily practice) is the surest and most direct route to quality.” We totally agree!

Dar’s 52 Mondays Blog

Dar’s “52 Mondays” project compiles photographs as well as her thoughts on nature, art, education, creativity, and more — a space in which she can share her ideas in one place. We appreciate her weekly dedication to “make Mondays more marvelous,” and think her approach is inspiring.

Since the New Year is just around the corner, we encourage you to start your own 365-day or 52-week project in January. If you have big, exciting plans for your site in 2013, let us know in the comments.

Happy New Year!

November was a busy month! Not only did bloggers and writers churn out pages for NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) and NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), but illustrators and artists also took part in NaNoDrawMo, which challenged participants to produce a minimum of 50 new works between November 1 and 30.

In honor of NaNoDrawMo, we’ve highlighted some illustrators and sketchers in our community. Take a look:

Photo courtesy of Pete Scully.

Pete Scully

Currently in Northern California, Pete Scully sketches the world as he sees it — and his visions are unique, intricate, and oh-so-fresh. (His sketches above prove this, don’t you think?) We love Pete’s style, as seen in his drawings of pubs, bookstores, and urban neighborhoods. Browse his sketchbook images of San Francisco, London, and more; and be sure to follow along on his NaNoDrawMo journey. His black-and-white header adds a personal touch, and his substantial blogroll of fellow artists is worth checking out.

Pete’s blog uses Twenty Twelve, an elegant, readable theme that’s fully responsive — content looks great on any device. If you’re curious to see how other artists use this theme, check out cartoonist Chuck Cottrell’s blog Sketches from Memory and follow along on his Sketch a Day series. (He’s also participating in NaNoWriMo. That’s dedication!)

Paula Knight

You’ll find art projects, sketchbook pages, and works in progress on Paula Knight’s blog. What we love best is that we get the sense of an artist at work — series of sketches, quick doodles in spiral notebooks, commentaries on older drawings, and personal reflections. Be sure to check out her comics, which comment on fertility and childlessness. Also a writer, Paula has published children’s books and is currently working on a graphic novel for adults called The Facts of Life.

Paula’s blog uses Twenty Eleven, the third most popular theme on WordPress.com (and our default theme in 2011). Versatile and full of features, Twenty Eleven is a tried-and-true theme on which you can experiment with various post formats, a light or dark color scheme, and different layouts. For more inspiration, check out how cartoonist and writer Ulises Farinas uses Twenty Eleven as well — the Brooklyn-based artist creates imaginative, super-detailed worlds of heroes and beasts. 

Our Process

For a dose of politics, current events, education, and culture with your artwork, don’t miss the comics, portraits, and maps of Aaron Guile. Aaron’s visual style is very distinct, and his commentary is sharp. Unlike the other illustrators in this list, Aaron doesn’t use much color. He eschews color for bold, black on white illustrations that convey potent ideas.

Aaron’s blog uses Forever, a simple and modern theme originally created with weddings in mind. But, as you can see, Forever works with different kinds of content — it’s really up to you to transform a theme into something that works for you!

The Town Mouse

Avid drawer and architectural historian Joanna Moore compiles drawings created on location — if you’re in London, you may find her sketching frantically on a street corner. Check out her mixed media drawings of Gothic cathedrals and sketches of castles, or browse her category archives at the top of her front page.

Joanna’s blog uses Imbalance 2, a modern, sophisticated theme that can easily turn your blog into a professional portfolio or online magazine. Imbalance 2 is also appropriate for collaborative projects — check out Illo Confidential, a group blog of about 20 illustrators.

Hotcharchitpotch

Gareth Cotter serves up wonderful sketches, illustrations, and comics that show his passion for architecture. His drawings inspired by a fall trip to Gdansk, Poland, are worth noting, as well as this comic/graphic story about a “cyclical city.” We’re waiting to see what whimsical little world he’ll illustrate next.

