Remove post type slug in custom post type URL and move subpages to website root in WordPress

90 Replies

I recently had a need to rewrite the URLs of all parent and child pages in a custom post type so that they appeared to live at the website root, but in reality, continued to live in a custom post type within their hierarchy.

Preface

The situation:

I have a page called Services that lives at domain.com/services.
I have a custom post type called Services.
I have Services post called Programming that lives at domain.com/services/programming.
I have Services post called Web Development, that is a child of Programming, that lives at domain.com/services/programming/web-development.

The goal:

The Services page should remain where it is i.e. domain.com/services.
The Programming post should appear to live at the website root i.e. domain.com/programming.
The Web Development service should also live at the website root i.e. domain.com/web-development.

The reason:

Shorter URLs.
Keep all website pages together.
Keep all services together.
Maintain hierarchy of services.

Setup

I have a custom post type setup like so:

function register_services() {
    $arguments = array(
        'label' => 'Services',
        'public' => true,
        'capability_type' => 'page',
        'hierarchical' => true,
        'supports' => array('title', 'editor', 'page-attributes'),
        'has_archive' => false,
        'rewrite' => true
    );
    register_post_type('services', $arguments);
}

function register_services() {
	$arguments = array(
		'label' => 'Services',
		'public' => true,
		'capability_type' => 'page',
		'hierarchical' => true,
		'supports' => array('title', 'editor', 'page-attributes'),
		'has_archive' => false,
		'rewrite' => true
	);
	register_post_type('services', $arguments);
}

Solution

1. Remove “services” from the custom post type URL

We’re going to use the post_type_link filter to do this.

Update 1/19/14: Tweaked function to work with WordPress installed in a subdirectory.

add_filter(
    'post_type_link',
    'custom_post_type_link',
    10,
    3
);
 
function custom_post_type_link($permalink, $post, $leavename) {
    if (!gettype($post) == 'post') {
        return $permalink;
    }
    switch ($post->post_type) {
        case 'services':
            $permalink = get_home_url() . '/' . $post->post_name . '/';
            break;
    }
 
    return $permalink;
}

add_filter(
	'post_type_link',
	'custom_post_type_link',
	10,
	3
);

function custom_post_type_link($permalink, $post, $leavename) {
    if (!gettype($post) == 'post') {
        return $permalink;
    }
    switch ($post->post_type) {
        case 'services':
            $permalink = get_home_url() . '/' . $post->post_name . '/';
            break;
    }

    return $permalink;
}

Line 9: If $post is a valid post object.
Line 13: If post belongs to a post type that we want to remove the post type slug from.
Line 15: Build a new permalink from home URL with just the post name.

All of this will essentially give us URLs like this:

domain.com/programming/
domain.com/web-development/

But neither of those will work – you’ll get a 404 error – because WordPress can no longer identify those posts as Services posts and therefore attempts to find pages called Programming and Web Development, which don’t exist, hence the 404 error.

If you take a look at WordPress’ rewrite rules:

1	echo '<pre>' . print_r(get_option('rewrite_rules'), true) . '</pre>';

echo '<pre>' . print_r(get_option('rewrite_rules'), true) . '</pre>';

You’ll see something similar to this:

Array
(
    [services/(.+?)(/[0-9]+)?/?$] => index.php?services=$matches[1]&page=$matches[2]
    [(.?.+?)(/[0-9]+)?/?$] => index.php?pagename=$matches[1]&page=$matches[2]
)

Array
(
	[services/(.+?)(/[0-9]+)?/?$] => index.php?services=$matches[1]&page=$matches[2]
	[(.?.+?)(/[0-9]+)?/?$] => index.php?pagename=$matches[1]&page=$matches[2]
)

As you can see, using the services slug, WordPress knows to take whatever comes after it ((.+?)) and pass it in as the pagename value ($matches[1]), which translates to something like:

domain.com/index.php?services=programming

Since the first rewrite rule no longer applies (slug removed), it now passes programming in as the pagename without specifying the post type, and since this page doesn’t exist, WordPress can’t return the page.

