You’ve published a new page, but it doesn’t appear anywhere in your navigation. Or maybe you want to reorder your menu items but simply can’t find where to do it. Questions about menus are among the most common ones we receive, and for good reason: WordPress now has two menu systems, and which one you have depends on your theme. Once you know which system your site uses, managing menus suddenly becomes simple. That’s why we’ll start there.
First: What kind of menu system does your site use?
The quickest way to check: go to "View" in your dashboard. If you see the “Menus” section there, your site is using a classic theme, and you manage your navigation on that screen. If you see the “Editor” (Site Editor) section instead, you’re using a block theme, and your menu is a navigation block that you edit directly in the header. If you’re using a page builder like Elementor with its own header, it often builds on the classic menu system: you create the menu under Appearance and Menus, and the builder determines how it looks. Incidentally, in neither system do new pages automatically appear in your menu unless this is explicitly configured; that explains why the new page from the opening question disappeared.
Creating a Menu in a Classic Theme
- Go to View and click Menus.
- Click “Create a new menu,” give it a descriptive name (for example, Main Menu), and click Create Menu.
- Check the boxes to the left of the pages you want to include, and click "Add to Menu." You can also add posts, categories, or custom links; use the latter for external URLs or a button that links to a specific section.
- Drag the items into the desired order. Drag an item slightly to the right beneath another item, and it will become a subitem, creating a drop-down menu.
- Check the box next to the menu location at the bottom—usually something like "Main Menu" or "Primary"—and click "Save Menu.".
That last step is the classic pitfall: a menu that isn’t linked to a location does exist but doesn’t appear anywhere. Themes often offer multiple locations (main menu, footer menu, mobile menu), and on this same screen, you can specify where each menu appears. Good to know: under “Screen Options” in the top-right corner, you can enable additional fields, such as opening a link in a new tab.
Editing the Menu in a Block Theme
For a block theme, go to View and then Editor, and click on your header in the preview. The menu there is a Navigation Block: click on it, and a toolbar will appear that lets you add, remove, and drag items. Use the plus button to add pages or custom links, and create submenus by selecting an item and choosing the submenu option. Click Save, and the change will go live on every page that uses this header. The advantage of this system is that you see the menu exactly as visitors do; the downside is that the settings are somewhat hidden within the block itself. Take a moment to click on the block and explore the sidebar options.
Hierarchy: Keep it flat and predictable
We have a strong opinion about the content of your menu, based on the hundreds of sites we’ve reviewed: less is better. Five to seven items in your main menu is the maximum for most sites; any more than that makes it noticeably harder for visitors to choose. Use drop-down menus sparingly and limit them to a maximum of one level deep, because submenus within submenus are virtually impossible to navigate on mobile devices. Give items short, predictable names (Services, About Us, Contact) instead of creative labels; a menu is a guide, not a place for originality. And put your most important page at the top, your contact page at the bottom: that’s the pattern visitors have come to expect. Anything that doesn’t fit in the main menu can easily go in the footer menu.
Don't forget your cell phone
On phones, your menu almost always collapses into the familiar hamburger icon (three lines). Your theme handles this automatically, but be sure to check it: open your site on your phone, expand the menu, and go through all the items and submenus. Long menu names may get cut off, deep submenus may be inaccessible, and some themes display the menu in a different location on mobile than on desktop. More than half of your visitors see only the mobile version, so this five-minute check should be a standard part of every menu update.
If your menu has disappeared
A menu that has completely disappeared after a theme change does not constitute data loss: your menus are safely stored in the database (your site’s storage), but the link to the menu location has been broken because the new theme uses different locations. Go to Appearance and Menus, link your existing menu to the new location, and everything will be back where it belongs. This is exactly why we recommend making a backup before switching themes and taking the time to prepare for the change; you can read about how to set up that safety net in our A Complete Guide to WordPress Backups and Migration.
At Surver: With our managed packages, we automatically create daily backups, so even a menu experiment that doesn’t go as planned can always be undone. And if you’re stuck with a tricky themed menu, our support team is here to help you seven days a week.
The menu as part of your site structure
A good menu results from a good page structure, not the other way around. If you’re still building your site, first decide which pages you need and then build the menu; our A Beginner's Guide to Creating a Website with WordPress follows that exact order. And then review your menu every six months, along with your other maintenance tasks from our A Complete Guide to WordPress Management: Outdated menu items that link to actions that no longer exist or to old pages are one of the most common areas of wear and tear on sites that have been up and running for a few years.
