How to Use AI to Generate Images in WordPress

Do you want to use artificial intelligence tools like DALL.E to generate images in WordPress?

AI-generated images can be a good alternative to generate images for your WordPress blog posts without worrying about copyright.

In this article, we’ll show you how to use AI to generate images in WordPress.

Why Use AI Tools to Generate Images for Your WordPress Website?

There are a ton of paid stock image websites offering images to use on your WordPress website for a small fee.

However, the cost of these images is an extra expense. Most bloggers and small businesses don’t have the budget for that.

There are certainly many websites that offer royalty free images like Unsplash or ShutterStock‘s limited free library.

But those images are highly overused and often too generic.

Now, the best way to create images for your website is by making your own images or using your own photographs. But not everyone is a professional photographer or digital artist.

This is where artificial intelligence comes in.

AI tools like DALL.E can generate unique artwork from text descriptions provided by the users.

These images are not only unique but highly creative and artistic.

For instance, here is an image of an office desk with a sunset backdrop generated by DALL.E 2. It mimics the style of generic stock image photos that you can find on hundreds of websites.

Now take a look at this example of an artwork created by DALLE.2.

This one is artistic, more colorful, and in a comic book style.

You can see the variety of styles, topics, and ideas you can use on the DALL.E homepage.

The best part is that you are free to use these images for your blog posts, articles, and even landing pages.

That being said, let’s take a look at how to easily use AI-generated images in WordPress.

We’ll be showing you two methods using two different AI tools, you can choose one that works best for you.

1. Generate AI Images for WordPress with DALL.E 2

DALL.E 2 is an Artificial Intelligence tool made by Open A.I. It is quite popular for its artistic rendering, surrealism, creativity, and versatility.

There are no plugins available to integrate DALL.E 2 directly with your WordPress website.

However, you can create images on DALL.E 2 website and download them to your computer. After that, you can upload those images to your WordPress website.

First, you need to visit the DALL.E 2 website and sign up for a free account which gives you 50 credits for your first month.

Upon signing up, you’ll see the DALL.E dashboard with a prompt field and some recent artworks generated by DALL.E.

Type a text description of the image that you want to generate in the prompt field. You can be as descriptive and creative as you want.

Click on the Surprise Me button to see some examples of prompts you can generate.

Once you click on the Generate button, the AI will generate images based on the prompt you provided and show you four results.

You can download all of them to your computer if you want. You can also click on any of the generated images to edit them.

The image editor in DALL.E allows you to expand the frame or pan in. You can also erase or retouch an area of the image.

Click on the Generate button again for AI to regenerate the image based on your changes.

Once you have downloaded the images to your computer you can switch back to the admin area of your WordPress website.

You can now upload the image to your WordPress media library by visiting the Media » Add New page.

You can also add an image directly to your WordPress posts and pages. Simply edit the post or page where you want to display the image.

On the post edit screen, add the Image block and then upload the image from your computer.

What is The License Used for Images Generated by DALL.E 2?

You retain the copyright for the images generated by the prompt provided by you to DALL.E 2.

You can use the images anywhere you want including your WordPress website, YouTube videos, eBooks, magazine, and more.

2. Use Imajinn to Generate AI Images in WordPress

For the first method, we’ll be using Imajinn AI to generate images in WordPress.

Imajinn AI is similar to the tools like DALL.E 2, Midjourney, and Stable Diffusion. It generates images using artificial intelligence based on the prompt you provide.

First, you need to install and activate the Imajinn plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Note: The base plugin is free and gives you 10 credits. After that, you can buy more credits from the plugin’s website.

Upon activation, you need to visit the Media » Imajinn AI to configure plugin settings and generate images.

First, you need to sign up by providing an email address and password to create your account.

After that, you will be able to start generating images using Imajin AI.

Simply provide a detailed prompt describing the image that you want to generate.

You can also choose from a list of styles, artist style, style modifier filters, and aspect ratio to further customize your prompt.

Below that you can choose to click on the Summon button to launch the Prompt Genie tool.

Based on the prompt description you provided the tool will suggest further prompt ideas to generate the best possible image.

You can click on the generate button to use a suggested prompt, or continue writing your own prompt by copying ideas from the suggestions.

Once you are satisfied, click on the Generate button to continue.

The plugin will now start generating images using the AI tool running on the cloud. Once finished, it will display four variations of images for you to choose from.