2. Add post type back to the post query

Now that WordPress doesn’t know that it’s dealing with a custom post type, we need to provide it with this information. For that we’re going to use the pre_get_posts hook.

add_action(
    'pre_get_posts',
    'custom_pre_get_posts'
);
 
function custom_pre_get_posts($query) {
    global $wpdb;
 
    if(!$query->is_main_query()) {
        return;
    }
 
    $post_name = $query->get('pagename');
 
    $post_type = $wpdb->get_var(
        $wpdb->prepare(
            'SELECT post_type FROM ' . $wpdb->posts . ' WHERE post_name = %s LIMIT 1',
            $post_name
        )
    );
 
    switch($post_type) {
        case 'services':
            $query->set('services', $post_name);
            $query->set('post_type', $post_type);
            $query->is_single = true;
            $query->is_page = false;
            break;
    }
}

add_action(
	'pre_get_posts',
	'custom_pre_get_posts'
);

function custom_pre_get_posts($query) {
    global $wpdb;

    if(!$query->is_main_query()) {
	    return;
    }

    $post_name = $query->get('pagename');

    $post_type = $wpdb->get_var(
    	$wpdb->prepare(
    		'SELECT post_type FROM ' . $wpdb->posts . ' WHERE post_name = %s LIMIT 1',
    		$post_name
    	)
    );

    switch($post_type) {
	    case 'services':
	    	$query->set('services', $post_name);
	    	$query->set('post_type', $post_type);
	    	$query->is_single = true;
	    	$query->is_page = false;
	    	break;
    }
}

Line 7: We’ll need the WordPress database object to get additional information about the post.
Line 9-11: We’re going to make sure that the current query is the main query. Since a page can have multiple queries, we’re limiting our filter to only the query that gets information about the page itself.
Line 13: We’re going to grab the pagename from the query, which might be programming or web-development.
Line 15-20: Now we’re going to use the pagename to look in the database for that particular post and extract its post type.
Line 22-23: If this post has a post type that we know we need to manipulate, we’ll need to perform additional actions.
Line 24: We need to a create a query var for the post type and set it to the pagename, so WordPress knows where to actually find the data for the post.
Line 25: We also need to set the post_type back to services.
Line 26: In order for WordPress to load the right template i.e. single-services.php, we need to set is_single to true.
Line 27: Last, but not least, we set is_page to false for good measure, since it’s a custom post type.

Update 9/20/13: Changed add_filter('pre_get_posts', 'custom_pre_get_posts'); to add_action('pre_get_posts', 'custom_pre_get_posts');

Update: 12/23/14: As of WordPress 4.0, the code above doesn’t work. The following changes need to be made:

$result = $wpdb->get_row(
    $wpdb->prepare(
        'SELECT wpp1.post_type, wpp2.post_name AS parent_post_name FROM ' . $wpdb->posts . ' as wpp1 LEFT JOIN ' . $wpdb->posts . ' as wpp2 ON wpp1.post_parent = wpp2.ID WHERE wpp1.post_name = %s LIMIT 1',
        $post_name
    )
);
 
switch($post_type) {
    case 'services':
        if ($result->parent_post_name !== '') {
            $post_name = $result->parent_post_name . '/' . $post_name;
        }
        $query->set('services', $post_name);
        $query->set('post_type', $post_type);
        $query->is_single = true;
        $query->is_page = false;
        break;
}

$result = $wpdb->get_row(
	$wpdb->prepare(
		'SELECT wpp1.post_type, wpp2.post_name AS parent_post_name FROM ' . $wpdb->posts . ' as wpp1 LEFT JOIN ' . $wpdb->posts . ' as wpp2 ON wpp1.post_parent = wpp2.ID WHERE wpp1.post_name = %s LIMIT 1',
		$post_name
	)
);

switch($post_type) {
	case 'services':
		if ($result->parent_post_name !== '') {
			$post_name = $result->parent_post_name . '/' . $post_name;
		}
		$query->set('services', $post_name);
		$query->set('post_type', $post_type);
		$query->is_single = true;
		$query->is_page = false;
		break;
}

Result

You’ve met all your goals. In addition, if you try to create a page with the same name as one of your services, you’ll notice that the slug (i.e. post_name, pagename, etc.) will now increment, avoiding a possible collision.

