The page controls which are used by default in DataTables (forward and backward buttons only) are great for most situations, but there are cases where you may wish to customise the controls presented to the end user. This is made simple by DataTables through its extensible pagination mechanism. There are two types of pagination controls built into DataTables: two_button (default) and full_numbers. To switch between these two types, use the paginationType initialisation parameter. You can add additional types of pagination control by extending the $.fn.dataTableExt.oPagination object.

The example below shows the full_numbers type of pagination, where 'first', 'previous', 'next' and 'last' buttons are presented, as well as the five pages around the current page.