A single gallery page works well for one shoot. Keep adding shoots to that same page, though, and it turns into one long scroll of everybody’s photos.
A client who came for their wedding pictures now has to scroll past every portrait session and event you’ve ever posted. That’s a lot to ask of someone who wants one set of photos.
The fix is to group your galleries into albums. Each shoot keeps its own gallery, and visitors pick the one they want from a page of covers.
Knowing the album vs gallery difference tells you when that fix is worth it, and when one gallery is enough. I built the album you’ll see below on a real WordPress site, so every screenshot shows how it actually looks.
In This Article:
What Is a Gallery in WordPress?
A gallery is a set of photos shown together on one page. Visitors see the photos as thumbnails, and a click opens each one larger.
WordPress has a built-in Gallery block for this. It places your photos in a grid, and its “Expand on click” setting opens each image bigger on the same page.
A gallery plugin gives you more control over how the photos look. Envira Gallery is a WordPress gallery plugin, and its free Lite version already covers galleries: drag-and-drop uploads, a built-in lightbox, and the Automatic layout.
If you haven’t built one yet, our guide to creating a WordPress photo gallery walks you through it.
In my experience, a gallery is the right size for one shoot, one event, or one product line. Once you have several of those, it’s time to think about albums.
What Is a Photo Album in WordPress?
An album is a collection of galleries. Instead of showing photos, the album page shows one cover image for each gallery, and a click opens that gallery.
WordPress itself has no albums. The Gallery block holds photos, but it can’t group several galleries under one page, which is why albums come from a plugin.
Say you photograph weddings. A “Weddings” album could hold one gallery per wedding, so each couple finds their day by its cover photo.
A portfolio works the same way. One “Portfolio” album with Portraits, Landscapes, and Events galleries lets visitors go straight to the kind of work they care about.
The album doesn’t copy your photos. It links to galleries you’ve already built, so every gallery keeps working on its own and you can keep adding new ones over time.
Here’s an album I built from three travel galleries, with each gallery’s title and photo count under its cover:
You can click through a bigger example in the Envira albums demo.
Album vs Gallery: The Key Differences
Both put your photos on a page, but they work at different levels. Here’s how they compare side by side:
| Gallery | Album | |
|---|---|---|
| What it holds | Photos | Galleries |
| What visitors see first | The photos themselves | A grid of gallery covers |
| What a click does | Opens one photo larger, in a lightbox | Opens a whole gallery, in a lightbox or on the gallery’s own page |
| Best for | A single shoot, event, or topic | A body of work with many shoots |
| Included in | Envira Lite and every plan | The Albums addon, on Pro and above |
The short version: a gallery shows photos, and an album shows galleries. Everything else follows from that.
When to Use a Gallery and When to Use an Album
The right choice depends on how much work you’re showing and how visitors look for it. These are the situations I see most often:
If you’re sharing one shoot or one product line: a gallery is all you need. Visitors land on the photos right away, with nothing to click through first.
If you shoot many sessions of the same type: use an album. A “Weddings” or “Events” album gives each session its own gallery, so nobody scrolls past other people’s photos.
If your portfolio covers several genres: an album with one gallery per genre keeps portraits, landscapes, and commercial work apart. Our guide to building a photography portfolio in WordPress shows how to plan those pages.
If your site only has a few dozen photos: stick with a gallery. An album adds an extra click, and that click only pays off when there are several galleries to choose from.
You can also start with galleries and add an album later. Nothing about your existing galleries changes when you do.
What Visitors See When They Open an Album
An Envira album opens on a grid of gallery covers. Under each cover, you can show the gallery’s title, caption, description, and photo count, each switched on separately in the album settings.
Out of the box, titles and photo counts are off. I’d turn both on, because a title and a count tell visitors what’s behind each cover before they click.
What happens on a click is your choice. By default, the cover takes visitors to that gallery’s own page, where each photo opens in the lightbox as usual.
If you’d rather skip that extra page, tick Enable Lightbox? in the album settings. The cover then opens the gallery’s photos in a lightbox right over the album. Arrows move through the photos, and closing the lightbox brings visitors back to the covers:
When covers open each gallery’s own page, the album can add a link back. Display Back to Album Link? puts a “Back to Album” link above or below the gallery, as our post on showing a back to album link explains.