Gareth’s blog uses Blogum, a clean and minimalist theme — with a touch of modern — that lets you focus on your content. Its simplicity allows for images and illustrations to take center stage. 

Easily Emused

How can you not enjoy the drawings at Easily Emused? They’re colorful and quirky, and complement the blogger’s musings perfectly. (Read “Earring Aids,” a recent post about piercing one’s ears — it’s a nice mix of storytelling and illustration.)

This blog uses Balloons, a lighthearted theme that effortlessly creates a playful mood.

Creative Stuff

Photographer and student Jessie Vittoria loves to draw, and she uses Creative Stuff to compile her illustrations, greeting card designs, comics, and doodles. Her artwork is airy and playful — you can see this right away in her blog’s header image. We like how she keeps it simple and makes her different types of artwork easy to find, and how she uses built-in features to add color and draw visitors to her popular content.

Jessie’s blog uses Yoko, a theme that’s simple and elegant, yet customizable. We asked Jessie about the features she uses.

Talk a bit about the features you use to make your blog look the way it does.

The full-size images in my posts allow viewers to see my art without having to click another link, while the slideshows present smaller, less prominent images. For example, I use the slideshow to quickly give an idea of a certain type of drawing. I really like the images in my sidebar; I am a very visual person, and for an illustration blog, it makes sense for users to click on images — rather than text — to navigate the site.

Why did you choose Yoko as your blog’s theme? What features do you like in general?

I was looking for a simple way to display my art with easy navigation, and Yoko seemed to have everything I was looking for. The sidebar makes it easy to find specific pages. I can display my work in the header to immediately show visitors what I do as an artist — even before they click on my posts. I also like the scroll-and-load feature – you don’t have to click “next” to view older posts. Overall, I like how clean the theme is, which doesn’t take away from the art itself.

Want more?

Looking for more advice on how best to showcase your art on your blog? Head on over to The Daily Post for our Q&A with two illustrators — Thomas James and Mark Armstrong — who share their design tips.

Say hello to the future of reading on the web. We’re happy to introduce a new feature for WordPress.com home pages: infinite scrolling.

Speed and performance are key on the modern web: new content loads in quickly without a full page reload. Instead of the old way of navigating down a page by scrolling and then clicking a link to get to the next page, waiting for a page refresh — the document model of the web — infinite scrolling pulls the next set of posts automatically into view when the reader approaches the bottom of the page, more like an application.

See this in action on Matt on Not-WordPress—Matt’s moblog. When you get to the bottom of the page, you’ll see a loading icon display briefly as the next posts load below.

Back? Now that you are drooling along with the rest of us at the wondrous food photos he posts there daily, you’ve experienced the power of reading without clicking “next”—it means reading through many posts without friction. Imagine your visitors doing the same with your content. Pretty cool, eh?

We’ve taken care of the details like integrating with your theme design as seamlessly as possible and supporting sites with footer widgets. We’ve also refined the basic footer appearance; as you scroll down a subtle footer pops up containing your blog title, which readers can click to scroll back up.

Many of you have already seen this in action on your site. To those of you who’ve sent in feedback, thank you—we’ve incorporated your suggestions to improve the experience. The metrics from infinite scrolling are conclusive: people are reading more posts and spending more time on your sites. As you might guess, people are more likely to just scroll down than they were to click the old style links—the new way is faster and better.

If you prefer the old-school way, and disable the feature in Settings → Reading, you’ll instead see a “Load more posts” button at the bottom of the page, which loads the next available content quickly after the button is clicked—avoiding a full, slow page reload.

We’ve also automatically enabled the click-to-load button for blogs where there might be important information in footer widgets, so your visitors always have access to the entirety of your content. The number of posts loaded with the button can be changed in your “Blog pages show at most” reading setting. Learn more about the settings.

Infinite scrolling is already enabled for over 30 themes to date, and in the coming weeks we’ll be rolling it out to the rest of our themes.

Now to investigate how to make ourselves a neverending breakfast—that would be amazing, too.