Title: search.php
Last modified: December 26, 2016

---

# search.php

 *  [kgmyat](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kgmyat/)
 * (@kgmyat)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/)
 * Hello everyone, I’m currently using twenty sixteen theme.
 * If you type something in search box (eg.show), and if the keyword matches with
   a post in your website, it show that post off the bat.
    But, if your keyword (
   eg. sho w) has a little conflict with the post, or that keyword include in other
   posts, the page “Search Results for:” shows all the relevant posts of your website.
   If the keyword matches nothing, it shows “Sorry, but nothing matched your search
   terms. Please try again with some different keywords.” or “Oops! That page can’t
   be found”
 * Ok,
    I would like to get my website’s users to the posts those I created. If 
   the keywords don’t match anything, I like “Oops! That page can’t be found” . 
   And I can make it.
 * What I really want is not to display “Search Results for:” page (with relevant
   posts) and replace with my custom page or post, if not possible, with my custom
   text.
 * In search.php file, the author said:
    Run the loop for the search to output the
   results. If you want to overload this in a child theme then include a file called
   content-search.php and that will be used instead.
 * But, I don’t know how to code content-search.php file.
    All I want is simple,
   let the theme be, but want to replace, (if not possible) remove “Search Results
   for:” page (with relevant posts)
 * Please someone guide me, help me with this.

Viewing 13 replies - 1 through 13 (of 13 total)

 *  [Joey](https://wordpress.org/support/users/leglesslizard/)
 * (@leglesslizard)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8601932)
 * To override theme templates you will need to create a child theme. Have a read
   [here](https://codex.wordpress.org/Child_Themes) on how this can be achieved.
 * Once you have a child theme any template file named the same as the parent theme
   file (e.g. search.php or content-search.php) will be used instead of the one 
   from the parent theme.
 * The easiest way to modify these templates is to copy and paste the original template
   from your parent theme to the child theme and just tweak it to suit your needs.
 * I hope that helps 🙂
 *  Thread Starter [kgmyat](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kgmyat/)
 * (@kgmyat)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8602007)
 * Hi, joey, I know how to make child theme, and I’ve already one for twenty sixteen.
   I don’t know how to tweak in content-search.php
    All I need is coding for my 
   solution.
 *  [Joey](https://wordpress.org/support/users/leglesslizard/)
 * (@leglesslizard)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8602605)
 * content-search.php is the file for editing what is displayed if search content
   is found. For example displaying more or less post data (title, image, excerpt
   etc.) for each result returned.
 * From the sounds of it you want to change the page title is that right? If you
   want to edit the text “Search Results for:” then you want to look at the search.
   php template. Just copy the whole file into your child theme, this will automatically
   override the parent template. Then make your changes 🙂 for the page title you’d
   be looking at this section:
 *     ```
       <header class="page-header">
         <h1 class="page-title"><?php printf( __( 'Search Results for: %s', 'twentysixteen' ), '<span>' . esc_html( get_search_query() ) . '</span>' ); ?></h1>
       </header><!-- .page-header -->
       ```
   
 * Apologies but from your initial question I don’t understand specifically what
   changes you want to make. But whatever they are the process will be the same.
 * Regards
 *  Thread Starter [kgmyat](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kgmyat/)
 * (@kgmyat)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8602769)
 * Thanks you for your concern, but Joey, what I mean is not ‘Search Results for:%
   s’.
    This is just a text. Under that ‘Search Results for: %s’, relevant post 
   titles (those you made in your website) are displayed.
 * What I mean is absolutely remove
    -  ‘Search Results for: %s’ function
 *  (that function shows my post titles which are relevant with user’s keyword)
 * Not just remove the text ‘Search Results for:’
    Can you make it?
 *  [Joey](https://wordpress.org/support/users/leglesslizard/)
 * (@leglesslizard)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8603420)
 * Sorry mate but I’m still unclear. If I break down the template for you maybe 
   that will help some? You can add/remove whatever you want from the template as
   long as it still adheres to coding standards. So, for example, you could remove
   the “loop” which shows the posts for the search page and the template would still
   work fine but it wouldn’t make a lot of sense to do this with a search page…
 *     ```
       <?php
       /**
        * The template for displaying search results pages
        *
        * @package WordPress
        * @subpackage Twenty_Sixteen
        * @since Twenty Sixteen 1.0
        */
   
       get_header(); ?>
   
       	<section id="primary" class="content-area">
       		<main id="main" class="site-main" role="main">
   
