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How To Create And Use Custom Taxonomies In Divi

Nelson Miller Profile Orange
This tutorial will show you how to create your own custom taxonomies with our free generator and how to add and use them in your Divi website.

▶️ Please watch the video above to get all the exciting details! 👆

What Is A Custom Taxonomy?

A taxonomy is a way to have orderly classifications of items. In this case, a WordPress taxonomy is a way to categorize your post types. By default, WordPress comes with two taxonomies for your Posts, and chances are you have used them and already know what they do. I’m referring to Categories and Tags. In fact, Divi even adds categories and tags for its own Projects custom post type that comes with Divi. You can also see examples of taxonomies if you are using WooCommerce. Things like Product Categories and Product Attributes are taxonomies. 

So now you have an idea of what these are. And these are great, but did you know you can make your own additional taxonomies? That’s right, and you can use our free generator! This super handy tool allows you to create your own custom taxonomies in Divi and assign them to any post type you want!

How To Use Custom Taxonomies In Divi

It’s really easy to use custom taxonomies in Divi. They go perfectly with custom post types, which you can learn more about in our other tutorial on custom post types in Divi. If you have used the Divi Theme Builder (which I sure hope you do by now) then you will be happy to know that custom taxonomies are just like default taxonomies when it comes to using them.

Theme Builder Support

The main way that taxonomies integrate with Divi is in the Theme Builder. When you go to Divi>Theme Builder and assign a template, you can choose to assign a template to the new taxonomies that you create just like any other taxonomy.

How To Create A Custom Taxonomy In Divi

There are at least two ways to make a custom post type. You basically can choose to use a plugin, use a generator, or hire a developer.

Use A Plugin

If you want to use a plugin, you could check out Custom Post Type UI, Pods, or another similar plugin. These plugins provide an interface for you to enter the data. Just remember, this is not automatic, but manual. Just because it is a plugin does not mean it is easier. To me, it makes more sense to use one less plugin and use our generator.

Use A Generator (Recommended)

I am all about teaching and learning, so I think you should try our generator instead of relying on a plugin to do the same thing. And the problem with the plugin method is that you have to keep it installed, whereas this way you can paste your snippet and be done! And our generator auto-populates the fields, which is super cool! 

How To Use Our Free Divi Taxonomy Generator

If you haven’t yet, be sure to keep our Custom Taxonomy Generator open in a new tab as we go along. Be sure to click on the Taxonomy tab, since the Post Type tab will come up by default.

The rest of this post will be an explanation of each of the features of the generator. I’ll do my best to break it down into simple language.

General

Name (singular)

This is the singular name you want to call your custom taxonomy.

Notice that when you type the name into the field, most of the other fields in the generator under the General and Labels sections auto-populate!

Name (plural)

This is the plural form of the name.

Key

This is the main value that the code uses to reference the taxonomy. This is usually a singular small case version of the name.

Post Types

This section is where you choose where to assign the new taxonomy. You can choose to assign it to the existing default post types like Pages or Posts, or assign it to a new custom post type that you have already generated.

Post Types

  • Pages
  • Posts

Custom Post Type

To assign the taxonomy to an existing custom post type, simply find the post type key and type it in the box. You can learn more by reading our other tutorial about how to create custom post types.

Labels

This allows you to configure how each of the post types labels will appear. If you want to see this in action, just browse around your site and look at how this works for pages and posts. Our generator will add these automatically, but you can edit them as needed.

Options

This allows you to configure how you would like your post type to appear in the back end of WordPress.

Hierarchical

A hierarchical taxonomy can have a parent and one or more children. The default categories in WordPress are a good example of a hierarchical taxonomy. One category can be the parent of other categories in a hierarchical fashion.

Public

This option changes the visibility of the WordPress taxonomy to authors and visitors. Just keep this set to True.

Show Admin UI

This determines where the custom taxonomy is shown in places like the admin bar at the top of the WordPress back end. This should be set to True.

Show Admin Column

This is the column in the backend of a post type where you can view the name, slug, date, etc. Keeping this on True will show the column for your custom taxonomy, which is most likely what you want. 

 Show in Navigation Menus

This sets whether the new custom taxonomy items will be available in the WordPress navigation menus. Most likely you would want to to be set to True.

Show In Tag Clouds

This usually refers to the WordPress tag cloud widget, so if you want the ability to show your new taxonomy like that then keep this on True.

There you go! That’s how you can use our free generator to use custom post types in Divi. Be sure to watch the video above.

If you want to take this further, we have a lesson on custom post types and more in our Beyond The Builder course, so consider purchasing that if you build or manage websites with Divi and WordPress.

Categories: Tutorials WordPress

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29 Comments

  1. Tony

    Hi Nelson – followed both tutorials now – but still the Taxonomies are not showing with in the Divi blog module – so cannot filter by them. What am I missing?? Thanks

    Reply
      • Katie

        Also wishing that taxonomies showed for CPTs in the divi blog module or divi blog extras module. Do you have an alternative workaround for displaying a list of CPTs of a specific taxonomy?

