The Dynamic Smart Showcase widget can show your posts as a modern magazine-style slider, but its own navigation can be limiting to style.
The Carousel Remote widget from The Plus Addons for Elementor gives the Magazine Slider its own Next/Prev buttons and dots, placed wherever you like. The two widgets are linked by the same ID.
To check the complete feature overview documentation of The Plus Addons for Elementor Carousel Remote widget, click here.
Requirement – This widget is a part of The Plus Addons for Elementor, make sure it’s installed & activated to enjoy all its powers.
Before You Start
- Edition: Pro — the Carousel Remote widget is part of The Plus Addons for Elementor Pro. No free equivalent exists.
- Widget to enable: Carousel Remote, switched on under The Plus Addons > Widgets.
- A Dynamic Smart Showcase widget with its content ready, set to a Carousel layout.
Step 1: Set the Style to Carousel
- Select the Dynamic Smart Showcase widget and set Style to Magazine Slider (this automatically sets the layout to Carousel); then choose the Post Type and Magazine Layout style you want.
Step 2: Give the Carousel an ID
- Open Style > Carousel Options (or Content, depending on the widget) and type an ID into Unique Carousel ID, for example
plans. Use letters, numbers, dashes or underscores, without spaces.
Step 3: Link the Carousel Remote
- Drag the Carousel Remote widget to where the controls should appear.
- In Content, type the same ID into Unique Connection ID.
- Leave Remote Type on Carousel (the default).
Step 4: Choose Buttons, Dots or Both
- Open Prev/Next. Next/Prev Button is on by default.
- Open Dots and turn on Dots (off by default).
- Add one dot item per slide, in the same order as the slides.
Publish the page and try the buttons and dots on the front end.
How It Behaves
- Next and Prev move the connected carousel one slide.
- Clicking a dot jumps straight to the matching slide and marks that dot active; moving the carousel by any other means (drag, autoplay) also updates which dot is active.
- Verified on the front end with 8 slides: Next moved slide by slide (0 -> 1 -> 2 -> 3), Prev moved back, and each dot jumped to its own slide. With only as many slides as the carousel shows at once, Next/Prev have nowhere to go, so add more slides than the widget’s column count if the buttons look inactive.
Limitations
- Dots are matched to slides by position and count. Add one dot per slide; a mismatched count leaves some slides with no dot of their own.
- Carousel Remote is part of The Plus Addons for Elementor Pro only.
Troubleshooting
The buttons or dots do nothing
- Check that Unique Carousel ID and Unique Connection ID match exactly, with no extra spaces.
- Make sure Remote Type is set to Carousel.
- If the carousel shows all its slides at once (few items, many columns), Next/Prev has nothing to advance to — add more slides.
