$10

How do I trim the_excerpt to a certain character count?

function devinsays_excerpt_more($more) {

	return '... // <a href="' . get_permalink() . '" class="read-more">Read More</a>'; 

}

add_filter('excerpt_more', 'devinsays_excerpt_more');

remove_filter( 'get_the_excerpt', 'wp_trim_excerpt' );

add_filter( 'get_the_excerpt', 'devinsays_trim_excerpt' );



function devinsays_trim_excerpt( $content ) {

	return substr( 0, 200, strip_tags( $content ) );

}

Devin Price | 08/06/10 at 11:55am | Edit

(16) Possible Answers Submitted...

• 
  Last edited:
  08/23/10
  12:13am
  Utkarsh Kukreti says:

  Should be
  
  

  	return substr( strip_tags( $content ), 0, 200 );

  • 08/06/10 12:06pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    Hm, already tried that.
    
    I'm seeing that it perhaps trims the excerpts that are manually entered- but it doesn't automatically trim the_content down if no excerpt is manually entered. Normally the_except will return something even if there is no manual excerpt in.

  • 08/06/10 12:45pm
    
    Utkarsh Kukreti says:

    Try hooking into the_excerpt then?
    
    
    

    remove_filter( 'get_the_excerpt', 'wp_trim_excerpt' );
    
    
    
    add_filter( 'the_excerpt', 'devinsays_trim_excerpt' );
    
    
    
    
    
    function devinsays_trim_excerpt( $content ) {
    
    
    
    	return substr( strip_tags( $content ), 0, 200 );
    
    
    
    }

  • 08/07/10 5:28pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    This is cutting it- for sure. But the character lengths coming out are:
    
    186 char
    188 char
    197 char
    188 char
    
    If I change the substr to 210 the char count goes up on all items by 10. So, that is working. But not sure why it doesn't return the full characters of substr.
    
    Also, on posts with less than 200 characters (like the standard Hello World! WordPress post)- nothing gets outputted.

  • 08/07/10 5:39pm
    
    Utkarsh Kukreti says:

    Try using
    
    

    add_filter( 'the_excerpt', 'devinsays_trim_excerpt', 11 );

• 
  Last edited:
  08/06/10
  12:03pm
  Chris Lee says:

  
  
  function devinsays_trim_excerpt( $content ) {
  
  $limit = 200;
  
  $content = $excerpt;
  
   $excerpt = explode(' ', get_the_excerpt(), $limit);
  
    if (count($excerpt)>=$limit) {
  
      array_pop($excerpt);
  
      $excerpt = implode(" ",$excerpt).'...';
  
    } else {
  
      $excerpt = implode(" ",$excerpt);
  
    }	
  
    $excerpt = preg_replace('`\[[^\]]*\]`','',$excerpt);
  
    return $excerpt;
  
  
  
  }
  
  
  
  remove_filter( 'get_the_excerpt', 'wp_trim_excerpt' );
  
  add_filter( 'get_the_excerpt', 'devinsays_trim_excerpt' );
  
  

  Previous versions of this answer: 08/06/10 at 12:03pm

  • 08/06/10 12:11pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    Breaks the site. Shows only the first item, with no except.

• 
  Last edited:
  08/06/10
  12:13pm
  Sidd says:

  Hey Devin,
  
  Give this a try. Add the following code to the functions.php This filter is used by wp_trim_excerpt()
  
  

  
  
  function new_excerpt_length($length) {
  
  	return 200;
  
  }
  
  add_filter('excerpt_length', 'new_excerpt_length');
  
  
  
  

  
  
  -- SOME CODE OMITTED --

  Previous versions of this answer: 08/06/10 at 12:05pm | 08/06/10 at 12:08pm | 08/06/10 at 12:13pm

  • 08/06/10 12:08pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    That returns a word count.

• 
  Last edited:
  08/06/10
  12:05pm
  Michael Fields says:

  add_filter( 'excerpt_length', 'mytheme_filter_excerpt_length' );
  
  if( !function_exists( 'mytheme_filter_excerpt_length' ) ) {
  
  	function mytheme_filter_excerpt_length( $length ) {
  
  		return 20;
  
  	}
  
  }

  Previous versions of this answer: 08/06/10 at 12:04pm | 08/06/10 at 12:04pm | 08/06/10 at 12:05pm | 08/06/10 at 12:05pm

  • 08/06/10 12:17pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    Returns a word count.