       		<?php if ( have_posts() ) : ?>
   
       			<header class="page-header">
       				<h1 class="page-title"><?php printf( __( 'Search Results for: %s', 'twentysixteen' ), '<span>' . esc_html( get_search_query() ) . '</span>' ); ?></h1>
       			</header><!-- .page-header -->
   
       			<?php
       			// Start the loop.
       			while ( have_posts() ) : the_post();
   
       				/**
       				 * Run the loop for the search to output the results.
       				 * If you want to overload this in a child theme then include a file
       				 * called content-search.php and that will be used instead.
       				 */
       				get_template_part( 'template-parts/content', 'search' );
   
       			// End the loop.
       			endwhile;
   
       			// Previous/next page navigation.
       			the_posts_pagination( array(
       				'prev_text'          => __( 'Previous page', 'twentysixteen' ),
       				'next_text'          => __( 'Next page', 'twentysixteen' ),
       				'before_page_number' => '<span class="meta-nav screen-reader-text">' . __( 'Page', 'twentysixteen' ) . ' </span>',
       			) );
   
       		// If no content, include the "No posts found" template.
       		else :
       			get_template_part( 'template-parts/content', 'none' );
   
       		endif;
       		?>
   
       		</main><!-- .site-main -->
       	</section><!-- .content-area -->
   
       <?php get_sidebar(); ?>
       <?php get_footer(); ?>
       ```
   
 * So get_header() just grabs the header template.
    The next 2 lines open the starting
   html tags (section and div). The next statement is what you are interested in.
   This says “if we have posts to show insert header and loop through the posts”.
   This header is the text we referred to earlier (Search Results for: %s). The 
   next statement (while ( have_posts() ) : the_post();) loops through all of the
   search results and pulls in the content-search.php template for each post. This
   loop and the pulled in template are what generates the results (title, image,
   text) for each post displayed on the search results page. Then your pagination
   links are inserted and the loop is closed along with the html tags.
 * Does that give you a better idea on how to edit the file? If, for example, you
   wanted to insert a completely custom page instead of displaying search results
   you could remove the “while” loop (everything from while – end while;) and write
   whatever you wanted to display there. Then the page would show the header text“
   Search results for..” and whatever you wanted underneath.
 * Regards
 *  Thread Starter [kgmyat](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kgmyat/)
 * (@kgmyat)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8604377)
 * Thanks for your reply. But Joey, I’m not a professional coder. It is very close
   what I want.
    Yes, I want to remove the loop, and it can be done by removing “
   while” loop (everything from while – end while;).
 * But, how to replace the gap underneath [contents under the title“Search results
   for..”](I mean relevant posts and pages) with my custom text or my custom post
   or page?
    Please, could you make some example code? It really helpful to me. 
   Thanks you so much.
 *  [Joey](https://wordpress.org/support/users/leglesslizard/)
 * (@leglesslizard)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8605344)
 * OK no problem but I like to try and make sure you understand what you are doing
   with the hope you can go back and make edits in the future 🙂 so the “<?php” 
   and “?>” are opening and closing tags for PHP code respectively. Outside of these
   tags the template will contain HTML which is the code interpreted by the web 
   browser and dictates what is displayed on the screen. The PHP is interpreted 
   server side before the HTML. Using PHP we can create loops etc to create dynamic
   content and output HTML using that content whereas HTML is used for displaying
   static content only.
 * I have edited the template below with some custom HTML code instead of the post
   loop as you have stated.
 *     ```
       <?php
       /**
        * The template for displaying search results pages
        *
        * @package WordPress
        * @subpackage Twenty_Sixteen
        * @since Twenty Sixteen 1.0
        */
   
       get_header(); ?>
   
       	<section id="primary" class="content-area">
       		<main id="main" class="site-main" role="main">
   
       		<?php if ( have_posts() ) : ?>
   
       			<header class="page-header">
       				<h1 class="page-title"><?php printf( __( 'Search Results for: %s', 'twentysixteen' ), '<span>' . esc_html( get_search_query() ) . '</span>' ); ?></h1>
       			</header><!-- .page-header -->
   
                               <div class="custom-content">
                                   <h2>This is a custom header</h2>
                                   <p>This is a custom paragraph</p>
                               </div>
   
       		<?php
       		// If no content, include the "No posts found" template.
       		else :
       			get_template_part( 'template-parts/content', 'none' );
   
       		endif;
       		?>
   
       		</main><!-- .site-main -->
       	</section><!-- .content-area -->
   
       <?php get_sidebar(); ?>
       <?php get_footer(); ?>
       ```
   
 *  [Joey](https://wordpress.org/support/users/leglesslizard/)
 * (@leglesslizard)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8605355)
 * If you have a certain post/page to display you can pull in the content as shown
   below. But you will need to know the ID of the specific post/page or have a way
   to find it. This is untested but should give you the title and content from whatever
   post/page ID you choose, I have used 1 to demonstrate:
 *     ```
       <?php
       /**
        * The template for displaying search results pages
        *
        * @package WordPress
        * @subpackage Twenty_Sixteen
        * @since Twenty Sixteen 1.0
        */
   
