Do you want to build an online question and answer community like Stack Overflow or Quora?
You can create a whole site dedicated to Q&A, or add a question and answer section to an existing WordPress site. No matter what approach you take, helpful questions and answers can improve the visitor experience and keep people on your website for longer.
In this article, we will show you how to easily create a question and answers site in WordPress.
Getting Started with a Question and Answer Website
To start your own question and answers website, you will need the following:
- A domain name. This is the name of your website such as stackoverflow.com.
- A web hosting account. This is where your website’s files are stored. All websites need web hosting.
- A Content Management System. This is software that helps you create, publish, and manage all your questions and answers. For this guide, we’ll be using WordPress as it powers nearly 43% of all websites and gives you complete control over your content. To learn more about why we recommend WordPress to all our readers, please see our complete WordPress review with pros and cons.
- Extra software, plugins, or tools. These add special question-and-answer features to your WordPress website.
How Much Does It Cost to Build a Question and Answer Website?
The answer to this question depends on the features you need, how many visitors you get, how much content you create, and lots of other factors.
To help you budget, we’ve created a complete guide on how much it really costs to build a website. However, typically the cost of building a website can range from anywhere between $100 per year to as high as $30,000 per year.
We recommend you start small and then add more features to your question-and-answer site as it grows and gets more popular. This helps you avoid spending too much on your site, before it starts making a profit.
That said, let’s see how you can build a successful Q&A website for under $100.
Step 1: Setting up Your Question and Answers Site
To create a WordPress website you’ll need a domain name and web hosting. To help you out, we’ve hand-picked some of the best WordPress hosting that you can buy for a question and answer website.
Although the WordPress software is free, hosting and domain names are where the costs can really start to add up.
A domain name typically costs $14.99/year and hosting costs start from $7.99/month. This is A LOT for new websites or anyone who is working with a limited budget.
Luckily, Bluehost has agreed to offer our users a free domain name and over 60% off on web hosting. Basically, you can get started for $2.75 per month.
→ Click Here to Claim This Exclusive Bluehost Offer ←
Bluehost is one of the largest hosting companies in the world and an officially recommended WordPress hosting provider.
They’re also offering our readers a free SSL certificate so you have the option to accept payments online. This is perfect if you want to make money from your question and answer website in the future.
To buy a domain name and hosting, simply go to the Bluehost website in a new browser window and click on the green ‘Get Started Now’ button.
This will bring you to a pricing page where you can choose a hosting plan for your question-and-answer website.
We recommend choosing a Basic or Plus plan, as they’re the most popular web hosting plans among our readers.
After selecting a plan, click on ‘Continue.’
On the next screen, you’ll need to choose a domain name.
Ideally, the domain name will be easy to pronounce and spell, and easy to remember.
Need help choosing a domain name for your question and answer website? See these tips and tools on how to choose the best domain name.
After choosing a name, click on the ‘Next’ button to continue.
Now you’ll need to provide your account information such as your name and business email address. After that, you’ll also see optional extras that you can purchase.
We generally don’t recommend purchasing these extras straight away, as you can always add them later on if you need them.
After that, simply type in your payment information to complete the purchase.
Once you’ve done that, you’ll get an email with instructions on how to log in to your web hosting control panel. This is your hosting account dashboard where you can manage your Q&A website, including setting up email notifications and asking for WordPress support, if you need it.
It’s also where you’ll install the WordPress software.
Step 2. Install WordPress on Your Question and Answer Website
When you signup with Bluehost using our link, you’ll get access to a one-click WordPress installer.
Simply log into your Bluehost account and click on ‘One Click Install.’
Here, you’ll see all the different software you can add to your account.
Simply find ‘WordPress’ and give it a click.
Here, just click on the ‘Install’ button.
You can now follow the onscreen instructions to install the WordPress software.
Once that process is finished, you can log in to the WordPress dashboard by simply going to yoursite.com/wp-admin/ directly from your browser.
If you’re using a different WordPress website host like SiteGround, Hostinger, HostGator, or WP Engine, then you can see our complete guide on how to install WordPress for all the top hosting providers.
Step 3. Select a WordPress Theme
After installing WordPress, you’ll typically want to change the default theme. WordPress themes are professionally designed templates that change how your site looks and acts.
There are lots of different premium and free WordPress business themes to choose from. You can generally categorize these as multipurpose WordPress themes, or niche industry themes.