Here are a couple of things to keep in mind:

I didn’t test the performance of this yet, but if you use some kind of caching system on your website, you should be fine.
All my functions live within a PHP namespace, so I only prefixed them with custom_ for simplicity of this post.
I’ve looked at many different solutions online, and they all had their fair share of problems, so this may too, I just don’t know it yet 🙂

If you have questions or suggestions, leave them in the comments below.

90 thoughts on “Remove post type slug in custom post type URL and move subpages to website root in WordPress”

Tristan C May 29, 2013 at 9:15 am

Thanks for the post! Unfortunately I can’t get it to work… I keep on getting 404s. Have tried updating the permalinks, flush_rewrite_rules();, etc.

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Post authorMay 29, 2013 at 12:50 pm
  
  First, I would output the current WordPress rewrite rules (example in post), just to make sure the ones you added are indeed active. Second, I would print out the $query variable (print_r($query, true)) in custom_pre_get_posts to see that the values are set to what you expect (and also make sure the code in the filter is executed).
  
  Reply ↓
Marco Panichi July 7, 2013 at 8:34 am

Hi Ryanm thank you very much for this article. I’m going mad with this slug!!! I’ve tried your solution but it doesn’t work. Maybe you can help me – I have this situation:
– a custom type called “static”
– it’s hierarchical
– my permalink structure is: “/blog/%postname%”
– WordPress 3.5.2
Following your instruction everything works in admin side: I can create a “static” page called “My Page Title” and the permalink in the editor becomes “http://www.—.com/my-page-title”
Unfortunally, in the website I can reach this page only with the URL “http://www.—.com/blog/static/my-page-title”
I have tryed lots of solutions for DAYS!

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Post authorJuly 11, 2013 at 8:36 am
  
  When you go to the permalink that it’s supposed to be, what do you get? A page not found?
  
  Reply ↓
GG July 8, 2013 at 3:34 am

Man… as much as I want this to work its just not happening.
I’m trying to use this in combination with 301 redirects to create a short urls post type.
I didnt have the postype setup to begin with, so it took a minute to figure out I needed to add: add_action( 'init', 'register_services' ); May want to note this in the post.
Also, setting has_archive to true automatically adds it to your permalink structure, you show false.
My custom permalink structure is set to: /blog/%postname%/
So I was getting /blog/posttype/postname/
Shouldnt have mattered because you’re grabbing the last part of the path, but I think something was screwy there because when I print $post_name later in custom_pre_get_posts, it wasn’t finding anything.
Last resort, i think ill use http://wordpress.org/plugins/custom-permalinks/ and change them manually.
Thanks for trying though! Glad it worked for you.

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Post authorJuly 11, 2013 at 8:48 am
  
  Let’s systematically troubleshoot this. For step #1, let’s confirm the post_type_link filter is working. If you go anywhere in your template and use get_permalink($id), with $id belonging to a services post, please provide the absolute path it printed out (you can omit the domain).
  
  Reply ↓
David July 14, 2013 at 11:43 pm

To get this to work I had to change: $query->set('services', $post_name);
to: $query->set('name', $post_name);

Reply ↓
AJ Clarke July 21, 2013 at 5:24 pm

Works great, thanks man!

Reply ↓
kevin July 30, 2013 at 8:16 pm

What are your thoughts about getting things running with WPMU, as of right now it would default the URL back to domain.com/services/ rather than domain.com/username/services/
Cheers
kc

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Post authorJuly 31, 2013 at 9:30 pm
  
  You have a couple options. (1) You could wrap the filters in a is_main_site() check, which would only apply it to your main site, leaving your child sites as-is. (2) In step 1, where you remove the “services” slug, you could perform a is_multisite() check and then parse $post_path accordingly, essentially accounting for the site name by keeping it in there or putting it back.
  