        I used CPTs to build ‘people’ profiles (e.g. name, photo, biography) and used taxonomies to organize people by groups/departments. Now I’m hoping to display specific groups of people on an About Us page.

      • Hemant Gaba

        Hey Katie,

        I have created a snippet and an explanation for you. Could you please go to this URL and see if that helps?
        https://www.codepile.net/pile/9k8q5OL2

        Let me know how it goes.

  2. Alan

    The taxonomy generator works great! Is there a way to access or display the new taxonomy within my WooCommerce Shop. I’m also using the most recent version of Divi.

    Reply
  3. Gentil

    it’s really good. your generator is great. I have a quick question. Would there be a simple way to create a carousel allowing to scroll through a custom post type? I did not even find in Divi how to make a post carousel elsewhere

    Reply
  4. robert

    i use custom post type IU to create a woocommerce custom taxanomy “brands”

    then i head over to the divi builder to try to customize the brands page. How do i make that page only show the custom taxanomy?

    Reply
    • Nelson Lee Miller (aka The Divi Teacher) <span class="comment-author-role-label author-label">Author</span>

      Hi Robert, based on the terminology used, I’m not sure what you mean. I assume you are referring to making a Theme Builder template for the taxonomy? But I don’t know what you mean to show on the page.

      Reply
  5. Yana

    Hi Nelson,

    Thank you for creating this generator! It is really cool and easy to use.

    I was wondering if you could help me with an issue I am running into… I have created the custom taxonomy for Locations to the default Posts and it is showing up and I can assign posts to various locations; however, when I try to search or filter for one of the locations, I am either getting a 404 error for the locations page or the URL gets redirected to another page on the website. I have checked my redirects and I don’t have anything set up to cause this behaviour.

    Your help would be greatly appreciated!

    Thanks!

    Reply
    • Hemant Gaba

      Hi Yana,

      I guess to investigate this issue and to know what the actual issue is we need to go into the backend of the website but that we can’t do. Please try asking the same question in Divi Support and they will definitely help you in that.

      Let us know if you need any other assistance. 🙂

      Reply
  6. Sabine

    Hi,
    I downloaded your empty child theme, activated it in the back-end. Pasted the generated code in the functions.php section and saved it (updated file)
    Everything seems ok, but.. nothing showing up: no custom post in the left column.
    Tried this for 4 times, refreshing page, still nothing.
    Divi/theme options/Builder: custom post is not there
    Disabled all my plugins, tried safe mode.
    What is going wrong?
    thanks for your support

    This is the code I pasted in my child theme:

    //add_action(‘init’, ‘register_cpt_mantelzorgorganisatie’);

    function register_cpt_mantelzorgorganisatie() {
    register_post_type(‘mantelzorgorganisatie’, array(
    ‘labels’ => array(
    ‘name’ => _x(‘mantelzorgorganisaties’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘singular_name’ => _x(‘mantelzorgorganisatie’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘add_new’ => _x(‘Add New’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘add_new_item’ => _x(‘Add New mantelzorgorganisatie’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘edit_item’ => _x(‘Edit mantelzorgorganisatie’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘new_item’ => _x(‘New mantelzorgorganisatie’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘view_item’ => _x(‘View mantelzorgorganisatie’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘search_items’ => _x(‘Search mantelzorgorganisaties’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘not_found’ => _x(‘No mantelzorgorganisaties found’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘not_found_in_trash’ => _x(‘No mantelzorgorganisaties found in Trash’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘parent_item_colon’ => _x(‘Parent mantelzorgorganisatie:’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’),
    ‘menu_name’ => _x(‘mantelzorgorganisaties’, ‘mantelzorgorganisatie’)
    ),
    ‘hierarchical’ => true,
    ‘description’ => ”,
    ‘supports’ => array(‘title’, ‘editor’, ‘thumbnail’, ‘trackbacks’),
    ‘taxonomies’ => array(),
    ‘public’ => true,
    ‘show_ui’ => true,
    ‘show_in_menu’ => true,
    ‘menu_icon’ => ‘dashicons-images-alt2’,
    ‘menu_position’ => ‘5’,
    ‘show_in_nav_menus’ => true,
    ‘publicly_queryable’ => true,
    ‘exclude_from_search’ => false,
    ‘has_archive’ => true,
    ‘query_var’ => true,
    ‘can_export’ => true,
    ‘capability_type’ => ‘post’,
    ‘rewrite’ => true
    ));
    }

    Reply
    • Hemant Gaba

      Hey Sabine,

      I have just generated the code using our tool and it works completely fine on my end. So to solve your issue, it would be great if you could provide me the information of all the entries that you were placing in the tool to generate the code so that I can generate it on my end, use it, and share it with you if everything works fine or fix it if there is an issue.

