A list template is any template that will be used to render multiple pieces of content in a single HTML page (with the exception of the homepage which has a dedicated template).

We are using the term list in its truest sense, a sequential arrangement of material, especially in alphabetical or numerical order. Hugo uses list templates to render anyplace where content is being listed such as taxonomies and sections.

Which Template will be rendered?

Hugo uses a set of rules to figure out which template to use when rendering a specific page.

Hugo will use the following prioritized list. If a file isn’t present, then the next one in the list will be used. This enables you to craft specific layouts when you want to without creating more templates than necessary. For most sites only the _default file at the end of the list will be needed.

Section Lists

A Section will be rendered at /SECTION/ (e.g. http://spf13.com/project/)

  • /layouts/section/SECTION.html
  • /layouts/_default/section.html
  • /layouts/_default/list.html
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/section/SECTION.html
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/_default/section.html
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/_default/list.html

Note that a sections list page can also have a content file with frontmatter, see Source Organization.

Taxonomy Lists

A Taxonomy will be rendered at /PLURAL/TERM/ (e.g. http://spf13.com/topics/golang/) from:

  • /layouts/taxonomy/SINGULAR.html (e.g. /layouts/taxonomy/topic.html)
  • /layouts/_default/taxonomy.html
  • /layouts/_default/list.html
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/taxonomy/SINGULAR.html
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/_default/taxonomy.html
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/_default/list.html

Note that a taxonomy list page can also have a content file with frontmatter, see Source Organization.

Section RSS

A Section’s RSS will be rendered at /SECTION/index.xml (e.g. http://spf13.com/project/index.xml)

Hugo ships with its own RSS 2.0 template. In most cases this will be sufficient, and an RSS template will not need to be provided by the user.

Hugo provides the ability for you to define any RSS type you wish, and can have different RSS files for each section and taxonomy.

  • /layouts/section/SECTION.rss.xml
  • /layouts/_default/rss.xml
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/section/SECTION.rss.xml
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/_default/rss.xml

Taxonomy RSS

A Taxonomy’s RSS will be rendered at /PLURAL/TERM/index.xml (e.g. http://spf13.com/topics/golang/index.xml)

Hugo ships with its own RSS 2.0 template. In most cases this will be sufficient, and an RSS template will not need to be provided by the user.

Hugo provides the ability for you to define any RSS type you wish, and can have different RSS files for each section and taxonomy.

  • /layouts/taxonomy/SINGULAR.rss.xml
  • /layouts/_default/rss.xml
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/taxonomy/SINGULAR.rss.xml
  • /themes/THEME/layouts/_default/rss.xml

Variables

A list page is a Page and have all the page variables and site variables available to use in the templates.

Taxonomy pages will additionally have:

.Data.Singular The taxonomy itself.

Example List Template Pages

Example section template (post.html)

This content template is used for spf13.com. It makes use of partial templates. All examples use a view called either “li” or “summary” which this example site defined.

{{ partial "header.html" . }}
{{ partial "subheader.html" . }}

<section id="main">
  <div>
   <h1 id="title">{{ .Title }}</h1>
        <ul id="list">
            {{ range .Data.Pages }}
                {{ .Render "li"}}
            {{ end }}
        </ul>
  </div>
</section>

{{ partial "footer.html" . }}

Example taxonomy template (tag.html)

This content template is used for spf13.com. It makes use of partial templates. All examples use a view called either “li” or “summary” which this example site defined.

{{ partial "header.html" . }}
{{ partial "subheader.html" . }}

<section id="main">
  <div>
   <h1 id="title">{{ .Title }}</h1>
    {{ range .Data.Pages }}
        {{ .Render "summary"}}
    {{ end }}
  </div>
</section>

{{ partial "footer.html" . }}

Ordering Content

In the case of Hugo, each list will render the content based on metadata provided in the front matter. See ordering content for more information.

Here are a variety of different ways you can order the content items in your list templates:

Order by Weight -> Date (default)

{{ range .Data.Pages }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Order by Weight -> Date

{{ range .Data.Pages.ByWeight }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Order by Date

{{ range .Data.Pages.ByDate }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Order by PublishDate

{{ range .Data.Pages.ByPublishDate }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .PublishDate.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Order by ExpiryDate

{{ range .Data.Pages.ByExpiryDate }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .ExpiryDate.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Order by Lastmod

{{ range .Data.Pages.ByLastmod }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Order by Length

{{ range .Data.Pages.ByLength }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Order by Title

{{ range .Data.Pages.ByTitle }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Order by LinkTitle

{{ range .Data.Pages.ByLinkTitle }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .LinkTitle }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Order by Parameter

Order based on the specified frontmatter parameter. Pages without that parameter will use the site’s .Site.Params default. If the parameter is not found at all in some entries, those entries will appear together at the end of the ordering.