Another option is to use a landing page builder plugin such as SeedProd.
SeedProd is the best drag-and-drop WordPress page builder and comes with built-in templates that you can use to build a professionally-designed question-and-answer website.
It even has a ready-made FAQ section that you can add to any page using drag and drop.
Once you’ve chosen a theme, please see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress theme.
Step 4. Setting up Your Question and Answers Site
The easiest way to add question and answer features to your WordPress website is by using the AnsPress plugin. This plugin allows you to create a Stack Overflow-style question and answer site.
Even better, AnsPress automatically creates all the pages you need to launch a successful Q and A site.
This includes a page where visitors can type in their questions, in exactly the same way people use websites like Quora.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate AnsPress. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, AnsPress automatically adds question-and-answer pages to your WordPress website. To see these pages, head over to AnsPress » Settings in the WordPress dashboard.
Once there, you can select ‘General’ in the menu on the left-hand side.
This page lists all the different pages that AnsPress has created.
To take a closer look at any page, simply click on its ‘View page’ link.
The default AnsPress pages should be a good fit for most WordPress blogs and websites. However, you can always add your own content to these pages.
For example, you might add some text that encourages visitors to post their questions, and tells them when to expect an answer.
To add your own content to any AnsPress page, simply click on the ‘Edit page’ link next to it.
This opens the standard WordPress post editor where you can add text, images, and more.
As you can see, AnsPress adds all its content using shortcode, so don’t change this code in any way.
When you’re happy with the changes you’ve made, just click on ‘Update.’
You can edit any default AnsPress page by following the same process described above.
When you’ve finished, don’t forget to click on ‘Save Pages’ to store your settings.
By default, AnsPress adds the following message to all its pages: ‘Question and answer is powered by anspress.net.’ This can make your site look less professional.
It also links to the AnsPress site, which can hurt your pageviews and bounce rate by encouraging people to leave your site.
Because of that, it’s a good idea to remove this text by checking the box next to ‘Hide author credits’ and then clicking on ‘Save Changes.’
Now if you look at any AnsPress page, you’ll see the text has vanished.
With that done, scroll to the ‘Permalinks’ section in the AnsPress settings.
Here, you’ll see the permalink structure and settings that the plugin uses by default. These settings should work well for most websites, but you may be able to improve your WordPress SEO by making some small changes.
For example, you may want to add some relevant keywords to the default ‘Question slug.’ This can help you create more SEO-friendly URLs in WordPress.
In the image below, each question will now use the slug /questions/wordpress-questions/question-name/ which will help us rank for the term ‘WordPress.’
If you do make any changes in this section, then don’t forget to click on ‘Save Changes.’
Next, it’s time to fine-tune the layout by scrolling to the ‘Layout’ section. Here, you’ll see that AnsPress shows the user’s Gravatar in a few different places including next to questions, answers, and comments.
You can change the size of these avatars by typing into the different boxes.
For more information on user avatars, please see our beginner’s guide on Gravatars and why you should start using them right away.
By default, AnsPress will show 20 questions per page and 5 answers per page. You can show more or less content by typing new numbers into the ‘Questions per page’ or ‘Answers per page’ box.
If you show fewer questions and answers per page, then users will need to scroll less. This is particularly helpful for visitors who are using smaller devices like smartphones and tablets. It can also speed up your WordPress performance since you’re loading less content.
Just be aware that most visitors expect to get the right answer on the first page, so you’ll want to show a reasonable number of answers per page.
When you’re happy with how your Q&A site is set up, click on the ‘Submit’ button.
Email notifications are an important part of running a successful question-and-answer website. They let admins know when customers or potential leads post a new question, and they also let users know when their question gets an answer.
In this way, emails can keep users engaged and help your Q&A site run more smoothly.
AnsPress comes with built-in email notifications that work out-of-the-box. However, it’s still smart to see whether there are any changes you want to make by clicking on the ‘Email’ link.
Here, you can see all the different emails that AnsPress will send automatically.
To enable or disable an email, simply click on the box next to it.
Pro Tip: You need to make sure all your Q&A emails go to the user’s email inbox and not to the spam folder. The best way to do this is by using an SMTP service provider to improve email deliverability. For more details, see our guide on how to fix WordPress not sending email issue.
As always, don’t forget to click on ‘Submit’ to save your changes.
