Advanced Editor Tools Plugin (previously known as TinyMCE Advanced)

The Advanced Editor Tools Plugin, previously known as TinyMCE Advanced, increases the number of formatting tools such as tables, emoticons and custom font families that are available and gives you more control of which tools are included on the visual editor on the classic block or in the classic editor.

Once you’ve activated the Advanced Editor Tools Plugin in Plugins > All it automatically replaces the default WordPress Visual editor with the Advanced Editor Tools which looks like this if you are using the classic block in the block editor and also adds a classic paragraph block.

It looks like this if you are using the classic editor.

Advanced Editor Tools Overview

The Advanced Editor Tools is composed of:

Editor menu
Toolbars

When the editor menu is enabled most of the items appear as menu items under a drop down menu on the editor menu.

Most of the menu items on the Editor menu are self explanatory and we’ve included a summary of the less obvious menu items below:

File > Print: used to print a copy of post/page.
Insert > Insert date/time: used to quickly add the date or time.
Insert > Anchor: Anchors are used to allow readers to jump to a specific part of a web page and are useful to create an index at the top of long pages.
Tables: Allows you to quickly add, edit and format tables. Tables can be added using a table block if you are using the block editor.

The default WordPress Visual editor has two toolbars. The Advanced Editor Tools can have up to four toolbars.

Configure Advanced Editor Tools

You configure your Advanced Editor Tools in Settings > Advanced Editor Tools (Tiny MCE Advanced).

How you configure depends on if you are using the block editor or the classic editor.

Block Editor

The following section explains how configure the Advanced Editor Tools if you are using the block editor. If you are using the classic editor, refer to the classic editor section.

Toolbars for the block editor

The Advanced Editor tools automatically adds Clear formatting and Mark to the drop down menu on the paragraph block‘s toolbar and moves Subscript, Superscript and Text Color from the drop down menu in the toolbar to the block settings in the editor sidebar and adds an underline option.

You drag and drop the options between the main toolbar’s drop down menu and the alternative side toolbar to change and reorder which items appear in the paragraph block toolbar drop down menu and block settings in the editor sidebar.

Remember to click Save Changes each time you make a change.

Any item you want removed from the paragraph block’s toolbar and block settings in the editor sidebar you drag and drop into the Unused buttons for blocks toolbar area.

“Enable setting of selected text color” and “Enable setting of selected text background color” can be changed to No as the latest version of WordPress already includes these options.

Toolbars for the Classic Paragraph and Classic blocks

The classic block looks like the classic editor but it is in block form and is narrower than the classic editor.

For best results enable the editor menu and only add essential items to the toolbar.

Here’s what the classic block looks like when the Advanced Editor tools plugin is activated.

You remove buttons from the toolbar by dragging the buttons from the toolbar and dropping them into the Unused button area. You add buttons by dragging the buttons from the Unused button area to the toolbar.

Options

List Style Options extend your bulleted and numbered list options.

Clicking on the drop down arrow next to the Bulleted list icon or Numbered list icon reveals the extra options.

Extra Bulleted list options:

Extra Numbered list options:

By default, extra list style options are enable.

Context Menu

When the Context Menu is enabled it replaces your web browser’s menu item when you right click in the content area of your post editor with the following TinyMCE Advanced content menu.

Alternative Link Dialog

When the Link is enabled it replaces the WordPress Insert/Edit Links dialog with the following TinyMCE Advanced Insert/Edit Links Dialog.

Advanced Options

Under advanced options you can replace the paragraph block with the Classic Paragraph block by selecting “Make the Classic Paragraph” or “Classic block” the default block.

Classic Editor

The following section explains how configure the Advanced Editor Tools if you are using the classic editor. If you are using the block editor, refer to the block editor section.

Enable/Disable Editor menu

By default, the editor menu is enabled. For best results it is recommended to keep the Editor menu enabled.

Add/Remove buttons

You remove buttons from the toolbars by dragging the buttons from the toolbar and dropping them into the Unused button area. You add buttons by dragging the buttons from the Unused button area to the desired toolbar.

Any button used regularly would added to the first toolbar row.