Secondary Navigation (Header)

What is Secondary Navigation in Crimson?

Crimson can display a second navigation strip below the Primary header.

We will call it Header Secondary, Secondary Navigation (Header), Category Navigation, or Secondary Navigation for Header.

It’s designed to feel like a category bar and can scroll horizontally—perfect for tags like Technology, Travel, Food, etc.

Secondary Navigation

This Secondary area is controlled by a Crimson Site-wide setting: Secondary navigation in header

Crimson gives three options:

1. Top Tags Shows up to 10 tags (typically based on which tags have the most posts). Great for magazine-style sites.

2. Secondary Navigation Shows the menu you build in Ghost Admin → Settings → Navigation → Secondary navigation.

3. Hidden Hides the Secondary navigation strip entirely (cleaner header).

If you choose Secondary Navigation, continue with the setup below.

Where to edit Secondary Navigation in Ghost Admin

1. Go to Ghost Admin → Settings → Navigation

2. Edit items under Secondary navigation (not Primary)

3. Save

Crimson uses Ghost’s Secondary navigation for the header secondary area.

Secondary Navigation in Ghost Settings

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Dropdown menus + Visibility rules

Crimson’s Secondary navigation supports:

• Dropdown menus

• Location visibility controls (show in header secondary only, footer only, or both)

A) Visibility prefixes (Secondary menu items only)

These prefixes go inside the Label of the navigation item:

• [h] → show only in Header Secondary

• [f] → show only in Footer

• No prefix → show in both Header Secondary and Footer

This matters because Crimson uses the same Secondary navigation list for both Header Secondary and Footer, and then automatically distributes items based on these prefixes.

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B) Dropdown structure symbols (Secondary menu items only)

In Secondary navigation, Crimson supports a clear dropdown format:

• + at the start of a label → dropdown parent (e.g., +Categories)

• - at the start of a label → dropdown child (e.g., -Technology)

✅ Order matters: add the parent first, then the children beneath it in the list.

Example: Category dropdown in Header Secondary only

In Secondary navigation (Ghost Admin):

• [h]+Categories → #

• [h]-Technology → /tag/technology/

• [h]-Travel → /tag/travel/

• [h]-Food → /tag/food/

Sample Dropdown navigation in Header Secondary

This produces:

• A “Categories” dropdown in the header secondary strip

• With Technology/Travel/Food underneath

Sample Dropdown navigation on the website

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Troubleshooting

My Secondary navigation isn’t showing

• Check Crimson setting: Secondary navigation in header must be Secondary Navigation (not Top Tags/Hidden)

• Confirm you added items under Secondary navigation in Ghost, not Primary

My dropdown isn’t working

• Parent must come before children

• Children must start with [h]- and parent with [h]+