Below each image, you’ll find options to share the image, repair faces (The AI is not great at generating human faces), or touch up the image.

You can also just click on the Save button to store an image in your WordPress media library.

To use the image in your WordPress posts and pages, simply edit the post or page where you want to add the image.

On the post-edit screen, add the Image block where you want to display the image and then click on Media Library.

Next, you need to select the image you saved earlier from your Media Library and provide an Alt text for the image.

After that, go ahead and click on the Select button to insert the image.

The plugin also comes with a Imajinn block that you can add to your post or pages and generate an image inside the block editor.

What is The License Used for Images Generated by Imajinn AI?

All images generated by Imajinn AI are provided under the free domain or CC0 license.

You are free to use them on your website as you see fit.

We hope this article helped you learn how to use Artificial Intelligence to generate images for your WordPress website. You may also want to see our ultimate image SEO guide and these easy tips to optimize images for speed.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Use AI to Generate Images in WordPress first appeared on WPBeginner.

October 19, 2022 at 03:41PM

How to Create a Simple Event Calendar with Sugar Calendar

Do you want to add an event calendar to your WordPress website?

A calendar is a great way to share in-person and virtual events with your visitors. You can use one to promote your upcoming events, get more people to attend, and help with brand awareness.

In this article, we’ll show you how to easily create a simple event calendar in WordPress with Sugar Calendar.

Why Create a Simple Event Calendar For Your WordPress Website?

By adding a calendar in WordPress, you can show upcoming events to your visitors.

This makes it easy for people to learn about your upcoming webinars, virtual retreats, online sermons, coaching calls, and more. In this way, a calendar can promote your events and encourage more people to attend.

If you have a membership website or a forum, then you can even accept user-submitted events. This is a great way to build a community, attract new visitors, and keep your calendar updated with the latest events. You’ll also save time since you don’t need to research upcoming events and add them to the calendar yourself.

With that being said, let’s see how you can add a simple event calendar to your site.

How to Create a Simple Event Calendar in WordPress

The easiest way to add an event calendar to WordPress is by using Sugar Calendar. It is the best WordPress calendar plugin and has everything you need to create multiple calendars, set start and end times for your events, sync with Google Calendar, and more.

The first thing you need to do is install and activate the Sugar Calendar plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, head over to the Calendar » Settings page. Here, you can enter your license key into the ‘License Key’ field.

You’ll find this key by logging into your Sugar Calendar account. It’s also in the email you got when you purchased Sugar Calendar.

After that, click on the ‘Verify’ button to check that your license key is valid. Finally, you can click on ‘Save Changes’ to store your settings.

Once you’ve done that, you’re ready to create a calendar by going to Calendar » Calender.

Here, click on the ‘Calendars’ tab.

You can now click on the ‘Add Calendar’ button.

This opens a popup where you can type a title into the ‘Name’ field. Sugar Calendar lets you create multiple calendars, but it only adds a single calendar view to your site. Visitors can switch between the different calendar views using a dropdown menu.

That being said, the ‘Name’ should help visitors tell the difference between the various calendars.

Similar to child pages, you can arrange calendars in parent-child relationships.

Children appear beneath their parents in the WordPress dashboard, so this can be a useful way to organize your calendars. This is particularly true if you have lots of different calendars.

All calendars are parent calendars by default. To create a child calendar, you’ll need to open the ‘Parent’ dropdown and then choose the calendar that you want to use as the parent.

Next, you can add an optional description. Depending on your WordPress theme, this may appear next to the calendar on your website, but not all themes show the calendar description. If you do add a description, then always check that it shows up on your WordPress website.

Finally, you may want to add a color that will appear next to the calendar in your WordPress dashboard. This color-coding can help you group related calendars together, or easily identify a particular calendar.

To add a color, simply click on the ‘Select Color’ switch and then make your selection using the controls that appear.

When you’re happy with the information you’ve entered, click on ‘Add New Calendar’ to go ahead and create your first Sugar Calendar.

You can create multiple calendars simply by repeating the same process described above.

Adding Events in Sugar Calendar

Once you’ve created a calendar, you’re ready to add events to that calendar.

To start, select the ‘Events’ tab and then click on the ‘Add Event’ button.

You can now add all the information about your event, such as date and time, duration, and whether or not it is recurring.

First, you’ll want to go ahead and give the event a name.

Then, add a start time and end date. If the event will last all day, then you can simply check the ‘All-day’ box.