Some question-and-answer sites are completely open to the public. This means that non-logged-in users can see the content, and may even be able to post questions and answers without creating an account.
Other Q&A sites are completely private or require user registration.
There are drawbacks and positives to the different approaches. A public question-and-answer site will typically get more traffic and engagement, but it may also get more spam and attract low-quality answers.
If you’re using questions and answers to make money online blogging with WordPress, then you may want to make some parts of your site members-only. This allows you to charge a subscription fee using a plugin like MemberPress.
Another option is allowing people to register with your website for free, so you can collect their email addresses. In this way, your question-and-answer site can help you do lead generation like a pro.
However you plan to use your question-and-answer site, it’s a good idea to review the posting permissions by selecting ‘User Access Control.’
Here, you can see all the different content that logged-in and non-logged-in users can access, and the actions they take. You can change these settings using the different dropdown menus.
You can also change whether questions and answers get posted automatically, or if they’re held for admin approval. By default, non-logged-in users can post questions and answers, but you’ll need to approve them manually in the admin area.
This is similar to how you moderate comments in WordPress.
These settings are self-explanatory but they have a big impact on how your question-and-answer site runs. With that being said, it’s worth going through the different settings carefully and then making any changes.
If you do edit these settings, then don’t forget to click on the ‘Submit’ button.
AnsPress encourages users to engage with your site through gamification, by awarding reputation points for different actions. This reputation system works by default, but you can change how many points AnsPress awards for each action by selecting ‘Reputations.’
Here, you’ll see all the different actions and their reputation points.
To award more or less points for an action, simply type a new number into its box. When you’re happy with how the reputation system is set up, click on Save Events Points.
There are some more settings you may want to look through, but this should be enough to help you set up a successful question-and-answer website.
When you’re happy with how the plugin and pages are set up, it’s a good idea to add them to your website’s navigation menu so visitors can find them.
For step-by-step instructions, please see our beginner’s guide on how to add a navigation menu in WordPress.
If you need reminding about all the different pages that AnsPress added to your site, then simply go to AnsPress » Settings and then click on the ‘Pages’ link.
Managing Your Question Answer Site
At this point, your site is ready to start accepting questions and answers from users. However, depending on how your Q&A site is set up, you may need to manually approve some, or all, of these posts.
By default, AnsPress will email the WordPress admin about any questions or answers that need manual approval. You’ll also see notifications in the admin dashboard.
To manually approve an answer or question, simply click on either ‘All Questions’ or ‘All Answers’ in the left-hand menu.
You can then hover your mouse over the post that you want to review and click on ‘View.’
This will show a preview of how the question or answer will look on your website.
If you’re happy to make it live, then click on the small cog icon and then select ‘Published.’
If you don’t want to publish the post, then select ‘Delete’ or ‘Delete Permanently’ instead.
We hope this article helped you create a question-and-answer site in WordPress. You may also want to see our guide on how to create a contact form in WordPress or see our expert pick of the best live chat software for small businesses.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
Gopal K says
This plugin hasn’t updated from past one year please updated alternative QA plugin list.
WPBeginner Support says
Thank you for letting us know, we will be sure to take a look at updating this article when we are able.
Admin
Jasmin says
How to add members
WPBeginner Support says
If you want to add them for a membership site, you would want to take a look at our article below:
https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/ultimate-guide-to-creating-a-wordpress-membership-site/
Admin
Andde says
Does this questions appear in google search results?
WPBeginner Support says
That would depend on Google and their opinion on the content.
Admin
MuneeburRehman says
Hi,
Which Theme we use for this Plugin…?
WPBeginner Support says
A specific theme is not required to use this plugin
Admin
Malay says
After activating the plugin I am only getting DW Question Answer page.
The DWQA Ask Question page is not reflecting.
What am I mising over here?
WPBeginner Support says
If I’m understanding your question correctly, you may need to clear your cache if it is a display issue. If you mean you’re not able to list the questions then you would need to reach out to the plugin’s support.
Admin
Sam says
How can I promote my questions and answers website.
WPBeginner Support says
For increasing your traffic you could take a look at our guide here: https://www.wpbeginner.com/beginners-guide/how-to-increase-your-blog-traffic/
Admin
Brij Bhushan says
This article is very useful and informative …………..your way of writing is really easy and understandable I learn so much from your blog thanks for sharing such an informative article
WPBeginner Support says
Glad you like our content
Admin
Bob says
Why this form of Q&A versus a traditional discussion forum such as BBPress? What are the pros and cons of each?