  • 08/06/10 12:37pm
    
    Michael Fields says:

    Might need some fine tuning, but I think this is what you are looking for?
    
    

    add_filter( 'the_excerpt', 'razorback_filter_excerpt', 1 );
    
    add_filter( 'the_content', 'razorback_filter_excerpt', 1 );
    
    function razorback_filter_excerpt( $content ) {
    
    	if( !is_single() && !is_page() ) {
    
    		$c = wp_kses( $content, array() );
    
    		$c = substr( $c, 0, 200 );
    
    		if( !empty( $c ) ) {
    
    			return '<p>' . $c . '</p>';
    
    		}
    
    		return $c;
    
    	}
    
    	return $content;
    
    }

  • 08/07/10 5:37pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    Semi works. Very similar outputs to what I'm getting with Utkarsh. Where excerpts where words get cut off, it's generally 199 char. But not always.

  • 08/07/10 10:36pm
    
    Michael Fields says:

    My last idea would be to swap mb_substr() for substr().

• 
  Last edited:
  08/06/10
  12:14pm
  West Coast Design Co. says:

  Hey Devin,
  
  Checkout
  
  Content and Excerpt Word Limit
  http://wcdco.info/au
  
  then add ‘<?php content('25'); ?>. ‘
  REPLACE (25) WITH THE AMOUNT OF CHARICTORS YOU WISH TO SHOW.
  
  
  Cheers!
  

  Previous versions of this answer: 08/06/10 at 12:14pm

  • 08/06/10 12:12pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    Looking for a character limit.

• 
  Last edited:
  08/06/10
  12:07pm
  Lee Rickler says:

  Try this:
  
  Instead of:
  

  <?php the_excerpt(); ?>

  
  
  Use:
  

  <?php $len = 200; $newExcerpt = substr($post->post_excerpt, 0, $len);
  
  if(strlen($newExcerpt) < strlen($post->post_excerpt)) { $newExcerpt = $newExcerpt." ...";
  
  } echo "".$newExcerpt.""; ?>

  • 08/06/10 12:15pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    If someone hasn't manually entered an excerpt- it returns nothing. Also, would prefer to have a filter which also keep the readmore filter intact.

• 
  Last edited:
  08/23/10
  12:13am
  enodekciw says:

  Paste this into functions.php
  
  

  <?php
  
  function short_excerpt($string) {
  
     echo substr($string, 0, 200); 
  
  }
  
  ?>

  
  
  And then, edit your theme and replace
  

  
  
  <?php the_excerpt(); ?>
  
  

  
  with this one:
  

  <?php short_excerpt(get_the_excerpt()); ?> 

  Previous versions of this answer: 08/06/10 at 12:13pm | 08/06/10 at 12:19pm

  • 08/06/10 12:30pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    Seems like that would cut off my read more filter- but will try. That can always be appended instead.

  • 08/06/10 12:40pm
    
    enodekciw says:

    Modified a bit. This goes into functions.php:
    

    <?php
    
    function short_excerpt($string, $id) {
    
       $excerpt = substr(strip_tags($string), 0, 200); 
    
       $read-more = '<a href="' . get_permalink($id) . '" class="read-more">Read More</a>'; 
    
       echo $excerpt . ' ' . $read-more;
    
    }
    
    ?>

    
    Replace
    

    
    
    <?php the_excerpt(); ?>
    
    

    
    with this:
    

    
    
    <?php short_excerpt(get_the_excerpt(), get_the_ID()); ?> 
    
    

  • 08/06/10 12:46pm
    
    enodekciw says:

    Ok it seems like $read-more variable breaks the code. Change that code in functions.php to this one:
    

    <?php
    
    function short_excerpt($string, $id) {
    
       $excerpt = substr(strip_tags($string), 0, 200); 
    
       $more = '<a href="' . get_permalink($id) . '" class="read-more">Read More</a>'; 
    
       echo $excerpt . ' ' . $more;
    
    }
    
    ?>

    
    
    Usage:
    

    <?php short_excerpt(get_the_excerpt(), get_the_ID()); ?> 

    
    
    Tested it on my own blog - works fine.