Another option is to set a start and end time, as you can see in the following image.

By default, Sugar Calendar creates all events as one-time events. However, some events are recurring. For example, you might run a webinar every Monday morning or have a monthly meetup for all the volunteers at your nonprofit organization.

To create a recurring event, simply select the ‘Recurrence’ tab, and then choose an option from the ‘Repeat’ dropdown, such as Daily, Weekly, or Monthly.

You can also set an optional ‘End Repeat’ date, which is when the event stops recurring. For example, you might only plan to run webinars until the end of the year.

If you’re organizing an in-person event, then you can also select the ‘Location’ tab and type in where this event will take place.

Next, enter some information about the event in the ‘Details’ box.

This works exactly the same as the WordPress classic editor so you can add images, videos, and formatting.

You can also add a featured image, which will appear on the event’s page. This can make the page more engaging and may also be used in search results and on social media news feeds.

To add a featured image, simply click on ‘Set featured image’ and then either choose an image from the media library or upload a new file.

In the ‘Calendars’ section, find the calendar where you want to add this event.

You can then click to select its radio button.

You can also create a new calendar in this section, simply by clicking on the ‘Add New Calendar’ button.

This adds some settings where you can give the new calendar a name and assign it an optional parent calendar.

Once you’ve entered all the information, just click on the ‘Publish’ button.

You can repeat this process to add more events to the calendar.

Putting Your Events Calendar on Your Website

You can add a calendar to any post or page using shortcode. If you’ve created multiple calendars then visitors can switch between these different calendars using a dropdown.

We’ll add the calendar to a new WordPress page, but the steps will be similar no matter where you’re adding the calendar.

First, go to Pages » Add New in your admin panel. If you want to add it to an existing page, simply click ‘Edit’ under its name on Pages » All Pages.

Then, give your page a title and add any categories and tags that you want to use.

You can then click on the ‘+’ icon to create a new block and type in ‘Shortcode.’ When the right block appears, click on it to add it to the page.

Next, copy the shortcode[sc_events_calendar] into the shortcode block. For more details, please see our guide on how to add a shortcode in WordPress.

You can now publish or update the page to make the calendar live on your website.

To see more information about an event in the calendar, simply click on it.

This will open the event’s page showing the time, date, and any other details.

Sugar Calendar also has a widget that you can add to any widget-ready area of your WordPress theme. This is an easy way to add a calendar to every page of your website or WordPress blog.

The widget also lets you set a default calendar, which will be selected in the dropdown menu. This gives you more control over which events visitors see.

To add a widget in WordPress, simply go to Appearance » Widgets. Here, click on the blue ‘+’ button.

You can then type in ‘Sugar Calendar.’

There are a few different Sugar Calendar widgets, so make sure you select the ‘Event Calendar’ widget.

Now simply drag and drop the widget onto the area where you want to show the calendar.

At this point, you can add an optional title and change the size of the calendar.

To change the default calendar, open the ‘Calendar’ dropdown and then choose an option from the list.

By default, Sugar Calendar will show the current month when the page loads, but you may prefer to show a different month instead. To make this change, simply type a new date into the ‘Default Month & Year’ field.

Once you’re finished, don’t forget to click on the ‘Update’ button. Your Sugar Calendar widget will now show up on your site!

We hope this article helped you learn how to create a simple event calendar with Sugar Calendar. You might also like our article on the best email marketing services and best push notification software, so you can keep your users updated about new events and activities.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Create a Simple Event Calendar with Sugar Calendar first appeared on WPBeginner.

October 18, 2022 at 11:52PM

Full Post vs Summary (Excerpt) in WordPress Archive Pages?

Are you wondering whether you should use an excerpt instead of full posts in your archive pages?

A summary helps provide a quick glimpse to your visitors about your content. Users can read through the short excerpt and decide if they’d like to view the entire blog. However, using the full post may get more eyes on the content because it doesn’t require extra action on the user’s part. But which is better?

In this article, we will compare full post vs summary (excerpt) in your WordPress archive pages.

What is an Excerpt and How to Add It in WordPress?

An excerpt is a short summary of an article that you can display on the archive pages in WordPress. The excerpt also has a link that users can click to read the whole article.

If you have limited space on your WordPress site, then excerpts are great for showing descriptions of your content.

By default, WordPress will use the starting 55 words of a blog post and show it as an excerpt. However, you can also manually add an excerpt.