The below example sorts a list of posts by their rating.

{{ range (.Data.Pages.ByParam "rating") }}
  <!-- ... -->
{{ end }}

If the frontmatter field of interest is nested beneath another field, you can also get it:

{{ range (.Date.Pages.ByParam "author.last_name") }}
  <!-- ... -->
{{ end }}

Reverse Order

Can be applied to any of the above. Using Date for an example.

{{ range .Data.Pages.ByDate.Reverse }}
<li>
<a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
<div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
</li>
{{ end }}

Grouping Content

Hugo provides some grouping functions for list pages. You can use them to group pages by Section, Type, Date etc.

Here are a variety of different ways you can group the content items in your list templates:

Grouping by Page field

{{ range .Data.Pages.GroupBy "Section" }}
<h3>{{ .Key }}</h3>
<ul>
    {{ range .Pages }}
    <li>
    <a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
    <div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
    </li>
    {{ end }}
</ul>
{{ end }}

Grouping by Page date

{{ range .Data.Pages.GroupByDate "2006-01" }}
<h3>{{ .Key }}</h3>
<ul>
    {{ range .Pages }}
    <li>
    <a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
    <div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
    </li>
    {{ end }}
</ul>
{{ end }}

Grouping by Page publish date

{{ range .Data.Pages.GroupByPublishDate "2006-01" }}
<h3>{{ .Key }}</h3>
<ul>
    {{ range .Pages }}
    <li>
    <a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
    <div class="meta">{{ .PublishDate.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
    </li>
    {{ end }}
</ul>
{{ end }}

Grouping by Page param

{{ range .Data.Pages.GroupByParam "param_key" }}
<h3>{{ .Key }}</h3>
<ul>
    {{ range .Pages }}
    <li>
    <a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
    <div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
    </li>
    {{ end }}
</ul>
{{ end }}

Grouping by Page param in date format

{{ range .Data.Pages.GroupByParamDate "param_key" "2006-01" }}
<h3>{{ .Key }}</h3>
<ul>
    {{ range .Pages }}
    <li>
    <a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
    <div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
    </li>
    {{ end }}
</ul>
{{ end }}

Reversing Key Order

The ordering of the groups is performed by keys in alphanumeric order (A–Z, 1–100) and in reverse chronological order (newest first) for dates.

While these are logical defaults, they are not always the desired order. There are two different syntaxes to change the order; they both work the same way, so it’s really just a matter of preference.

Reverse method

{{ range (.Data.Pages.GroupBy "Section").Reverse }}
...

{{ range (.Data.Pages.GroupByDate "2006-01").Reverse }}
...

Providing the (alternate) direction

{{ range .Data.Pages.GroupByDate "2006-01" "asc" }}
...

{{ range .Data.Pages.GroupBy "Section" "desc" }}
...

Ordering Pages within Group

Because Grouping returns a key and a slice of pages, all of the ordering methods listed above are available.

In this example, I’ve ordered the groups in chronological order and the content within each group in alphabetical order by title.

{{ range .Data.Pages.GroupByDate "2006-01" "asc" }}
<h3>{{ .Key }}</h3>
<ul>
    {{ range .Pages.ByTitle }}
    <li>
    <a href="{{ .Permalink }}">{{ .Title }}</a>
    <div class="meta">{{ .Date.Format "Mon, Jan 2, 2006" }}</div>
    </li>
    {{ end }}
</ul>
{{ end }}

Filtering & Limiting Content

Sometimes you only want to list a subset of the available content. A common request is to only display “Posts” on the homepage. Using the where function, you can do just that.

first

first works like the limit keyword in SQL. It reduces the array to only the first N elements. It takes the array and number of elements as input.

{{ range first 10 .Data.Pages }}
    {{ .Render "summary" }}
{{ end }}

where

where works in a similar manner to the where keyword in SQL. It selects all elements of the slice that match the provided field and value. It takes three arguments: ‘array or slice of maps or structs’, ‘key or field name’ and ‘match value’.

{{ range where .Data.Pages "Section" "post" }}
   {{ .Content }}
{{ end }}

first & where Together

Using both together can be very powerful.

{{ range first 5 (where .Data.Pages "Section" "post") }}
   {{ .Content }}
{{ end }}

If where or first receives invalid input or a field name that doesn’t exist, it will return an error and stop site generation.

These are both template functions and work on not only lists, but taxonomies, terms and groups.