How to Include Custom Post Types in WordPress Archive Pages

This tutorial on how to include custom post types in WordPress archive pages is related to my previous article on how to include custom post types in WordPress search results.

We’ll learn how to get custom post types to appear in your WordPress archives by modifying the main query via the pre_get_posts hook.

By default, custom post types are not included in archive pages, even if they use the default category and tag taxonomies built into WordPress.

Building the Function to Include Custom Post Types in WordPress Archive Pages

Open up your functions.php file and paste in the following snippet of code:

/**
 * This function modifies the main WordPress archive query for categories
 * and tags to include an array of post types instead of the default 'post' post type.
 *
 * @param object $query The main WordPress query.
 */
function tg_include_custom_post_types_in_archive_pages( $query ) {
    if ( $query->is_main_query() && ! is_admin() && ( is_category() || is_tag() && empty( $query->query_vars['suppress_filters'] ) ) ) {
        $query->set( 'post_type', array( 'post', 'movies', 'products', 'portfolio' ) );
    }
}
add_action( 'pre_get_posts', 'tg_include_custom_post_types_in_archive_pages' );

What does this function do? It modifies the primary frontend WordPress query when you are in a category or tag context. Then, it injects the custom post types you define into the query itself, allowing them to be shown on category and tag archive pages. The above function will return content from each of these custom post types: post, movies, products and portfolio.

Change the names of the custom post types in the array to match your custom post types that you want included in your WordPress archive pages.

And that’s it! You have successfully included custom post types in your WordPress archive pages!

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