Adding Excerpts in WordPress Posts

First, you’ll need to add a new post or edit an existing one. Once you’re in the WordPress content editor, you can click the ‘gear’ icon at the top right corner to open the settings panel.

Next, scroll down to the ‘Excerpt’ section and add your text in the ‘Write an excerpt (optional)’ field.

When you’re done, simply publish or update your blog post.

Adding Excerpts in WordPress Pages

If you need to add a summary to a WordPress page, then you’ll notice that there’s no option to add an excerpt. However, you can simply add the following code to your website:

add_post_type_support( 'page', 'excerpt' );

To add the code, you’ll need to install and activate the WPCode plugin. For more details please see our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, head to Code Snippets » Add Snippet from your WordPress dashboard, and then select the ‘Add Your Custom Code (New Snippet)’ option.

Next, you can enter a name for your code snippet.

After that, simply paste the snippet in the ‘Code Preview’ area and select the ‘PHP Snippet’ from the Code Type dropdown menu.

From here, you can scroll down to the ‘Insertion’ section and select where you’d like to add the snippet on your site.

Next, click on the ‘Location’ dropdown menu and choose the ‘Run Everywhere’ option under ‘PHP Snippets Only.’

After entering the code, you can click the toggle at the top to activate the snippet and then click the ‘Save Snippet’ button.

This will add an ‘Excerpt’ meta box in the settings panel in your WordPress editor, where you can easily provide a short summary for your page.

Please see our tutorial on how to add excerpts to your pages in WordPress for more information.

That said, let’s see the advantages of using a summary vs a full post in archive pages.

Benefits of Using Summary vs Full Post in Archives

When optimizing your site for a better user experience, choosing between excerpts and full posts in archive pages can play a huge role. You want users to easily browse the website, find what they are looking for, and improve search engine ranking.

With summaries, you can provide an improved user experience. It helps users find the content they want to read. Plus, it keeps your page organized and allows you to display multiple posts on a page. This would be very difficult if you show full posts in archives.

That said, here’s a closer look at why we recommend using summary (excerpts) vs full posts on your WordPress site’s archive pages.

1. Improves Page Load Time

Did you know Google now uses your site speed as a ranking factor? The search engine will rank fast-loading websites higher than the ones that take a lot of time to load fully.

By using excerpts on your archive pages, you significantly improve the page load time.

Imagine an archive page that shows 10 posts per page. If each of those 10 pages is 500+ words long with 5 images each, then your user has a lot to scroll through. The page will also load slower than normal.

By using excerpts, you can significantly improve the user experience.

Here’s a preview of how a short summary appears on WPBeginner when you view the archive pages.

Users can load and browse through our category, tags, date, and other archive pages quickly and easily. As for search engines, you will see a boost in rankings for archive pages and improvement in WordPress SEO with faster page load times.

2. Prevents Duplicate Content

By showing excerpts on your archive pages, you can prevent being flagged for duplicate content in search engines.

For example, WordPress by default has category, tags, date, and author archives. Publishing full posts in archives will make each article appear at full length on several different pages on your site.

Even though search engines are quite smart in finding canonical URLs for each post, they can still flag the site for duplicate content which will affect your search engine rankings.

3. Increases Pageviews and Reduces Bounce rate

Using summaries or excerpts can reduce the bounce rate and increase pageviews. Users can click through to the full post in order to read the entire article.

If you just have full posts displayed in the archive pages, then people will not see any other elements that are on the blog page itself, such as a popular posts widget inside the post or page content.

By displaying the full post, users might just leave your site after looking at a single page instead of clicking around.

A summary makes your archive page more engaging and allows your readers to see find more content easily.

Disadvantages of Using Summary vs Full Post in Archives

1. Short Excerpts Provide Poor User Experience

If you don’t set an excerpt for blog posts, then WordPress will automatically create a summary using the first 55 words in the article. This is too short, and sometimes your sentences will be cut in half, resulting in a poor user experience.

You can always change the excerpt length in a WordPress theme, but that doesn’t fix the problem entirely.

One solution is to write a custom excerpt in the content editor before publication. Another solution is to write short, catchy introductions that will most likely make the user interested and can easily work as excerpts.

2. Hidden Content

Some users prefer to read everything on one page rather than having to go to a different page to read the entire article. This is useful if you have short blog posts that don’t contain many images.