  Reply ↓
Tomas August 7, 2013 at 8:36 am

Will this work with WPML, too?
I’ve tried this plugin http://wordpress.org/plugins/remove-slug-from-custom-post-type/ but it only removes the slug for the main language…

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Post authorAugust 7, 2013 at 8:55 am
  
  I do have MU enabled on the site that I did this on, however, I’m only applying this code on the main site and not child sites, since don’t need it (yet). Looking at the code above, there is nothing to suggest that it wouldn’t work, except for, as Kevin pointed out, you may have to adjust the $permalink that’s created in step #1 when MU is installed as sub-directories instead of sub-domains, since there’ll be an extra component in the URL that needs to be accounted for.
  
  Reply ↓
Stefan September 19, 2013 at 2:38 am
Ryan, your tutorial was very useful. My case was similar to yours and I was able to remove the slug. But I made a few modifications for this to work as you can see here https://gist.github.com/stefanbc/6620151. First of all, this line
1
add_filter('pre_get_posts','custom_pre_get_posts');
add_filter('pre_get_posts','custom_pre_get_posts');
should be something like this
1
add_action('pre_get_posts','custom_pre_get_posts');
add_action('pre_get_posts','custom_pre_get_posts');
because according to the WordPress codex there is no filter pre_get_posts
And another thing I modified was this
1
$post_name = $query->get('pagename');
$post_name = $query->get('pagename');
to this
1
$post_name = $query->get('name');
$post_name = $query->get('name');
This was my case. Thanks for the awesome tutorial.
Reply ↓
1. Ryan Post authorSeptember 20, 2013 at 10:03 pm
  
  Thanks for the feedback, Stefan. You are right about it being an action and not a filter. I’ve updated my post above. With regard to `pagename` vs `name`, if your custom post type is based on a post, which is the default, `name` would be in fact the way to go, but if it’s based on a page, I think `pagename` is recommended. I’m actually using it as a page, but omitted that in my setup– thanks for catching that!
  
  Reply ↓
2. Dennis October 13, 2016 at 11:49 am
  @stefan
  Your github code worked except that it was throwing a php error regarding variables. I changed:
```
$post_name = end(explode('/', trim($post_path, '/')));
```
  to
```
$path_base = explode( get_template(), str_replace( '\\', '/', dirname( __FILE__ ) ) );
$post_name = ltrim( end( $path_base ), '/' );
```
  and it worked beautifully.
  Thanks
  Reply ↓
chụp ảnh cưới October 12, 2013 at 4:25 am

I using
[product-category/(.+?)/feed/(feed|rdf|rss|rss2|atom)/?$] => index.php?product_cat=$matches[1]&feed=$matches[2]
[product-category/(.+?)/(feed|rdf|rss|rss2|atom)/?$] => index.php?product_cat=$matches[1]&feed=$matches[2]
[product-category/(.+?)/page/?([0-9]{1,})/?$] => index.php?product_cat=$matches[1]&paged=$matches[2]
[product-category/(.+?)/?$] => index.php?product_cat=$matches[1]
[product-tag/([^/]+)/feed/(feed|rdf|rss|rss2|atom)/?$] => index.php?product_tag=$matches[1]&feed=$matches[2]
[product-tag/([^/]+)/(feed|rdf|rss|rss2|atom)/?$] => index.php?product_tag=$matches[1]&feed=$matches[2]
[product-tag/([^/]+)/page/?([0-9]{1,})/?$] => index.php?product_tag=$matches[1]&paged=$matches[2]
[product-tag/([^/]+)/?$] => index.php?product_tag=$matches[1]
with htaccess?

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Post authorOctober 12, 2013 at 3:58 pm
  
  The rewrite rules I showed were only a subset of those in the system to explain that particular point. What you have works just as well.
  
