category_description()WP 1.0.0

Retrieve category description.

No Hooks.

Return

String. Category description, if available.

Usage

category_description( $category );
$category(int)
Category ID.
Default: current category ID

Examples

0

#1 A common example of use

Let's display the description of category 3 (category id) using the echo operator. echo is needed to display the category description because the function just returns the description and doesn't display anything.

<?php echo category_description(3); ?>

As a result, we get a description of category 3.

0

#2 Output the category description only if there is one

$cat_desc = category_description();

if ( $cat_desc ) {
	echo '<div class="cat__desc">'. $cat_desc .'</div>';
}
else {
	echo '<div class="no__cat__desc">No description!</div>';
}
0

#3 Description of the category received through the label

Let's display the category description using a slug (an alternate category name) instead of an ID as in the last example. To do this, get the ID using get_category_by_slug().

$term = get_category_by_slug( 'category-slug' );

if( $term ){
	echo category_description( $term->term_id ); 

	// or
	echo esc_html( $term->description );
}
0

#4 Clean up the category description in the output, through the filter term_description

Suppose our category description uses the shortcode [image=/link_to_image] we use this shortcode in other places, but when we display the category description, we don't need it. To remove it, we will use the filter:

add_filter( 'term_description', 'clear_term_description_image_shortcode' );

function clear_term_description_image_shortcode( $value ){

	return preg_replace( '/[image=[^]]*]/', '', $value );
}

Changelog

Since 1.0.0 Introduced.

category_description() code WP 6.4.3

function category_description( $category = 0 ) {
	return term_description( $category );
}