CMS Categories

Magento 2 ships with a powerful CMS page editor but provides no built-in way to organise those pages into a navigable hierarchy visible to shoppers. Without a structure, large content sites end up with scattered pages that customers must find through search or manually entered URLs. The CMS Category Tree extension for Magento 2 by Mage2Expert solves this by adding a complete category management system for CMS pages — a dedicated admin tree, a configurable sidebar block that appears automatically on every CMS page, and a standard Magento widget that lets you place the tree anywhere on your storefront. Categories are unlimited in depth, each page can be assigned to one or more categories, and the entire system is store-view scoped so multilingual and multi-store installations have independent navigation trees with no extra configuration.

Key Features

• Hierarchical CMS Category Admin — A dedicated section under Content → CMS Category Tree gives you a visual tree panel with Add Root Category and Add Subcategory buttons. Categories can be nested to any depth with independent position ordering at each level.   
• Assign CMS Pages to Categories — The category edit form includes a searchable CMS Pages grid. Tick any page, set an optional Custom Navigation Title and a sort Position, and it appears under that category immediately. A single page can appear in multiple categories.   
• Automatic Sidebar on CMS Pages — When the extension is enabled, a collapsible category tree block is injected into the sidebar of every CMS page automatically — no layout XML changes required. The default position (left or right sidebar) is configured globally and can be overridden per store view.   
• Left or Right Sidebar Position — Choose whether the tree appears in     the left or right sidebar from the admin configuration. The extension detects the CMS page layout and places the block in the correct column; if no sidebar column exists, the configured default is used.   
• Customisable Tree Block Title — Set the heading displayed above the tree on the frontend (e.g., “CMS Categories” or “Browse Topics”). The title is store-view scoped so it can be translated per locale.   
• Root Category Scoping — Optionally restrict the frontend tree and all widgets to show only a specific sub-branch of your category hierarchy. This is useful when you want different page groups isolated from each other across store views.   
• CMS Category Tree Widget — A native Magento widget lets you place the tree in any sidebar, content area, or page section via Content → Widgets. Widget parameters include a custom title, a root category override, and a maximum depth limit so you can show only the top two levels if the full tree is too deep for a particular placement.   
• Automatic Breadcrumb Integration — When a CMS page is assigned to a category, the category path is automatically prepended to the page breadcrumb trail. No template changes required — the extension hooks into Magento’s standard breadcrumb block via a plugin.   
• Enable / Disable without Uninstalling — A master switch in Stores → Configuration → Magento Expert → CMS Category Tree lets you deactivate the entire extension without removing it. All category and page assignment data is preserved.   
• Store-View Scope Throughout — Every configuration field — enable flag, position, title, root category — is scoped to the store view, giving you independent CMS navigation per website, store, or locale.   
• Zero Core Code Changes — Built exclusively on Magento’s layout XML, widget framework, and plugin system. No class rewrites, no preferences, no patches. Safe to upgrade alongside Magento core.   

How It Works

After enabling the extension, navigate to Content → CMS Category Tree. Click Add Root Category to create your first top-level category, give it a name and a position, then click the CMS Pages tab to assign existing pages. Save. Repeat to build subcategories using Add Subcategory on any node in the tree. The sidebar block appears on all CMS pages immediately — no cache flush is required for the tree structure to update. To configure the position and title, go to Stores → Configuration → Magento Expert → CMS Category Tree and save. 

Widget Placement

To place the tree in a specific location rather than the automatic sidebar injection, go to Content → Widgets → Add Widget, select CMS Category Tree as the type, choose your design theme, and configure the widget options: a custom title, a root category to scope the tree, and a maximum depth. Assign the widget to the desired pages and layout container (sidebar, content, etc.) and save. The widget renders using the same tree template as the automatic block. 

Use Cases

• Documentation or knowledge base — Organise support articles, FAQs, and how-to guides into a multi-level tree so visitors can browse topics without relying on site search.   
• Policy and legal page library — Group terms, privacy policies, and compliance pages under a “Legal” root so customers can navigate related pages from any policy page.   
• Blog-style content sections — Use categories to represent topics or series, assign CMS pages as articles, and let the sidebar tree act as a table of contents within each section.   
• Multi-language sites — Maintain a different tree structure per store view — different category names, different page assignments, different root scope — all from the same admin panel.   
• Landing page suites — Group campaign or seasonal landing pages under a hidden root category for internal organisation without exposing the tree to shoppers on the main site, using the enable switch per store view.   

Why Mage2Expert CMS Category Tree

This extension is built entirely on Magento’s own data layer and rendering stack. Categories are stored in a dedicated database table with a foreign-key relationship to the CMS pages table, so the data is clean and portable. The frontend tree block is a standard AbstractBlock rendered through Magento’s layout system; the widget is a proper BlockInterface implementation registered in widget.xml. The breadcrumb integration uses Magento’s plugin (interceptor) mechanism — no template overrides. The result is an extension that installs cleanly, degrades gracefully when disabled, and imposes no compatibility risk on any other installed extension.