PHP is one of the most popular programming languages on the internet. In fact, 78.8% of all websites[1] use PHP in one way or another. If you’re using WordPress, you’re also using PHP, even if you’re not directly interacting with code. PHP in WordPress enables most of the functionality you will use and understanding how it works is necessary if you want to make big changes to your website.
There are many ways to add PHP in WordPress edit or change code to add to your website. Which approach you use depends on your comfort level when editing WordPress files, but the process is a lot simpler than you might imagine.
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In this article, we’ll briefly go over how PHP works. Then we’ll show you four ways to add PHP in WordPress, whether you prefer to use a plugin or do it manually. Get to work!
📚 Table of Contents:
- An Introduction to PHP in WordPress
- 1. Convert PHP to WordPress shortcodes
- 2. Add sitewide code snippets with a plugin
- 3. Customize your child theme in WordPress
- 4. Use an FTP client to edit PHP files manually
An Introduction to PHP in WordPress
PHP is a “generic” programming language used in development of websites is popular. More importantly, WordPress is built with PHP. Therefore, a basic understanding of how PHP works is essential if you want to make major changes to the content management system (CMS) or add new code to your website.
You don’t need to be a programmer to use PHP edit or add in WordPress. Depending on what you want to do, it’s easy to find numerous tutorials that will walk you through the entire process and even provide code snippets that you can use. For example, we have a full article that walks you through various changes you can make to the functions.php file.
Easy methods to add PHP in WordPress
If not comfortable with code, editing WordPress and PHP files can be intimidating. However, WordPress offers several ways to add PHP code to your website, ranging from plugins to the manual approach. As long as you back up your site before making any major changes or using a staging site, you can experiment as needed.
1. Convert PHP to WordPress shortcodes
As usual, plugins offer the easiest approach to solve a given problem in WordPress. There are several plugins that allow you to add custom code to your WordPress files without having to edit them directly.
One way is to turn your PHP code snippets into shortcodes that you simply in the wordpress editor or can use widget areas. This is useful if you want to add PHP to a specific post or page on your site.
You can do this using the free Insert PHP Code Snippet plugin:
With This plugin allows you to create custom shortcodes for PHP code snippets. You can add these snippets with the plugin, and it will generate shortcodes that you can use anywhere on your site to perform these functions.
After installing and activating the plugin, you will see a new tab in it the dashboard labeled XYZ PHP Code. Select this tab and go to PHPCode Snippets → Add New PHP Code Snippet:
The plugin will ask you to set a “name” for your snippet, which describes its purpose and its code paste in php code field:
Remember that paste php code snippet does not validate the code you add. If the code doesn’t work, you’ll have to fix it yourself.
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Once you’ve added a code snippet using the plugin, it will appear in the PHPCode Snippets tab. You have options to pause individual scripts, edit, delete and preview them:
The shortcode to place the snippet is available in the “Snippet Short Code” column. After previewing the code to make sure it works, you can go ahead and add the shortcode anywhere on your site.
2. Add sitewide code snippets with a plugin
Another plugin that can help you add PHP to WordPress is the free Code Snippets plugin.
With this plugin, you can Easily add generic code snippets to your website by going to Code Snippets → Add New. When you add your PHP code snippet, you can choose to run it anywhere or just on the frontend or backend of your website:
In addition to adding PHP code to WordPress, the plugin can also help you help in adding custom JavaScript, CSS or HTML.
3. Customize your child theme in WordPress
WordPress comes with a tool called Theme Editor that allows you to edit your theme files right from the dashboard. Ideally, do this while using a child theme so you don’t lose any changes you make when you update the parent theme.
To access the theme editor, go to Appearance → Theme editor . On the left you will see a simple text editor and on the right a list of files:
The theme files list gives you direct access to all customizable files of your theme. You can also see the complete file name under each entry.Most of the options here will be PHP files.
You can switch which theme you are editing using the Select theme to edit dropdown menu. Additionally, you can use the Documentation dropdown menu below the editor to look up documentation for specific features:
If you search for a feature, you will be taken to their WordPress development codex page (if one is available is). Keep in mind that when editing a custom theme, you may not be able to find documentation for specific features. Once you’ve made the changes you want, you can click Update File to save them.
If you specifically want to add code snippets to your website, you probably want to edit the functions.php file.
4. Use an FTP client to manually edit PHP files
The main downside to using the WordPress theme editor is that the editor itself is very basic. If you’ve ever used a full code editor, you know that you’re missing out on a lot of functionality by modifying files from your dashboard.
A better alternative is to access your website’s files via FTP and use your favorite text editor to update them. To do this, you need an FTP client such as FileZilla.
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If this is your first time using an FTP client, you will need to look up your website’s login credentials. Your FTP credentials are not the same ones you use to log into WordPress.
Traditionally, your web host creates an FTP account for you when you sign up for a plan. The details of this account should be accessible in your hosting control panel:
To connect to your website via FTP, you need the host address, your FTP username and password, and specific port Details (if available). Once you have this information, you can connect to your website using FileZilla or another FTP client.
After accessing your website, you need to find the WordPress root folder, which contains all of your website’s files contains . Usually this folder is named public or public_html or named after your website:
Once you have access to the root folder, you can modify any of your WordPress files and add custom PHP code to them. In general, we don’t recommend modifying files unless you’re sure what they do.
To edit files, you need a general understanding of how the root directory is structured. In the main folder you will find site-wide configuration files. This includes the .htaccess file which you can modify to add interesting functionality in WordPress.
Theme and plugin files can be found in the wp-content folder. If you go to wp-content/plugins or themes you will see that each theme and plugin has its own folder. For example, if you open one of your theme folders, you can edit the same files that you can access with the WordPress theme editor tool.
To edit a file, right-click Right-click it and select the View/Edit option. This will open the file with your local default text editor:
When you’re done making changes to a file, save it and your FTP client will upload the new version to your server. That’s it!
Conclusion
However, when adding code to WordPress, you should always back up your site first in case something goes wrong. For example, adding PHP with incorrect syntax could trigger WordPress recovery mode.
To recap, the top four ways to add PHP in WordPress are:
- Turn your PHP into shortcodes with Insert PHP Code Snippet Plugin
- Add PHP snippets to your website with Code Snippets Plugin
- Customize your child theme with Theme Editor
- Using an FTP client to manually edit WordPress files
When you’re ready to get started, check out our collection of ten useful code snippets for WordPress sites . If you want to go even further, we have a guide on how to become a WordPress developer.
Have questions about adding PHP to WordPress? Let’s talk about it in the comments section below!
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