How to Add a Page Break Block to WordPress

Today’s WordPress Wednesday is brought to you by the page break block. As always, we like to kick off with two things:

1. A general understanding of how to navigate the WordPress block editor is always helpful. You can get that overview HERE.
2. Why the heck adding a particular type of block may be useful to your goals. So, let’s tackle that one now.

Why Add a Page Break Block to a WordPress Post

Adding page breaks to a post splits the content across multiple pages. Every time you add a page break, a new page is added to contain the content. You’ve likely seen content like this. You’re reading an article, and you get to the bottom of the page, and you see:

Pages: 1 2

The “2” is a hyperlink you click on to keep reading on the next page. Sometimes this can be annoying, but there are a couple of good reasons for breaking up content across pages.

Reduce Page Load Time

Site speed affects your SEO. Therefore, if you have a big chunk of content to share, putting it all on one page can slow your site down. By splitting the content over two or more pages, you minimize the amount of time it takes for the page to load.

Break Up a Post into Chapters

Perhaps you’re tackling a big topic that’s comprised of several subtopics. For example, an overview of content marketing that included specifics for blogging, email marketing, and social media, might best be presented as three chapters. Each of the three topics would then have a page to itself.

Step-by-Step Processes

Similarly, it can be helpful to readers to take a how-to post that includes several, detailed steps and break it up by step. When the reader gets to the bottom of the page, they know they’ve completed the step and can click to move on to the next.

How to Add a Page Break Block

Now, for the main event!

Page breaks are easy to add, and they don’t require any special formatting to deal with. Add a page break where you want to split your content by either

1. Clicking on the block inserter menu (the big + icon on the top left) and scrolling until you see the pagebreak icon.
2. Typing /pagebreak into a new, paragraph block. (If you recall, the paragraph block is the default block. A new paragraph block is created simply by hitting ‘enter.’)

Every time you add a page break block, a new number will be added to the bottom of each page. For example, adding two page breaks means you have three pages, so the bottom of the page would display:

Page: 1 2 3

The numbers for the pages the visitor is not on are hyperlinks to the additional pages for the post.

Moving or Deleting a Page Break Block

Although there’s not much to do with a page break block, it has its own block-specific menus just as every other type of block does. When the page break block is active (i.e., you clicked on it!), a menu appears just above the block.

The menu options are to change the type of block, manually drag the break to a new location (icon with the six dots), or move the block up or down one by one position, using the arrows.

Clicking the final icon on the menu (with the three dots) pops out a few more basic options:

• Copy the block.
• Duplicate the block.
• Insert before (adds a paragraph block before the break).
• Insert after (adds a paragraph block after the break).
• Move to (moves the block to wherever you then click on the page.

You can also select “remove” if you’ve changed your mind about splitting the content across pages.

Note that when you click on the gear/cog icon on the top right, the block-specific control menu appears as a sidebar, but there are no actions available there.

At the End of the Day

The need to use a page break block might not come up that often, but it’s helpful to know how and why to use them. Add page breaks to step-by-step tutorials and to long-form, “pillar” content, as well as anywhere it’s logical to break up information into smaller chunks.