How to set up a WordPress cookie policy page with Must-Have Cookie

A cookie banner on its own is not much help if visitors cannot review what you use, reopen the consent dialog, or withdraw consent later.

On many WordPress sites, that part gets bolted on manually. The result is usually inconsistent, hard to maintain, and not very transparent. With Must-Have Cookie, you can build a proper cookie policy page directly from the data and controls already managed by the plugin.

Start with the right plugin mode and core settings

Before building the page, make sure your consent behavior is set up properly. The policy page works best when the plugin is already governing cookies and, if needed, external resources.

1. In WordPress admin, open Must-Have Cookie.
2. Go to General Settings.
3. Turn on Preview mode first if you want to test safely without affecting the frontend yet.
4. Choose your Mode:
   – Notice-only if you only want the UI
   – Cookie-consent to block non-essential cookies
   – Full-consent to block non-essential cookies and third-party domains
5. Choose a Display Mode:
   – Full Screen for a modal-style experience
   – Banner for a top or bottom banner with a details flow
6. If relevant for your setup, enable:
   – Consent by Geolocation
   – Logging
   – Google Consent Mode
   – Multi Language Mode

For most sites that want a meaningful policy page, we recommend at least Cookie-consent mode. If your site uses embeds, maps, videos, or other third-party resources, Full-consent is usually the better fit.

That matters because the page you build should reflect real consent controls, not just display static text.

Scan and organize your cookies and domains

Your policy page becomes more useful when the underlying cookie and domain lists are accurate.

1. Open the System tab.
2. Run a manual Scan.
3. Go to the Cookies tab and review discovered cookies.
4. Edit each cookie name or pattern if needed. You can use * as a wildcard.
5. Assign each cookie to the correct purpose:
   – Essential
   – Required
   – Analytics
   – Marketing
   – Media
   – Other Services
6. Open the Domains tab.
7. Review discovered third-party domains.
8. Assign each domain to the correct purpose.
9. Add inline descriptions for domains where helpful, so visitors can understand why a service is used before consenting.

This step is worth doing carefully. If your lists are messy, your cookie policy page will also be messy.

In practice, a clean setup usually means:

• wildcarding cookie name variations where needed
• removing irrelevant discoveries
• rewriting vague domain labels into plain-language descriptions
• making sure only truly necessary items are marked essential

Create a dedicated cookie policy page in WordPress

Now build the page itself.

1. Go to Pages > Add New.
2. Create a page called something like Cookie Policy or Privacy Preferences.
3. Add a short introduction in plain language, for example:

• what the page is for
• that visitors can review cookies and services by category
• that they can reopen or change their consent choices anytime

4. Below that intro, add a control to reopen the consent dialog using this shortcode:

Review cookie settings

5. Add a consent withdrawal control:

Withdraw consent

6. If you want a direct accept button on the page, add one of these:

Accept all cookies and services

or

Accept required only

These shortcodes turn the page into an actual consent management touchpoint, not just an informational page.

Add the cookie and domain listings

Once the basic controls are in place, add the actual lists.

1. To show cookies grouped by purpose, insert:

2. To show domains grouped by purpose, insert:

3. If you prefer one combined view, use:

4. If you want to explain a category in a custom section, add a group description shortcode such as:

A statisztikai sütik és szolgáltatások felhasználási információkat gyűjtenek, amelyek lehetővé teszik számunkra, hogy betekintést nyerjünk abba, hogyan lépnek kapcsolatba látogatóink a weboldalunkkal.

A practical page structure often looks like this:

1. Intro text
2. Button to open consent details
3. Button to revoke consent
4. Combined entities list, or separate cookies and domains sections
5. Optional category explanations

If you are using inline descriptions in the Domains tab, those notes will help visitors understand specific hosts or resources directly on the page.

This is one part of the feature we like. You do not need to maintain a separate manual list every time your stack changes. The plugin already knows about the cookies and domains you are managing.

Show consent history for logged transparency

If you enable logging in General Settings, you can also expose a visitor-facing consent history section.

1. First, enable Logging in General Settings.
2. Save your settings.
3. On your cookie policy page, add:

If the user has not provided consent yet, this section stays blank. If they have, it can show their recorded consent history.

From an admin perspective, you can also review logged entries in the Logs tab, including:

• device ID
• consent data
• IP address
• device information
• timestamp

That is useful for transparency and internal recordkeeping. It also helps when clients or compliance teams want a clearer picture of what the site is actually storing.

Add a menu link or footer link back to consent settings

A good cookie policy page should be easy to find after the initial banner is gone.

1. Add the new page to your footer menu or privacy menu.
2. Optionally place a text link anywhere on the site using a hash trigger like this:

<a href="#mhcookie-show-dialog">Cookie settings</a>

3. If you want a CSS-triggered element inside a block or template, add the class:

mhcookie-show-dialog

4. If you use the built-in preferences widget, configure it under Widget and choose:
   – text or icon widget
   – colors
   – screen position

This gives visitors more than one route back to their preferences. In other words, the policy page becomes the permanent reference point, while the widget and triggers act as quick-access controls.

If you want to style the page and consent UI more closely to your site, use the Live Editor and the Custom CSS field in General Settings. We built this so you can adjust the presentation without turning the policy page into a separate maintenance project.

For the full shortcode list and setup options, see our Must-Have Cookie documentation or explore the Must-Have Cookie product page.

Take-home message

A working cookie policy page should do more than explain your setup. It should let visitors review categories, see the services you use, reopen the dialog, and change their consent at any time.

With Must-Have Cookie, you can build that page directly inside WordPress using shortcodes, scanning, categorized entities, and optional consent logs. If you are setting up consent properly, this is one of the simplest ways to make the whole system more transparent and easier to maintain.