  • 08/06/10 12:53pm
    
    enodekciw says:

    btw, this also includes whitespaces into your 200 characters count ;)

• 
  Last edited:
  08/06/10
  4:11pm
  Roberto Mas says:

  This always worked for me and yes it counts white space also. you can create multiple exceprts this way
  
  in functions.php add
  
  //custom excerpt
  function new_excerpt_length($length) {
  return 100;
  }
  function cutMe($content){
  $limit = 350;
  $content = strip_tags($content);
  if (strlen($content) > $limit)
  $content = substr($content, 0, strpos($content," ",$limit)) . ' [...]';
  return $content;
  }
  function cutMeAgain($content){
  $limit = 250;
  $content = strip_tags($content);
  if (strlen($content) > $limit)
  $content = substr($content, 0, strpos($content," ",$limit)) . ' [...]';
  return $content;
  }
  function cutMeSmaller($content){
  $limit = 100;
  $content = strip_tags($content);
  if (strlen($content) > $limit)
  $content = substr($content, 0, strpos($content," ",$limit)) . ' [...]';
  return $content;
  }
  add_filter('excerpt_length', 'new_excerpt_length');
  
  
  then in you php code where you want a custum excerpt <?php echo cutMe(get_the_excerpt()); ?>
  

  Previous versions of this answer: 08/06/10 at 4:11pm

  • 08/06/10 12:27pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    Seems like it should work, but is giving different lengths. White space counted?

• 
  Last edited:
  08/06/10
  12:14pm
  Lew Ayotte says:

  Sid's answer is the best, in my opinion :)
  
  From: http://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/the_excerpt#Control_Excerpt_Length_using_Filters
  
  Lew

  • 08/06/10 12:17pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    Returns a word count.

  • 08/06/10 12:31pm
    
    Lew Ayotte says:

    Ah, misread your question ;)...
    
    Try:
    

    
    
    function new_wp_trim_excerpt($text) {
    
        return substr($text, 0, 200);
    
    }
    
    add_filter('wp_trim_excerpt', 'new_wp_trim_excerpt');
    
    

    
    
    I haven't tested it yet...
    

  • 08/06/10 12:38pm
    
    Lew Ayotte says:

    Oh this might be better:
    
    

    remove_filter( 'get_the_excerpt', 'wp_trim_excerpt' );
    
    add_filter('get_the_excerpt', 'new_wp_trim_excerpt' );
    
    
    
    function new_wp_trim_excerpt($text) {
    
    	$raw_excerpt = $text;
    
    	if ( '' == $text ) {
    
    		$text = get_the_content('');
    
    
    
    		$text = strip_shortcodes( $text );
    
    
    
    		$text = apply_filters('the_content', $text);
    
    		$text = str_replace(']]>', ']]>', $text);
    
    		$text = strip_tags($text);
    
    		$text = substr($text, 0, 200)
    
    		$excerpt_more = apply_filters('excerpt_more', ' ' . '[...]');
    
    		$text = $text . $excerpt_more;
    
    	}
    
    }

  • 08/06/10 12:39pm
    
    Lew Ayotte says:

    forgot the return :)
    
    

    function new_wp_trim_excerpt($text) {
    
    	$raw_excerpt = $text;
    
    	if ( '' == $text ) {
    
    		$text = get_the_content('');
    
    
    
    		$text = strip_shortcodes( $text );
    
    
    
    		$text = apply_filters('the_content', $text);
    
    		$text = str_replace(']]>', ']]>', $text);
    
    		$text = strip_tags($text);
    
    		$text = substr($text, 0, 200)
    
    		$excerpt_more = apply_filters('excerpt_more', ' ' . '[...]');
    
    		$text = $text . $excerpt_more;
    
    	}
    
    	
    
    	return $text;
    
    }

• 
  Last edited:
  08/06/10
  1:22pm
  Gianni D'Alerta says:

  function.php
  

  function excerpt($num) {
  
  $limit = $num+1;
  
  $excerpt = explode(' ', get_the_excerpt(), $limit);
  
  array_pop($excerpt);
  
  $excerpt = implode(" ",$excerpt)."...";
  
  echo $excerpt;
  
  }

  
  
  then call this:
  

  <?php excerpt(16); ?>

  
  in the loop, the number represents character count.
  