  Reply ↓
Sam October 30, 2013 at 8:21 am

Sorry for asking – I couldn’t get where do I make the changes :$
Help? O:-)

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Post authorOctober 30, 2013 at 8:38 am
  
  You could put this in your theme’s functions.php file, however it would probably be best suited in a plugin. Take a look at the WordPress codex on how to create a plugin.
  
  Reply ↓
efix December 11, 2013 at 4:30 pm

Hi,
Can I use your way for post-type pages also? I want to rewrite my URL structure from http://www.ex1.com/parentpage/childpage to http://www.ex1.com/childpage. So your code should work for me to. But it didn’t. Any idea why?
thank you
efix

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Sechrest Post authorDecember 12, 2013 at 2:40 am
  
  This code will not work on native post types, only custom post types.
  
  Reply ↓
Victor December 30, 2013 at 3:59 pm

here is how i did:
register_post_type with these args
'rewrite' = array('slug' => '/','with_front' => false)
'capability_type' => 'page'
using this approach there is no need to use post_type_link filter
then comes custom_pre_get_posts

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Sechrest Post authorDecember 30, 2013 at 9:27 pm
  
  Thanks for sharing, Victor. I’ll try that out next time I’m working with that code!
  
  Reply ↓
Bill January 12, 2014 at 10:55 am

Great article. THis seems to work for me on my sandbox site except one thing….
I have a main wordpress website at http://www.website.com, but I have an additonal wordpress install in a folder of the main website….so in other words, I have my live site here:
http://www.website-name.com
but I installed another wordpress install in a folder I named DEMSO off that live site I use for sandbox stuff.
http://www.website-name.com/demos/SANDBOX-SITE
I never have any problems, however when I am trying to use this code on the sandbox site, when I view the custom post type, it takes me back to the root wordpress install, so instead of the custom post type url being
http://www.website-name.com/demos/SANDBOX-SITE/post-name (the CPT slug is gone…yeah!!)
it is
http://www.website-name.com/post-name
Can you recommend the code alteration so it doesnt strip it all the way back to the main website root, and instead takes it back to that particular wordpress install’s root?
http://www.website-name/demos/

Reply ↓
1. Ryan Sechrest Post authorJanuary 13, 2014 at 2:38 pm
  
  Bill, I revised the function to be a little more flexible and it should also now work with WordPress installed in a subdirectory. Take another look at the code in step 1.
  
  Reply ↓
  1. Bill January 18, 2014 at 7:02 pm
    Thanks for the reply Ryan. I must be doing something wrong, because I cant get it to work. First, in step 1, you forgot the word custom in the function. Line 8 should be:
    function custom_post_type_link($permalink, $post, $leavename) {
    But regardless, I tried this but it didnt work. Not sure if this matters or not, but the site is located in this path
    public_html/SUBFOLDER/the-wordpress-install-is-here
    The custom post type name is “neighborhoods”. Here is my code:
    /* Remove the neighborhoods slug from published post permalinks. Only affect our CPT though*/ add_filter( 'post_type_link', 'custom_post_type_link', 10, 3 ); function custom_post_type_link($permalink, $post, $leavename) { if(is_object($post) && property_exists($post, 'post_type')) { switch($post->post_type) { case 'neighborhoods': $permalink = str_replace('/' . $post->post_type, '', $permalink); break; } } return $permalink; }
    /* * Some hackery to have WordPress match postname to any of our public post types * All of our public post types can have /post-name/ as the slug, so they better be unique across all posts * Typically core only accounts for posts and pages where the slug is /post-name/ */ add_action( 'pre_get_posts', 'custom_pre_get_posts' ); function custom_pre_get_posts($query) { global $wpdb; if(!$query->is_main_query()) { return; } $post_name = $query->get('pagename'); $post_type = $wpdb->get_var( $wpdb->prepare( 'SELECT post_type FROM ' . $wpdb->posts . ' WHERE post_name = %s LIMIT 1', $post_name ) ); switch($post_type) { case 'neighborhoods': $query->set('neighborhoods', $post_name); $query->set('post_type', $post_type); $query->is_single = true; $query->is_page = false; break; } return $query; }
    Reply ↓
    1. Ryan Sechrest Post authorJanuary 19, 2014 at 5:36 am
      
      You’re right, I didn’t test my quick update and it contained an error. Please take another look, this time tested, and it should now work for you.
      
