Creating Categories in Joomla

Categories in Joomla are like folders in a filing cabinet, helping you organize your website’s content so it’s easy to find and manage. Whether you’re building a website for a business, portfolio, or community, this beginner-friendly tutorial will show you how to create and use categories. If you’re used to WordPress, think of Joomla categories as similar to WordPress categories, but with a lot more flexibility.

What Are Categories?

Let's stay with the file cabinet analogy. Each drawer of your filing cabinet would be a category, and each file in a drawer (category) would be an article. You can also nest categories as deep as you need, though I recommend keeping it simple with two or three (max) levels. A good example is this website's blog. I have a parent blog category (the blog home page) and in that parent category are several sub-categories (sometimes called "Child categories".

Here is a partial structure of my blog, showing The Blog as one parent category and two more parent categories, Free Joomla Tutorials and Advanced Joomla Tutorials. Only The Blog has sub-categories (child categories).

  1. The Blog
    1. Opinions & Insights
    2. Joomla vs WordPress
    3. Showcase & Reviews
  2. Free Joomla Tutorials
  3. Advanced Joomla Tutorials

Joomla always starts with a default “Uncategorized” category, but you’ll create your own to suit your website’s needs. As confusing as this might sound, if you want a standalone page (article), this will go into the Uncategorized category.

Why Use Categories?

Categories make it easy to manage and display content. You can filter articles by category in the admin panel or show specific categories on your website, like a “Services” section. Unlike WordPress, where articles can have multiple categories, Joomla limits each article to one category, but you can use tags for extra flexibility (covered in a later tutorial).

How to Create Categories and Sub-Categories

Creating categories in Joomla 5 is simple, like organizing folders on your computer. You can add categories from the admin home dashboard, the navigational column, or the Categories page.

screenshot showing a couple methods of creating a category
Two methods to create a category
Screenshot showing how to create a category from the category list page
Creating a category from the category list page

Here’s how you can do it:

  1. Go to the Categories Page: Log in to your Joomla admin. In the left-side navigation, expand the Content dropdown and click Categories. Alternatively, from the Home Dashboard main window, click the + next to “Article Categories” if it’s visible.
  2. Create a New Category: On the Articles: Categories page, click the green New button to open the “Articles: New Category” form.
  3. Add Category Details:
    • Title: Enter a name for your category, like “Services” or “Products.” This is the only required field.
    • Parent: To make a sub-category, select an existing category as the parent (e.g., choose “Pets” to create “Dog Care” under it). Leave as “- No parent -” for a top-level category.
    • Description: Add an optional description, like “All about dog grooming,” to explain the category’s purpose.
    • Status: Set to Published to make it active, or choose Unpublished, Archived, or Trashed for other states.
    • Access: Set who can see the category (e.g., Public for everyone, Registered for logged-in users).
    • Tags: Add optional tags, like “pet care,” to connect related content across categories.
  4. Save the Category: Click Save & Close to return to the Categories page, or Save & New to create another category right away.
screenshot showing the editor for creating the category
Create your category with the editor

Using Categories on Your Website

Once you’ve created categories, they’re ready to start receiving articles. In the categories page, use the Filter Options to filter and show the articles (if any) for that particular category. You can also create menu items to display categories on your site, but we will save that for another tutorial.

I will show you a screenshot of what my current category list looks like at the moment:

Screenshot showing the category list layout
The category list showing article count

Quick Tips for Categories

  • Create from Articles: You can add a category while editing an article, like creating a new folder while saving a file.
  • One Category per Article: Each article can only belong to one category, so plan carefully.
  • Keep It Simple: Avoid too many sub-categories (stick to 2–3 levels) to make management easier.
  • Use Tags for Flexibility: Combine categories with tags to group content in multiple ways, like WordPress tags.

What’s Next?

With categories set up, your Joomla 5 website is ready for organized content! In my next tutorial, I’ll guide you through creating your first article or page to fill those categories. 

Continue to the Next Tutorial: Creating Articles and Pages