The Canvas Block Library

Everything you place on a Canvas page is a block, and the library is large enough that knowing its map matters more than knowing any single block. Canvas groups its blocks into ten categories, and the block inserter shows them under exactly these names, in exactly this order. Before you assemble something from generic pieces, scan the category it would belong to: the odds are good a block already does the job, with options, and a purpose built block will always outlast a hand built imitation.

The Ten Categories

Each name below links to that category's reference listing, where every block has its own page:

• Canvas is the general purpose group: buttons, icons, images, dividers and everything not tied to one kind of content or one region of the page. When you do not know where a block would live, look here first.
• Canvas Interactive holds blocks that respond to the visitor: tabs, toggles, accordions, carousels, counters and overlays. Reach for these to fit more into one screen, or to hold detail back until someone asks for it.
• Canvas Header holds the pieces a header is built from: the logo, the navigation, search, the cart, and the container and zone blocks that arrange them. These are meant to be placed inside a Header record, not on a page, so one header serves the whole site.
• Canvas Content presents a piece of content: feature boxes, testimonials, pricing tables, team members. Use these when you are building the body of a page and the words matter more than the structure around them.
• Canvas Forms holds the blocks a form is built from. Build the form once as a Form, then place it anywhere with the form embed block, so one change reaches every page carrying it.
• Canvas Posts reads from your posts: archive loops, the parts of a single post, related lists. Their content comes from a query, so it stays current without being edited.
• Canvas Portfolio covers Portfolio grids, filters and single project parts, all reading from your Portfolio records.
• Canvas Events covers calendars, listings and single event parts. A date changed on the Event record is a date changed everywhere it appears.
• Canvas WooCommerce covers the shop: product grids and carousels, cart and checkout parts, single product pieces. WooCommerce must be active, or these blocks have nothing to read from.
• Canvas Layout holds the structure: rows, columns, containers and wrappers. They carry classes, spacing and backgrounds and hold other blocks inside them, so reach for these first when a section needs a shape.

Content Blocks Versus Query Blocks

The split worth internalising is between blocks you type into and blocks that read. A testimonial block holds the words you gave it; a posts block holds a query, and its cards change as your content does. Prefer the reading kind wherever the content already exists as records, because a page assembled from queries never goes stale.

Blocks That Arrive With A Design

If you meet a block in the editor that none of the ten category listings documents, it belongs to a ready made design your site was built from. Those blocks are documented with their design, under Designs, rather than in the core reference.

Turning Blocks Off

The Blocks tab of Canvas > Theme Options lists the library and lets you disable blocks you will never use, which keeps the inserter short for editors. See the Blocks options page for the tab itself.

Pitfalls

Two situations account for most "missing block" reports:

• A block is not in the inserter. Check the Blocks tab of Canvas > Theme Options first: a disabled block disappears from the inserter but re-enabling it brings it back, and content already using it keeps rendering throughout.
• A block appears in content but not in the reference. It is design scoped. Find it under Designs, on the page of the design your site was imported from.

What To Read Next

Before opening any individual block page, read Shared Block Controls once: three panels repeat under every Canvas block, and the block pages do not re-explain them.