If you’re running a business like a restaurant or a physical store, you might not want to create a whole online shop. However, you may want to offer an easy way for customers to order food or other goods for you to deliver.

Creating an Online Order Form in WordPress

Perhaps you decided to start a website for your business recently, and you’re feeling a bit overwhelmed.

Many businesses start an online store to not only collect orders but also accept payments and manage inventory. However, not all businesses need a complete eCommerce website.

If you only want customers to be able to fill an online order form, then you can create that much easier without a shopping cart solution.

A simple online order form gives you the option to either accept payments online, upon order pickup, or on delivery.

In this tutorial, we will be using WPForms to create an online order form because it allows you to do that easily with their drag & drop interface.

WPForms is the best WordPress form builder plugin on the market. Over 3 million websites use WPForms to easily create any kind of online form and add it to their website (no coding skills required).

First, you’ll need to install and activate the WPForms plugin. Need help installing the plugin? See our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin for detailed instructions.

Plugins are like apps for your WordPress website. If you are new to WordPress, then take a look at our article on what are WordPress plugins and what you can do with them.

Once you have activated the WPForms plugin, you’ll see a new WPForms tab in the admin sidebar of your WordPress dashboard.

You need to visit WPForms » Settings page to enter your license key. You can find this information under your account on the WPForms website.

Now you are ready to create your online order form.

Simply head over to WPForms » Add New page to create your first form.

Now, you’ll see the form creation screen. Type in a name for your form and choose a template. We recommend the ‘Billing / Order Form’ template.

Simply move your cursor over the template description and click the ‘Create a Billing / Order Form’ button.

Your form will automatically be created for you, and you’ll be taken straight into the WPForms form editor.

You can now edit your online order form however you want. The different parts of the form are called “fields”. You can change, add, or remove fields on your form with a single click.

The default template already includes fields for most of the information you’re likely to need, such as name, address, and phone number. However, you’ll need to list your actual products.

Click on the ‘Available Items’ field to edit it.

Type in the name and price of each of the items that customers can order from you. The price won’t automatically display on the form, so you may want to add this into the item name.

To add more options, simply click the (+) icon wherever you want to add the extra items.

Note: You can add as many items as you want. However, customers will only be able to select one option from this field.

If you have several categories of options, then you may want to copy the field to create groups.

You can copy the ‘Available Items’ field by clicking the ‘Copy’ icon that appears when you run your cursor over it, or when it’s selected.

Make sure you change the ‘Label’ of the fields to something appropriate to each group, too.

If you want customers to be able to select two or more options within a single field, you’ll need to use a different type of field.

Click on the ‘Add Fields’ tab then scroll down to ‘Payment Fields’ where you’ll find a ‘Checkbox Items’ field. Drag and drop this into position on your form.

You can now edit that field as before, entering names and prices for your items. Customers can check as many items as they want to order.

If you want to show images of your products, that’s really easy too. Simply click the ‘Use image choices’ box:

For each item, click the ‘Upload Image’ button to add images either from your computer or from your WordPress Media Library.

Your images won’t be resized or compressed by WPForms, so it’s important to upload them at the right size. They should all be the same size and no more than 250×250 pixels.

Ideally, you should also optimize your images for the web.

Finally, you may want to edit the ‘Comment or Message’ field at the bottom of the form, so that it’s not required. Not all users will want to add a message.

Simply click on the field and then uncheck the ‘Required’ box on the right to make this field optional.

You can follow this process for any field that you want to be optional. You can tell which fields are required because they’ll have a red asterisk next to the field’s label.

Once you’re happy with the design of your form, you can move on to configuring its settings. It’s a good idea to save the form first by clicking the ‘Save’ button at the top of the screen

-WP Beginner