      Reply ↓

Bill January 19, 2014 at 6:43 am

Hi Ryan…
Ok, I tried new code …the permalink does change int he editor screen …the slug is not there, but I get the 404. I tried resetting permalinks just to make sure there wasn’t an issue there with the 404, but still no dice.
I will paste what I have below for the CPT just in case it is something on my end…

/** Remove slug from custom post type for "neighborhoods" custom post ype */
add_filter(
  'post_type_link',
  'custom_post_type_link',
  10,
  3
);
 
function custom_post_type_link($permalink, $post, $leavename) {
    if (!gettype($post) == 'post') {
        return $permalink;
    }
    switch ($post->post_type) {
        case 'neighborhoods':
            $permalink = get_home_url() . '/' . $post->post_name . '/';
            break;
 
    }
 
    return $permalink;
}

/*
 * Some hackery to have WordPress match postname to any of our public post types
 * All of our public post types can have /post-name/ as the slug, so they better be unique across all posts
 * Typically core only accounts for posts and pages where the slug is /post-name/
 */
add_action(
  'pre_get_posts',
  'custom_pre_get_posts'
);
 
function custom_pre_get_posts($query) {
    global $wpdb;
 
    if(!$query->is_main_query()) {
      return;
    }
 
    $post_name = $query->get('pagename');
 
    $post_type = $wpdb->get_var(
      $wpdb->prepare(
        'SELECT post_type FROM ' . $wpdb->posts . ' WHERE post_name = %s LIMIT 1',
        $post_name
      )
    );
 
    switch($post_type) {
      case 'neighborhoods':
        $query->set('neighborhoods', $post_name);
        $query->set('post_type', $post_type);
        $query->is_single = true;
        $query->is_page = false;
        break;
    }
 
    return $query;
}

/*****nd this is my custom post type:******/

/* Add Custom Post Type for Neighborhoods*/
add_action( 'init', 'create_my_post_types2', 2 );

function create_my_post_types2() {
	register_post_type( 'neighborhoods', 
		array(
			'labels' => array(
				'name' => __( 'Neighborhoods' ),
				'singular_name' => __( 'neighborhoods' ),
				'add_new' => __( 'Add New' ),
				'add_new_item' => __( 'Add neighborhood' ),
				'edit' => __( 'Edit' ),
				'edit_item' => __( 'Edit neighborhood' ),
				'new_item' => __( 'New neighborhood' ),
				'view' => __( 'View neighborhood' ),
				'view_item' => __( 'View neighborhood' ),
				'search_items' => __( 'Search neighborhoods' ),
				'not_found' => __( 'No neighborhoods found' ),
				'not_found_in_trash' => __( 'No neighborhoods found in Trash' ),
				'parent' => __( 'Parent neighborhoods' ),
			),
				'public' => true,
				'show_ui' => true,
				'publicly_queryable' => true,
				'exclude_from_search' => false,
				'menu_position' => 20,
				'menu_icon' => get_stylesheet_directory_uri() . '/images/neighborhood-icon.png',
				'hierarchical' => false,
				'query_var' => false,
				'supports' => array( 'title', 'editor', 'excerpt', 'custom-fields', 'thumbnail', 'page-attributes', 'author', 'comments' ,'genesis-layouts', 'genesis-seo' , 'trackbacks', 'revisions' ),
				'rewrite' => array( 'slug' => 'neighborhoods', 'with_front' => false ),
				'taxonomies' => array( 'post_tag', 'category'),
				'has_archive' => true,
				'can_export' => true,
				
		)
	);
}