What Are Drupal Modules and How Do I Install Them?

In this tutorial, I will explain what Drupal modules are and also show you how to install them. This tutorial gets you started with understanding and using Drupal modules.

What Are Drupal Modules?

Drupal modules are like plugins for your site. The modules allow you to add different functions to your site such as polls, search fields, and contact forms. Modules make it easy on administrators to further expand their site. You can download modules to add to your site too. They are just link plugins.

How Do I Install Modules in Drupal?

You can install the modules that are already on your Drupal site. Most of the modules on your Drupal site are not installed or enabled, however you want to look at it. You will need to go into your admin panel and install them.

Login to your admin panel and click Site Building > Modules in the menu on the left. The modules page will load and you will see a list of modules available for you to install. You will see the name of the modules and then you will see a description of the modules. To install a module, tick the box next to the module. Then click the Save Configuration button at the very bottom of the page. Your module will be installed.

Downloading and Installing Modules for Drupal

You can also download modules and install them in Drupal. Find a module you want to download. Download it and unzip it. Take the unzipped file and uploaded it to your Modules folder in Drupal. It should be Drupal/modules directory.

After you have uploaded the module, you will need to go back to your module page, or if you are on your module page, simply refresh it. Your new module will appear at the bottom of your page. You will need to tick the module box and click the Save Configuration button to activate it.

Note

If your module page only has links and you do not see the modules, you will need to click the links to expand the sections for the modules. The Core Optional section is the section of modules that Drupal provides. The Core Required are modules that you cannot enable or disable because they are required. When you install new modules you downloaded, a new section will probably be made for them. A couple of modules I downloaded were placed in the Core Optional section, but some were placed in their own sections. So, I guess it all depends on the module.