  I know its not what you wanted as a replacement for the_excerpt() but this has worked in the past for us. Good luck on the answer.
• 
  Last edited:
  08/07/10
  12:30am
  Guillermo Sornoza says:

  Hi, why don't you try this plugin http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/advanced-excerpt/ ?
  
  It has been useful for me...
  
  
• 
  Last edited:
  08/07/10
  4:54am
  wjm says:

  This question got my attention because of how many reponses it has received so far.
  
  Your approach is wrong for a simple reason,
  you are removing the filter 'wp_trim_excerpt' and are replacing it by a subtr function,
  
  wp_trim_excerpt() basically takes care of empty excerpts and does a lot of (de)formating to the content text to create the new excerpt.
  
  what you need to do is recreate the same features of wp_trim_excerpt but to suit your needs.
  Right now there is no way to configure the excerpts by char lenght.
  Here is the solution that takes care of that,
  at first i used substr, but there is an issue with that. You may cut off words. and wordpress never does that with excerpts so i had do deal with that.
  
  So this function checks the lenght, if it can be cut at 200 char lenght, it will leave all the words. but if longer, it will remove the last word.. maybe leaving the excerpt with 190 something chars (depending on the lenght of the last word) but never longer than 200.
  
  you can change the 200 value by using the new filter called "excerpt_chars_length"
  

  
  
  remove_filter( 'get_the_excerpt', 'wp_trim_excerpt' );
  
  add_filter( 'get_the_excerpt', 'devinsays_wp_trim_excerpt' );
  
  function devinsays_wp_trim_excerpt($text) {
  
  	$raw_excerpt = $text;
  
  	if ( '' == $text ) {
  
  		$text = get_the_content('');
  
  		$text = strip_shortcodes( $text );
  
  		$text = apply_filters('the_content', $text);
  
  		$text = str_replace(']]>', ']]>', $text);
  
  		$text = trim(strip_tags($text));
  
  		
  
  		$excerpt_char_length = apply_filters('excerpt_chars_length', 200);
  
  		$excerpt_more = apply_filters('excerpt_more', ' ' . '[...]');
  
  		
  
  		if ( strlen($text) > $excerpt_char_length ) {
  
  			//We don't want to cut-off words so we need to split the text by words and check its length
  
  			$words = preg_split("/[\n\r\t ]+/", $text, -1, PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY);
  
  			$count = 0;
  
  			foreach ( $words as $k => $word ) {
  
  				$count += strlen($word);
  
  				//if we have the exact amount of chars, then we leave all the words
  
  				if ( $count == $excerpt_char_length ) {
  
  					$words = array_slice( $words, 0, $k+1 );
  
  					break;
  
  				}
  
  				//if we have more than the chars required, we don't include the last word
  
  				elseif ( $count >= $excerpt_char_length ) {
  
  					$words = array_slice( $words, 0, $k ); //skip this last word
  
  					break;
  
  				}
  
  				$count++; // counter increase for additional space
  
  			}
  
  			$text = implode(' ', $words) . $excerpt_more;
  
  		}
  
  	}
  
  	return apply_filters('wp_trim_excerpt', $text, $raw_excerpt);
  
  }
  
  

  
  
  I may submit this to trac.worpress.org as an enhancement to wp_trim_excerpt() to include words or chars.
  
  full code is here.
  http://wordpress.pastebin.com/kGcJFSbc
  
  Let me know what you think,
  if it works, if this is what you excepected
  so i can submit the patches to trac.wordpress.org
  -wjm

  • 08/07/10 5:20pm
    
    Devin Price says:

    I'm not sure if you had a chance to test this. I'm using 2010 just for the test environment. I removed the regular excerpt filters- and just pasted your code into the functions.php.
    
    The call that's being used in <?php the_excerpt(); ?> from the loop.php.
    
    With your code in, the "read more" filters don't get added- and I'm still getting excerpt character lengths of 238 char, 310 char, etc.
    
    I think this is perhaps the right direction though- not sure why the code is not taking.
    
