How to remove the parentheses from the category widget

Question

In the default category widget, when you check the "show posts count" checkbox, the number of posts appear surrounded by parentheses, how to remove them.

Answer 1

Add this code to your functions.php file and it will remove the parentheses and surround the post count with a span with a class to easily style it.

function categories_postcount_filter ($variable) {
   $variable = str_replace('(', '<span class="post_count"> ', $variable);
   $variable = str_replace(')', ' </span>', $variable);
   return $variable;
}
add_filter('wp_list_categories','categories_postcount_filter');

++Bonus In the archive widget, if you checked "Show posts count" checkbox you'll see the same parentheses around posts count, here's another filter to remove them and add a class to easily style theme.

function archive_postcount_filter ($variable) {
   $variable = str_replace('(', ' ', $variable);
   $variable = str_replace(')', ' ', $variable);
   return $variable;
}
add_filter('get_archives_link', 'archive_postcount_filter');