Bob
WPBeginner Support says
The main bonus of using the plugin from this article is the option to upvote specific answers while a forum is not required to answer questions. It is personal preference for what to use for what you’re trying to achieve.
Admin
Askedon says
Isn’t there any other way of creating such website? I mean without the use of a plugin?
WPBeginner Support says
While you could make something similar without using plugins, it would require a large number of customizations to make it a simple process for your users which the plugin allows.
Admin
Brij Bhushan says
Such a more valuable information. I also read your all Blogs. This is awesome!! I’ve always enjoyed reading your blog. Keep writing such kind of info on your page. I am really impressed with this type of writing. Thanks for sharing with us.
WPBeginner Support says
Glad you like our articles
Admin
Ian says
This is helpful but when I generate a new question the formatting goes all wrong. I have a transparent header and menu and because the questions is generated on a white background I lose this visibility. Likewise as I edit a question page to make it look right as soon as I generate another question the format reverts back. How do I overcome this?
WPBeginner Support says
You would want to reach out to your specific theme to see if this is a conflict between your theme and the plugin.
Admin
Anna says
Hello,
I would like to enable the option of adding comments and answers without a need to be logged in and without the requirement for an email address. How can I do it? Right now to add anything person needs to give the email.
Thanks in advance.
Anna
WPBeginner Support says
You would want to go into the plugin’s settings to allow anonymous posting or comments
Admin
Graham FB says
I use a site that the questions asked come in the form of an email. I know postie plugin can convert the email to a post. Can any of the Q and A plugins accept” questions by email ?
WPBeginner Support says
We don’t have a specific one we would recommend at the moment but this method does give an option for your users to submit the questions through your site.
Admin
Arti Sharma says
Very nice collections of question answer sites, i have found here best question answer site over my search experience. and also its great use for my question’s answer,thanks for sharing such a wonderful sites. thank you very much.
WPBeginner Support says
Glad our content could help answer your questions
Admin
ATUL says
Sir I can create a one website that is number of user ask IT question.and ans any user.please tell me about requirement to popular website.
Sandeep Pujare says
I did not find any option to post the answer as an admin. Are they have any?
Adamu Malte says
You can post your anser by visiting your Answer Questions Page link
vikash says
Its not SEO friendly plugin even Youst Seo is not helpful to index in google of questions. i have convert my bbpress tp DWQA but i think its big mistake. its five days gone and there is 112 new questions but no any indexed in google but with bbpress any questions was indexed within 24-48 hrs. now any one can help me the way to convert DWQA to bbpress again? i am not a coder and its very difficult for me please any one help me :(:(
Margie says
Hi Vikash
Did you receive any help in the end? I am trying to integrate BuddyPress with DW Questions & Answers but the recommended code
include_once get_template_directory().’/buddypress/bp-custom.php’;
is reporting errors.
Asif Shaik says
Does this plugin support media upload
Raju says
I had a website name. Now I want to create a page for the students where all question regarding maths, especially for engineering and other numerical questions well be in solved form.. can i use this plugin for numerical question or can i put HTML codes using this plugins? pls explain me . Thank you.
WPBeginner Support says
Please contact plugin author for support.
Admin
Zain Javed says
Hi sir ,
Can you please tell me some good free themes with this plugin to work .
Thank You ,
Zain
WPBeginner Support says
It should work great with default themes as well. Also check out these 43 beautiful free WordPress blog themes.
Admin
dh danny says
How to design my own template for questions and answers…?
Ajay Rathaur says
Hi,
As I have checked on this plugin that user can login with the wordpress account only. is it possible i can modify it. so that people can login with their gmail, yahoo and other mail account also.
WPBeginner Support says
You can try login with Facebook.
Admin
syed Ismail Shah says
i want to create a website for the students where all question regarding maths, statistics and other numerical questions well be in solved form.. can i use this plugin for numercal question or can i put HTML codes using this plugins?
WPBeginner Staff says
@designwall Thanks for dropping by
designwall says
Hi everyone,
Thanks WPBeginner for this awesome article about our DW Q&A plugin. We really appreciate it.
@Everyone who is using our plugin and facing any issue or having questions, please feel free to raise it at our Support page: http://www.designwall.com/question/
Our support staff will answer all the questions and issues.