These users are likely to stay on your site longer, even if they don’t click on any other pages, which is also a metric that Google uses to determine search engine rankings.

Should You Use Full Post or Summary in Archive Pages?

If your articles are short and do not contain a lot of images, then you can get away with displaying full posts on your archive pages.

However, in most cases, we always recommend using a summary or excerpts for your archive pages. Most WordPress themes come with a built-in option that allows you to choose between full posts vs excerpts from the settings.

Excerpts provide a better user experience and make your site look clean and organized. You can boost user engagement, increase pageviews, and show multiple articles on your archive pages.

We hope that this article answered the question of whether you should use a full post or summary in your WordPress archive pages. You may also want to see our guide on how to move a WordPress from HTTP to HTTPS and WooCommerce made simple.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post Full Post vs Summary (Excerpt) in WordPress Archive Pages? first appeared on WPBeginner.

October 18, 2022 at 06:02PM

How to Make Google Fonts Privacy Friendly (3 Ways)

Are you concerned about the privacy issues and legal risks of using Google Fonts on your WordPress site?

Google Fonts have been found to breach the EU’s privacy regulations. That means if you have website visitors from Europe, then you may be at risk of paying legal damages.

In this article, we’ll show you how to make Google Fonts privacy friendly in WordPress.

Why Are Google Fonts Not Privacy Friendly?

Your WordPress website’s typography plays an important role in your design and brand identity. That’s why many website owners customize their typography by using Google Fonts.

However, when someone visits a website that uses Google Fonts, their IP address is logged by Google when the fonts are loaded. This is done without their permission and the European Union considers it a breach of privacy regulations.

This means that websites using Google Fonts are no longer GDPR compliant. That’s an important legal consideration if you have website visitors from the European Union because it may make you liable for damages (of course you should consider your legal advisors before taking any action).

With that being said, let’s take a look at how to make Google Fonts privacy friendly. We’ll cover three methods, and you can use the list below to jump to the one you wish to use.

• Method 1: Host Google Fonts Locally in WordPress
• Method 2: Replace Google Fonts With Bunny Fonts
• Method 3: Disable Google Fonts in WordPress

Method 1: Host Google Fonts Locally in WordPress

One way to make Google Fonts privacy friendly is to host them locally in WordPress. Luckily, that’s easy to do by using a plugin.

The first thing you need to do is install and activate the OMGF (Optimize My Google Fonts) plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you need to visit Settings » Optimize Google Fonts to configure the plugin. You will see a statement that the default settings will automatically replace your Google Fonts with locally hosted copies.

All you need to do is scroll down the page and make sure that the ‘Font-Display Option’ has the default setting of ‘Swap (recommended)’ selected.

After that, simply click the ‘Save & Optimize’ button at the bottom of the page.

You’ll see a message at the top of the screen that says ‘Optimization completed successfully.’ Your Google Fonts are now hosted locally.

To learn more, see our guide on how to host local fonts in WordPress, including how to do this manually without a plugin.

Method 2: Replace Google Fonts With Bunny Fonts

Bunny Fonts is an alternative to Google Fonts that puts privacy first. Their zero tracking and no-logging policies help you stay fully GDPR compliant. The Bunny Fonts API is fully compatible with the Google Fonts API, and this makes switching simple.

All you need to do is install and activate the Replace Google Fonts with Bunny Fonts plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

There will be no configuration needed. Once you’ve activated Bunny Fonts, they will immediately replace Google Fonts on your WordPress blog, shop, and every other part of your site.

Method 3: Disable Google Fonts in WordPress

Another way of avoiding the privacy issues of using Google Fonts is to disable them altogether, and simply use the system fonts installed on your users’ computers. We did this when we redesigned the WPBeginner website, and it improved our page load times.

Simply install and activate the Disable and Remove Google Fonts plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, the plugin will automatically disable all Google Fonts used by your theme and plugins. It doesn’t need to be configured.

Now WordPress will automatically use a default font in place of any Google Fonts that were being used. If you would like to choose different fonts, then see our guide on how to change fonts in your WordPress theme.

You can learn more in our guide on how to disable Google Fonts on your WordPress website.

We hope this tutorial helped you learn how to make Google Fonts privacy friendly. You may also want to learn how to get a free email domain, or check out our list of ways to make money online blogging with WordPress.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Make Google Fonts Privacy Friendly (3 Ways) first appeared on WPBeginner.