    I'm going to go back through the other responses again and test various methods.

  • 08/08/10 12:52pm
    
    wjm says:

    Devin
    
    add this code to functions.php
    http://wordpress.pastebin.com/kGcJFSbc
    
    in fact, that code was developed under twenty ten.
    i dont know why it is not working,
    acutally, i removed the readme more filter 2010 added, but your own filter overwrites it.
    you may have other code (maybe the from the other responses) interfering with my code.
    imho, that is the right way of doing it.

• 
  Last edited:
  08/07/10
  1:09pm
  Valentinas Bakaitis says:

  Really simple way to do this would be to take strip_tags(the_content()); and put it in one of functions mentioned here: http://www.the-art-of-web.com/php/truncate/. It would probably not be the very "right" method to do that, but at least it would be very clear and easy, should be something like 5 lines of code.
• 
  Last edited:
  08/07/10
  10:15pm
  Mirza Rahman says:

  Add this function:
  

  // Excerpt Word Limit
  
  function excerpt($num) {
  
  	$link = get_permalink();
  
  	$ending = get_option('wl_excerpt_ending');
  
  	$limit = $num+1;
  
  	$excerpt = explode(' ', get_the_excerpt(), $limit);
  
  	array_pop($excerpt);
  
  	$excerpt = implode(" ",$excerpt).$ending;
  
  	echo $excerpt;
  
  	$readmore = get_option('wl_readmore_link');
  
  	if($readmore!="") {
  
  		$readmore = '<p class="readmore"><a href="'.$link.'">'.$readmore.'</a></p>';
  
  		echo $readmore;
  
  	}
  
  }

  
  
  And then call the excerpt (limited to the number of words you need) by using.
  

  <?php excerpt('word-limit'); ?>
• 
  Last edited:
  08/09/10
  10:40am
  jedw says:

  I recently implemented a function to limit post titles and excerpts to a certain amount of characters. This implementation takes the use of html entities into account. I think you are missing this. From your question I couldn't derive if you want to allow cutting off words at the end of the string, and wether you want to allow special characters (& and other punctuation characters) at the end of the string. Therefore you can set two booleans at the beginning of the function. You can strip it down if you like ofcourse.
  
  Try the following for your situation. This includes the read more link:
  
  
  

  
  
  remove_filter('the_excerpt', 'wp_trim_excerpt'); // remove default wp filter
  
  add_filter('the_excerpt', 'devinsays_trim_excerpt'); // add custom filter
  
  function devinsays_trim_excerpt($content) {
  
  	$max_chars = 200;
  
  	$allow_cutoff = true;
  
  	$allow_specialchars = true;	
  
  	
  
  	$content = strip_tags($content);
  
  	$content = html_entity_decode($content, ENT_COMPAT, 'UTF-8'); // decode html entities to characters with (charset UTF-8)
  
  	if(strlen($content) > $max_chars) {
  
  		$content = substr($content, 0, $max_chars);
  
  		if(!$allow_cutoff) {
  
  			$last_space = strrpos($content, ' '); // find the last space in string to avoid word cut-off
  
  			$content = substr($content, 0, $last_space);
  
  		}
  
  		trim($content); // trim in case last char is a space;
  
  		if(!$allow_specialchars) {
  
  			while(eregi('[[:punct:]]$', $content))
  
  				$content = trim(eregi_replace('[[:punct:]]$', '', $content)); // strip last char if punctuation
  
  		}	
  
  	}
  
  	$more_string = '... // <a href="' . get_permalink() . '" class="read-more">Read More</a>'; // the "read more" link
  
  	return $content.$more_string;
  
  }
  
  

  
  
  

  Previous versions of this answer: 08/09/10 at 10:40am
• 
  Last edited:
  08/09/10
  6:09pm
  Eugen Rochko says:

  Try to put this into functions.php, and commenting out all other filters for the_excerpt you might have there.
  
  

  <?php
  
  
  
  function trim_excerpt($excerpt) {
  
  	return substr($excerpt, 0, 200);
  
  }
  
  
  
  add_filter('the_excerpt', 'trim_excerpt');
  
  
  
  ?>
  
  

  Previous versions of this answer: 08/09/10 at 6:09pm

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