How to Add Quicktags in WordPress Comment Forms

If you look at our blog posts, you’ll see that the comments section is often buzzing with conversation. If you’re hoping to build a blog community that’s just as active and engaged, using quicktags can help with this.

By default, the WordPress comment box allows basic HTML tags like bold and italic. However, many visitors don’t know this or how to use HTML code. That means they won’t be able to rely on formatting to help showcase their personal style or effectively communicate their message.

Adding quicktags to your WordPress comment forms can make a big difference. They make it easier for everyone to style their comments, which can boost engagement.

In this article, we’ll show you how to add quicktags to your WordPress comment forms.

Why Add Quicktags in Your WordPress Comment Forms?

Quicktags are buttons that visitors can use to style their WordPress comments.

If you’ve ever used a word processor like Google Docs or even the old WordPress classic editor, then you’ve seen their formatting buttons, which are similar to WordPress quicktags.

For example, in this image, you can see that Google Docs has buttons for creating bold and italic text.

WordPress quicktags work the same way.

By making it easy for visitors to style their comments with the click of a button, you can encourage people to comment more.

They’ll also feel more inclined to express their thoughts in more detail, which leads to increased user engagement on your site.

In the following image, you can see that the bold word stands out from the rest of the comment text.

Formatting can also encourage visitors to read your post’s entire comment section, even when it’s long and even when your comments are split across multiple pages.

With that in mind, let’s look at how to add formatting quicktags to your WordPress comment forms.

How to Add Quicktags in Your WordPress Comment Forms

The easiest way to add quicktags to your WordPress comment forms is by using the Simple Comment Quicktags plugin.

First, you’ll need to install and activate the plugin. If you need help, then please see our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Once you activate this plugin, it will add new settings to your WordPress website’s comment form. Just visit any page or post to see your new quicktags live.

So, whenever visitors want to make their text bold or italic, they simply need to click on the ‘b’ for bold or ‘i’ for italic buttons.

This will add an HTML opening tag to their comment.

Now, everything the visitor types after that will have bold or italic formatting.

When they want to type plain text again, they just need to click the ‘b’ or ‘i’ button again. Then, the bold or italic closing tag will appear on their text.

Visitors can also use a ‘link’ button to add links to their comments. This lets them share useful links with other readers.

However, some people may use this ‘link’ quick tag to post spam links. With this in mind, you may want to take extra steps to combat comment spam in WordPress and moderate your comments carefully.

The final quicktag is blockquotes.

Your visitors can use this quick tag to quote your post or other commenters’. For more details, see our guide on how to customize blockquotes in WordPress.

Bonus Tip: Boost Engagement With Thrive Comments

Want to make your WordPress comments even more engaging? Try using Thrive Comments!

Thrive Comments is part of the Thrive Themes Suite, and it’s the best WordPress comments plugin to improve user engagement on your website.

With Thrive Comments, you can allow users to like or dislike comments. This helps make the conversation more interactive.

You can also let users subscribe to comments. This means they’ll get notified when new comments are added.

Another cool feature is notifying users only when someone replies to their comment. This keeps them in the loop without spamming their inbox.

We hope this article helped you learn how to add quicktags in WordPress comment forms. You may also want to check out our beginner’s guide on how to moderate comments in WordPress or see our expert tips for getting more comments on your WordPress blog posts.

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