October 17, 2022 at 04:02PM

12 Most Useful WordPress Custom Post Types Tutorials

Would you like to learn more about custom post types?

WordPress allows you to create custom types of content. Besides posts and pages, you might like to add other types of content to your website, such as products, reviews, or recipes.

In this article, we will share the 12 most useful WordPress custom post types tutorials.

What Are Custom Post Types in WordPress?

Custom post types are a type of content on your WordPress site that are not the default posts and pages. Custom post types are often added to a WordPress site using custom code or plugins.

For example, you can create custom post types for portfolios, testimonials, and products. Many WordPress plugins also use custom post types to store data on your website.

How can you use custom post types on your WordPress website?

As the largest free WordPress resource site for beginners, we’ve written a lot about custom post types over the years. Let’s take a look at the most useful custom post types tutorials here on WPBeginner.

1. Decide Whether You Need A Custom Post Type

Before you start creating custom post types or taxonomies on your WordPress site, it’s important to evaluate your needs. A lot of times you can get the same results with the default WordPress posts and pages.

With the help of built-in categories and tags, you can sort your content in many different ways. For example, with pages, you can set up a hierarchical layout of content with child pages. You can also set up subcategories.

Using the default WordPress features makes content management easier in many ways. For example, a custom post type wouldn’t appear on your blog page or in your post RSS feeds.

After looking at the default options, you may find that you don’t need custom post types after all.

If you are unsure, then refer to this guide about when you need a custom post type or taxonomy in WordPress.

2. Create Custom Post Types in WordPress

Once you decide that you do need a custom post type, you’ll need to create it. You can do this with a plugin, or manually by using code.

The Custom Post Type UI plugin makes it easy to create custom post types and is recommended for most users. You do this from the ‘Edit/Add Post Types’ page.

Alternatively, you can add a custom post type by pasting a code snippet into your theme’s functions.php file. The advantage of this method is your custom post types won’t disappear if the plugin is deactivated, but it’s only suitable if you’re comfortable handling code.

To learn more, see our guide on how to create custom post types in WordPress.

3. Create a Custom Post Types Archive Page

Adding custom post types in WordPress has become very easy thanks to the Custom Post Type UI plugin. However, many beginners have trouble displaying them on their websites.

To add a custom post type archive page, you first need to make sure that archives are enabled for your custom post type. In most cases they are, but if not then you can enable them in Custom Post Type UI’s advanced options or by using code.

Now you can visit the custom post type archive page. Let’s say your custom post type is called ‘movies’ and you have SEO friendly permalinks enabled. Then your post type archive will be located at:

http://www.example.com/movies/

You’ll need to replace ‘example.com’ with your own domain name, and ‘movies’ with your custom post type name.

You can now add this archive page to your navigation menu. You can also customize it by adding a custom template to your WordPress theme or using a theme builder like SeedProd.

We show you how to do all of these things step by step in our guide on how to create a custom post types archive page in WordPress.

4. Add Custom Post Types to Your Main RSS Feed

By default, WordPress only includes your blog posts in your site’s main RSS feed. This means that your custom post type content won’t be visible to your main RSS feed subscribers.

You can easily include all publicly available post types into your main RSS feed by adding the following code to your theme’s functions.php file or a site-specific plugin.

function myfeed_request($qv) {
if (isset($qv['feed']))
$qv['post_type'] = get_post_types();
return $qv;
}
add_filter('request', 'myfeed_request');

However, you can use a different code snippet to only include specific custom post types.

For more detail on both methods, see our guide on how to add custom post types to your main WordPress RSS feed.

5. Make a Separate RSS Feed for Each Custom Post Type

WordPress automatically generates separate RSS feeds for different archive pages of your website, including custom post types.

Let’s say you have a custom post type called ‘movies’ on your website. We’ve already seen that you can view all content created in that post type by visiting the post type archive page.

https://example.com/movies

To view the RSS feed, all you need to do is add /feed/ to the custom post type archive URL.

https://example.com/movies/feed/

Alternately, you can also view the feed by adding the post type parameter to your main WordPress RSS feed. For example:

https://example.com/feed/?post_type=movies

Now that you know how to access the RSS feeds for any custom post type on your website, you can use that URL to create links to your custom post type feeds.

For instance, you may want to display an icon or plain text link on the custom post type archive page, so that your visitors can easily subscribe to those posts.