Thanks a lot
Cheers,
Harsha Sampath says
Toolbar not work. Please help me
raunek says
Does this plugin affect website loading time?
hiren patel says
hello, is there any way to show particular page related question and answer using wp-answers plugin.
pls advice
thanks.
younes says
hello…my friend
tanx a lot for this post…
Vote option in Local working perfectly but in really host dont appear
I disabled all plugin but vote dont appear
please help me
HUSSAIN says
please give me link how to set notification setting… with image
Christian Trejo says
Awesome! I was going to spend $124 in the WP-Answers Pro plugin but I installed this and it is awesome. Any idea about how can I translate it? Thanks
Ra Ek says
DWQA has DWQA in the “DWQA Questions” literal. Where can this be changed? I didn’t find it in the php code.
Micheal Crols says
I love this plugin very much. Very awesome!
Nicola says
Can I allow anonymous users to post a question without registering?
marian says
A very good post! I just instaled dwqa plugin, and I came here from a google search ” what theme should I use with dwqa plugin” I read the all post, I read it how to instal from dw guide original page, but tour post is better then their post :)). Good Job. Checking my site http:// Just kiding, this isn’t a spam comment :). Is my feedback
Sai says
Does WordPress.com support downloading plugins and installing them? I saw that it doesn’t. Does that mean all the plugins that are mentioned are for wordpress.org?
WPBeginner Support says
Yes all the plugins mentioned here are for WordPress.org, please check out our guide on Self Hosted WordPress.org vs. WordPress.com
Admin
ahsan karim says
HELLO SIR THANKS WELL DONE
Kjetil says
Thanks for this info
What is the main benefits with this (or this kind of) plugin compared with a forum plugin (like Simplepress) – apart that Q&A obviously is simpler to setup?
WPBeginner Support says
It depends on how you use a forum plugin. If you want to use it to create Q&A site, then you would need to set it up in a way so that your users can quickly understand what you want them to do. Using a Q&A specific plugin takes the guess work out of the equation and provides a better user experience.
Admin
Charlie Sasser says
I have also been looking for something like this. Have not installed yet, but it wasn’t clear if Q&A could be “viewed” without a login. I would want everyone to view the information but have a login to ask a question or answer. Could this be integrated with a plugin that allows login via Facebook, Twitter, acccount, etc.?
Arup Ghosh says
Great share I was looking something for free. There is a theme by wp-answer.com which allows importing of question and answers from Yahoo! answers.
Andy says
how does this integrate with paid membership pro?
WPBeginner Support says
We tested it on default WordPress install. Check out plugin’s support forum to find out if it has any compatibility issue.
Admin
Anna Coffin says
This plug in is perfect for my site. I followed your directions but the pages are not appearing on my site? Any suggestions on what might be wrong?
WPBeginner Support says
You can also create your own pages. Simply create two new pages and then go to plugin settings and use one page as Ask question page and the other page for listing questions.
Admin
shamsher says
very informative..
Mark H says
I had a Q&A page on our site for a while (plugin from WPMU) but it was constantly hit with spam. How does this plugin deal with it? Unchecking “anyone can register?” Then what?
WPBeginner Support says
According to plugin website they will soon release an update to the plugin which will enable captcha support.
Admin
Jin Matsumoto says
Hi Mark,
DesignWall Team has updated the plugin and support reCAPTCHA from Google.
Erik says
It also appears you need to use a redirect plugin.. after you submit a question you get a 404 page.
Erik says
Ok, my mess up you need to leave permalinks at default.
WPBeginner Support says
No ,you don’t. Just update your permalink settings.
Admin
Debra Dalgleish says
I was getting that 404 page too, and had to add forward slashes at the start of the permalinks.
Michael Crols says
@Debra Dalgleish
Just go to Dashboard >> Q&A >> Settings -> Permalink -> Save Changes.
You do not have to change anything just press “Save Changes”button at the bottom of the screen and the 404 issue will be resolved.
Erik says
It would be nice if you could remove the questions category and tags option. Just have the title and question.
Bob Dunn says
Wow, perfect timing, as I have been debating between a forum and this kind of a plugin for a new site. This helped make my decision
After installing and testing, I did find a couple minor bugs with the theme I am using, but this plugin is in it’s first version I believe, and that is bound to happen. Overall it looks great. Also, going through the support questions it sounds as if they are working on some more specific features as people ask questions or find issues. I see a great future for this plugin… cheers!