       get_header(); ?>
   
       	<section id="primary" class="content-area">
       		<main id="main" class="site-main" role="main">
   
       		<?php if ( have_posts() ) : ?>
   
       			<header class="page-header">
       				<h1 class="page-title"><?php printf( __( 'Search Results for: %s', 'twentysixteen' ), '<span>' . esc_html( get_search_query() ) . '</span>' ); ?></h1>
       			</header><!-- .page-header -->
   
                       <?php $custom_post = get_post( 1 ); ?>
                       <?php $content =  apply_filters( 'the_content', $custom_post->post_content ); ?>
                               <div class="custom-content">
                                   <h2><?php echo $custom_post->post_title; ?></h2>
                                   <?php echo $content; ?>
                               </div>
   
       		<?php
       		// If no content, include the "No posts found" template.
       		else :
       			get_template_part( 'template-parts/content', 'none' );
   
       		endif;
       		?>
   
       		</main><!-- .site-main -->
       	</section><!-- .content-area -->
   
       <?php get_sidebar(); ?>
       <?php get_footer(); ?>
       ```
   
 *  Thread Starter [kgmyat](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kgmyat/)
 * (@kgmyat)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8605808)
 * Thank you for your kindly reply. Joey.
    Wordpress community is great, because
   of you guys. And Happy New Year, be good luck for the whole year.
 *  [Joey](https://wordpress.org/support/users/leglesslizard/)
 * (@leglesslizard)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8605973)
 * Open source tends to mean everyone helps each other out 🙂 it is a great community.
   Same to you!
 * All the best 🙂
 *  Thread Starter [kgmyat](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kgmyat/)
 * (@kgmyat)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8606043)
 * This code really helpful to me. It link to my specific post/page.
    But, one more
   thing in this code, Joey. In my child-theme, I put some code not to show post
   or page title.
 * With your code, the title of (post/page) display, (under Search Results for:)
   
   Please guide me how to hide that title of specific page/post.
 *  [Joey](https://wordpress.org/support/users/leglesslizard/)
 * (@leglesslizard)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8606234)
 * If you don’t want the page header delete the following:
 *     ```
       <header class="page-header">
       				<h1 class="page-title"><?php printf( __( 'Search Results for: %s', 'twentysixteen' ), '<span>' . esc_html( get_search_query() ) . '</span>' ); ?></h1>
       			</header><!-- .page-header -->
       ```
   
 * If you want to remove the specific post/page title delete this part:
    `<h2><?
   php echo $custom_post->post_title; ?></h2>`
 * Regards
 *  Thread Starter [kgmyat](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kgmyat/)
 * (@kgmyat)
 * [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8606570)
 * Thank again. Joey.

Viewing 13 replies - 1 through 13 (of 13 total)

The topic ‘search.php’ is closed to new replies.

 * In: [Fixing WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/how-to-and-troubleshooting/)
 * 13 replies
 * 2 participants
 * Last reply from: [kgmyat](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kgmyat/)
 * Last activity: [9 years, 4 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/search-php/#post-8606570)
 * Status: not resolved

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