To learn how to do that, see our guide on how to make a separate RSS feed for each custom post type in WordPress.

6. Include Custom Post Types in Search Results

By default, WordPress will never show custom post types in its on-site search results. That means your visitors may miss out on some great content, and you’ll miss out on extra page views.

The easiest way to include custom post types in WordPress search is with the SearchWP plugin. It’s easy to use and lets you search content that isn’t included in the default WordPress search.

To include custom post types in your searches, simply click on the plugin’s ‘Sources & Settings’ button. Here you can put a checkmark next to each post type you wish to include in search results.

You can also choose how important each custom post type is when displaying search results, and customize the search engine in other ways.

To learn how, see our step by step guide on how to include custom post types in WordPress search results.

7. Create a Search Form for Custom Post Types

You can also create a custom search form that will only show results from your custom post type. For example, if you have a custom post type called ‘movies’, then you can create a special movie search form that only returns movies in the search results.

This kind of custom search helps your visitors view more pages and spend more time on your website. This will give off positive WordPress SEO signals like lower bounce rate and increased dwell time.

You can create an advanced search form for custom post types using the SearchWP plugin. It allows you to create a second search engine that will only search your custom post type. You can then create a custom search form that you can add to your posts or sidebar.

For more details, see our guide on how to create an advanced search form in WordPress for custom post types.

8. Add Categories to a Custom Post Type

By default, WordPress categories can only be used to organize posts, not custom post types.

You could create a custom taxonomy to organize your custom posts, but what if you want to use the same categories you use for your blog posts?

The easiest way to associate your custom post type with categories is the Custom Post Type UI plugin. It adds a ’Taxonomies’ area in the settings for each custom post type.

Simply check the ‘Categories (WP Core)’ box and you will be able to use categories to organize your custom post types.

See our guide on how to add categories to a custom post type in WordPress to learn more.

9. Add Sticky Posts for Custom Post Types

The sticky posts feature in WordPress allows you to add featured posts. By default, it only works for blog posts and not for custom post types.

You can enable sticky posts for your custom post types as well by installing the Sticky Posts – Switch plugin. You simply check the box next to the custom post types that you wish to support this feature.

Now when you visit the admin page for that custom post type, you will notice a new column where you can make posts sticky.

All you need to do is click the star next to the posts you wish to feature.

These sticky posts will be shown on your WordPress home page. To display sticky posts on your custom post type archive page as well, you’ll need to add some code to your theme files.

You’ll find all the details in our guide on how to add sticky posts in WordPress custom post type archives.

10. Add User Submitted Content to Custom Post Types

You may want to allow users to submit content for custom post types on your site, such as movie reviews or recipes. This is an easy way of adding extra content to your site.

One way to do this is by giving users access to your WordPress admin area and assigning them the author user role. Alternatively, you can add a submission form to your website.

You can do that using the WPForms plugin. You will need the Pro version to access the post submissions addon, and the provided ‘Blog Post Submission Form’ template makes creating the form simple.

By default, user submitted posts are saved as ‘Drafts’ pending review. You can change the post type in the form’s settings so content is submitted to a custom post type instead.

For more details, see our guide on how to allow users to submit posts to your WordPress site.

11. Switch or Convert Custom Post Types

You may come across situations where you will have to merge or convert custom post types. For example, you may want to move items from one post type to another.

Simply install and activate the Post Type Switcher plugin. Upon activation, you should go to the custom post type admin page and select the posts you want to move.

When you bulk edit the posts, you will notice there is a new drop down menu allowing you to change the post type for that item.

You can learn more in our guide on how to switch or convert custom post types in WordPress.

12. Add Custom Meta Boxes for Post Types

Custom meta boxes allow you to add custom fields to the WordPress post editor screen. This way you can create additional input fields for your post types.

The easiest way to create custom meta fields in WordPress is by using the Advanced Custom Fields plugin. Simply click the ‘Add New’ button on the Custom Fields page.

After that, you should follow the on-screen instructions to create a group of custom fields to add to your custom post type.

For further details, see our step by step guide on how to add custom meta boxes in WordPress posts and post types.

We hope this tutorial helped you learn some cool tricks for custom post types in WordPress. You may also want to see our ultimate WordPress security guide, or check out our list of tips on how to speed up WordPress performance.

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The post 12 Most Useful WordPress Custom Post Types Tutorials first appeared on WPBeginner.

October 14, 2022 at 11:58PM