      Reply
  7. Pascal

    Hey Nelson and thank you so much for your tools and tutorials. I discover the Custom Post Type and your post is very useful. I created a Producer Custom Poste type with categories. I generate the Poste type and the taxonomies (bio; conventional) with your generator. As a result the categories are shared with normal posts ! I Don’t see where is my mistake 😉 Can you tell me please ?

    Reply
    • Pascal

      Hey Nelson, sorry to disturb you, I found my mistake 😉

      Reply
      • Hemant Gaba

        Hey Pascal,

        We are glad that the issue is resolved now. Please let me know if you need any further assistance. 🙂

  8. D Sinc

    In the standard Divi Blog Module there are options for “All Categories” and “Current Category”.

    I would like to be able to have an option for “Current Category” (1 Divi Library Template to rule them all). This would show up in your awesome Custom Blog module as an option under whichever CPT I had in there.

    How and where would this be done? Currently using CPT UI since it was a quick test.

    Thanks!

    Reply
  9. Alessia

    Hi Nelson, all post categories are automatically copied and those written in the form are not inserted. Also, if I delete a category, it deletes itself from the regular post categories as well.
    I can’t understand my mistake, could you help me please?

    add_action(‘init’, ‘register_cpt_progettiisf’);

    function register_cpt_progettiisf() {
    register_post_type(‘progettiisf’, array(
    ‘labels’ => array(
    ‘name’ => _x(‘ProgettiISF’, ‘progettiisf’),
    ‘singular_name’ => _x(‘ProgettoISF’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘add_new’ => _x(‘Aggiungi Nuovo’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘add_new_item’ => _x(‘Aggiungi Nuovo Progetto ISF’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘edit_item’ => _x(‘Modifica Progetto ISF’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘new_item’ => _x(‘Nuovo Progetto ISF’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘view_item’ => _x(‘View ProgettoISF’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘search_items’ => _x(‘Search ProgettoISFS’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘not_found’ => _x(‘Nessun Progetto ISF Trovato’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘not_found_in_trash’ => _x(‘No Progetto ISF trovato nel cestino’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘parent_item_colon’ => _x(‘Parent ProgettoISF:’, ‘progettoisf’),
    ‘menu_name’ => _x(‘Progetto ISF’, ‘progettoisf’)
    ),
    ‘hierarchical’ => true,
    ‘description’ => ”,
    ‘supports’ => array(‘title’, ‘editor’, ‘author’, ‘thumbnail’, ‘trackbacks’, ‘custom-fields’, ‘revisions’, ‘post-formats’),
    ‘taxonomies’ => array(‘category’, ‘post_tag’),
    ‘public’ => true,
    ‘show_ui’ => true,
    ‘show_in_menu’ => true,
    ‘menu_icon’ => ‘dashicons-hammer’,
    ‘menu_position’ => ’20’,
    ‘show_in_nav_menus’ => true,
    ‘publicly_queryable’ => true,
    ‘exclude_from_search’ => false,
    ‘has_archive’ => true,
    ‘query_var’ => true,
    ‘can_export’ => true,
    ‘capability_type’ => ‘post’,
    ‘rewrite’ => true
    ));
    }

    Reply
    • Hemant Gaba

      Hi Alessia!

      I’m not able to find any mistake in the code. It is difficult to understand the issue this way. We need to remotely access the dashboard for further checking.

      Reply
  10. Muhammad Fuzail

    Hi I am using your plugin custom blog module, but issue is it is not getting my categories from custom post type. its show all category. how to fix this issue.
    All post or categories getting through csv file.

    Reply
  11. vishal

    Installing plugin from uploaded file: Divi Taxonomy Helper – Posts – Demo 9.json
    Unpacking the package…

    The package could not be installed. PCLZIP_ERR_BAD_FORMAT (-10) : Unable to find End of Central Dir Record signature

    Go to Plugin Installer

    Reply
    • Hemant Gaba

      Hi Vishal!

      Please note that you’re adding the layout JSON file. Please add the file in the Divi library and not in the plugins option.

      Hope it helps!

      Reply
  12. Caroline

    Hello!
    thanks for the generator.
    I made a CPT with it, works fine exept I asked for some taxonomies witch doesn’t appears.
    So I use the Taxonomie generator and create one taxonomie for my CPT, add it into the functions.php file, and then error 500.
    Could you help me to figure out what I’m doing wrong ?

    Reply
    • Hemant Gaba

      Hi Caroline!

      Can you share all the details you have added to generate the taxonomy so that I can apply the same on my end?

      Reply
  13. Elana Gaines <span class="comment-author-role-label"><a href="https://www.peeayecreative.com/product/divi-adventure-club/" class="comment-author-role-link" rel="external nofollow" target="_blank">Divi Adventure Club Member</a></span>

    Is there a way to use the custom taxonomies as filter options on the Blog module?

    Reply
    • Hemant Gaba

      Hi Elana!

      You may need a third-party plugin for it. You can join our Facebook Group The Divi Teacher for more suggestions.

      Reply

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