# How to create a dynamic menu in Jekyll that auto-populates nav items when creating new pages **URL:** \ **Category:** Help\ **Created:** [September 6, 2018, 2:58pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-create-a-dynamic-menu-in-jekyll-that-auto-populates-nav-items-when-creating-new-pages/2141 "2018-09-06T14:58:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![nicholastillman](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/nicholastillman/32/1272_2.png) [@nicholastillman](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/nicholastillman)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2018, 2:58pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-create-a-dynamic-menu-in-jekyll-that-auto-populates-nav-items-when-creating-new-pages/2141/1 "2018-09-06T14:58:20Z")
I am wondering how to go about creating a dynamic menu in Jekyll that automatically populates the navigation with nav items whenever a new page is created to make it easier for clients to maintain. I read an article -[https://thinkshout.com/blog/2014/12/creating-dynamic-menus-in-jekyll/](https://thinkshout.com/blog/2014/12/creating-dynamic-menus-in-jekyll/) that touched a bit on the subject, but it was geared toward just sub-nav items. Has anyone had any experience in doing something like this? Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![mmistakes](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/mmistakes/32/2169_2.png) [@mmistakes](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/mmistakes)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2018, 7:34pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-create-a-dynamic-menu-in-jekyll-that-auto-populates-nav-items-when-creating-new-pages/2141/2 "2018-09-06T19:34:30Z")
You can loop through `site.pages` or `site.posts` to populate your nav logic. I believe Jekyll’s default theme [Minima](https://github.com/jekyll/minima/blob/master/_includes/header.html) does this to list all of the site’s pages in the header. ---
**Author:** ![jhvanderschee](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/jhvanderschee/32/583_2.png) [@jhvanderschee](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/jhvanderschee)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2018, 8:20pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-create-a-dynamic-menu-in-jekyll-that-auto-populates-nav-items-when-creating-new-pages/2141/3 "2018-09-06T20:20:24Z")
It is a bad idea to do this automatically. However, it is very easy to achieve. Here is the code: ```auto ``` Source: [https://jekyllcodex.org/without-plugin/simple-menu/](https://jekyllcodex.org/without-plugin/simple-menu/) To define the order of appearence, you might want to add a front matter variable called ‘order’ to the pages and add a different pagenumber to this variable on each page. The code should sort the pages before looping over them. That looks like this: ```auto {% assign sitepages = site.pages | sort: order %} {% for item in site.pages %} ... {% endfor %} ``` Happy coding! ---
**Author:** ![nicholastillman](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/nicholastillman/32/1272_2.png) [@nicholastillman](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/nicholastillman)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2018, 1:49pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-create-a-dynamic-menu-in-jekyll-that-auto-populates-nav-items-when-creating-new-pages/2141/4 "2018-09-13T13:49:59Z")
Thanks a bunch for help and link. Also, why would it be a bad idea, just curious? Thanks again! ---
**Author:** ![jhvanderschee](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/jhvanderschee/32/583_2.png) [@jhvanderschee](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/jhvanderschee)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2018, 12:39pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-create-a-dynamic-menu-in-jekyll-that-auto-populates-nav-items-when-creating-new-pages/2141/5 "2018-09-27T12:39:34Z")
It is a bad idea since this script does not allow you to make unlisted pages. Adding pages to your menu is not a regular thing you want to do, I guess, while creating pages (hopefully) is. ---
**Author:** ![Vadorequest](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/vadorequest/32/2383_2.png) [@Vadorequest](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/Vadorequest)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2020, 4:09pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-create-a-dynamic-menu-in-jekyll-that-auto-populates-nav-items-when-creating-new-pages/2141/6 "2020-03-26T16:09:43Z")
[https://pmarsceill.github.io/just-the-docs/](https://pmarsceill.github.io/just-the-docs/) looks like a really good theme for github documentation. ---
**Author:** ![MichaelCurrin](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/michaelcurrin/32/2340_2.png) [@MichaelCurrin](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/MichaelCurrin)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2020, 9:09pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-create-a-dynamic-menu-in-jekyll-that-auto-populates-nav-items-when-creating-new-pages/2141/7 "2020-03-26T21:09:45Z")
Indeed as mentioned before minima uses approach to iterate over pages (I think alphabetically) - [https://github.com/jekyll/minima/blob/master/\_includes/header.html](https://github.com/jekyll/minima/blob/master/_includes/header.html) If you at the top you’ll see that it uses `header_pages` as a list set if config and then falls back to pages it can find on its own. ---
**Author:** ![MichaelCurrin](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/talk.jekyllrb.com/michaelcurrin/32/2340_2.png) [@MichaelCurrin](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/u/MichaelCurrin)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2020, 9:12pm UTC](https://talk.jekyllrb.com/t/how-to-create-a-dynamic-menu-in-jekyll-that-auto-populates-nav-items-when-creating-new-pages/2141/8 "2020-03-26T21:12:49Z")
Also for interest see the jekyll menus plugin. I haven’t tried it but allows nesting of menus and setting of weights and it looks like either frontmatter or a data file. - [https://github.com/forestryio/jekyll-menus/blob/master/README.md](https://github.com/forestryio/jekyll-menus/blob/master/README.md)