The album can carry its own description too, shown above or below the covers. It’s a good spot for one line about the collection, like the season or the type of work.
How to Turn Your Galleries Into an Album With Envira Gallery
Albums come from the Albums addon, which is included with the Pro plan and every plan above it. Your galleries stay exactly as they are, and the album is built from them.
Start in your dashboard under Envira Gallery » Addons, and activate the Albums addon. Albums uses Envira’s Standalone feature, which gives each gallery its own page.
When I activated it on my test site, a notice asked me to enable Standalone first. If you see it too, go to Envira Gallery » Settings, open the Standalone tab, tick Enable Standalone, and click Save.
Next, go to Envira Gallery » Albums and add a new album. Give it a name, then drag your galleries into the box at the top of the screen.
You can also click each gallery under Available Galleries and then click Add Selected Galleries to Album. Here’s my album with three galleries added:
Click the pencil icon on any gallery to choose its cover. Each gallery’s cover can be any photo from that gallery, and you can edit the title and caption shown in the album there too.
Then open the Configuration tab to show gallery titles and photo counts, and the Lightbox tab if you’d rather have covers open the photos in a lightbox. Click Publish when you’re happy.
The album gets its own page right away. To place it somewhere else, copy the shortcode from the album screen and paste it into any page or post.
Every album setting is covered in the Albums addon documentation if you want to go further.
Give Every Shoot Its Own Place
The Albums addon comes with Envira Gallery Pro and every plan above it. Turn the galleries you already have into albums your visitors can browse.
Tips for Building Albums Visitors Want to Explore
An album only works if visitors can tell the galleries apart at a glance. These are the habits that help most:
- Pick a strong cover for every gallery. The cover is all a visitor sees before clicking, so choose the photo that sums up the shoot, not just the first one you uploaded.
- Name galleries the way people look for them. “Garden Wedding” or “Studio Portraits” beats “Gallery 4”, because the title is what shows under the cover.
- Put the galleries in a sensible order. Drag them into place, or use the album’s Sorting setting: No Sorting, Random, Published Date, Title, Caption, or Alt, each Ascending or Descending.
- Help visitors find their way around. Breadcrumbs (Pro and above) show where a gallery sits inside its album, as our guide to breadcrumb links in galleries and albums shows.
- Make the album easy to reach. Adding it to your site menu puts the whole collection one click from any page. Here’s how to add galleries and albums to your WordPress menu.
On Pro and above, the Related Galleries addon adds up to three related gallery cards after each album, so visitors always have a next gallery to open. You can switch them off for any album you’d rather keep on its own.
Frequently Asked Questions About Albums and Galleries
Does WordPress have photo albums built in?
No. WordPress comes with a Gallery block for showing photos, but it has no way to group several galleries into an album. For albums, you need a gallery plugin such as Envira Gallery with its Albums addon.
Is the Albums feature free in Envira Gallery?
No. Albums come with the Albums addon, which is part of Envira Gallery Pro and every plan above it. Galleries themselves are free in Envira Lite.
Can the same gallery appear in more than one album?
Yes. An album links to your galleries rather than copying them, so one gallery can sit in several albums at once. A “Best of” album can reuse galleries that also live in your “Weddings” album.
Can I sort the galleries inside an album?
Yes. You can drag the galleries into any order on the album screen. The album’s Configuration tab also has a Sorting setting, with Random, Published Date, Title, Caption, and Alt in ascending or descending order.
Galleries hold your shoots, and albums hold your galleries, so your whole body of work stays easy to browse as it grows. Ready to build yours? Follow our step-by-step guide on how to create a photo album in WordPress.
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Envira, this seems so backwards intuitively. Albums are books we slide our photos into. We all have them. We go to a gallery to view art. You could have an album in a gallery, but not the other way around. What is the reasoning behind this?
It might be worthwhile to contact support with any feature requests on updating this functionality. There are no guarantees, but it will be reviewed and discussed!
FWIW, I have to agree with Joy on this. Almost certain that Envira will not change it at this point – would be too confusing to long-time users – but based on the actual meaning of the words “Album” and “Gallery”, I’ve always found this to be a bit counterintuitive.