I’m here to guide you through creating a new menu in Joomla 5 to help your website visitors navigate your content. Menus are essential for organizing access to articles, categories, or external links. In this step-by-step guide, I’ll show you how to set up a new menu, create a menu module, and position it on your site. As a bonus, I will be creating an advanced Joomla tutorial about Hidden Menus and why they are important.
Why Create a Menu in Joomla?
Menus in Joomla are collections of navigation links, starting with your Main Menu that directs visitors to pages like blog articles, membership signups, support, or contact forms. While Joomla creates a Main Menu by default, I often add new menus for specific content types, user roles, or hidden pages (e.g., for custom URLs). Joomla 5’s improved menu sorting makes organizing these links even easier compared to Joomla 4.
Controlling Layout and Display with Menu Items
In Joomla, menus are containers for menu items, and these menu items give you powerful control over how content is displayed. When a user clicks a menu item, I can choose a specific template or layout for that page, like a unique design for a blog versus a contact page. Even better, menu items let me show or hide elements, such as the author name, publish date, pagination, or category name, through settings in the menu item’s options. For example, I might hide the author's name on a Privacy Policy page but show it on blog articles. This flexibility, tied to menu items rather than the menu itself, makes Joomla’s navigation system incredibly versatile!
To give you an idea of what kinds of options you have for customization, here is a screenshot showing the current "Home" menu item:
In addition to the large choice of options, each one has a drop-down list of options:
Step-by-Step Guide to Creating a New Menu
Follow these steps to create a new menu in Joomla 5, set up a menu module, and prepare it for adding menu items. I’ll walk you through each part clearly.
1. Log In to the Administrator Dashboard
Start by logging into your Administrator Dashboard, where you can then make changes or add new menus and menu items.
2. Access the Menu Manager
Go to Menus > Manage from the left navigational column. This opens the Menu Manager, displaying all existing menus, such as the Main Menu that was created by default when you installed Joomla. From here, you can add more menus. Note: You can have as many menus as you want; you can even have more than one main menu.
3. Create a New Menu
From the top menu bar, click New and begin filling the form out:
- Title: A name for the menu, like “Footer Menu” (displayed in the Menu Manager).
- Unique Name: A system name, like
footer-menu(no spaces, use hyphens) or skip the hyphenfootermenu - Description: Optional, but I add a note like “Menu for footer navigation” for reference.
I click Save & Close to create the menu and return to the Menu Manager.
4. Create a Menu Module
A menu won’t appear on your site until it’s assigned to a module. In the Menu Manager, I click Add a module for this menu next to your new menu. In the Module form, set:
- Title: A descriptive title, like “Footer Navigation.”
- Show Title: I choose “Show” or “Hide” depending on whether I want the title visible on the frontend.
- Select Menu: My new menu’s name should already be selected.
- Position: I pick a template position, like
footer(Check your template’s positions, e.g., Cassiopeia’s options.)
Click Save & Close to create the module. Alternatively, I can create this module via Content > Site Modules > New > Menu.
5. Check the Menu on Your Site
If you already have menu items assigned to this menu, you can visit your website’s frontend to ensure the menu module appears in the chosen position. If it’s not visible, I double-check the module’s status (make sure it's set to Published) and the template’s position settings. Joomla 5’s menu sorting lets you drag and drop items in the Menu Manager for easy organization. Also, make sure that your menu has menu items published (this will be the next tutorial).
Here is a screenshot showing my menus in the bottom area of this website:
Tips for Success
- Use descriptive titles and unique names to avoid confusion in the Menu Manager.
- Check your template’s documentation for available module positions (e.g., Cassiopeia’s
top-bar,sidebar-right). - If the menu doesn’t show, ensure the module is published and assigned to the correct pages via the Menu Assignment tab.
What’s Next?
With your new menu created, you’re ready to add menu items to link to articles or other content! In my next tutorial, I’ll guide you through adding menu items to your Joomla 5 menu.
Continue to the Next Tutorial: Adding Menu Items