wp_redirect hangs, but returns true

Question

I have no idea what I'm doing wrong, but I can't get the wp_redirect to actually redirect the page. I enabled the wp_debug to check for "header already sent" errors, but nothing. I installed the "Better HTTP Redirects" plugin to check the response, but it says 302 found.

If I check the wp_redirect response like this, it says "redirect success". But nothing really happens in the end, no errors show up either.

if ( wp_redirect( admin_url( 'admin.php?page=plugin_test&success=item_saved' ) ) ) {
   echo 'redirect success'; 
} else {
   echo 'no';
}

I tried to add ob_start to the init, and add an action for the admin_init and call ob_start from there but both made no difference. This is a stripped down version of the code I have, but it has the same problem.

What happens in the complete code is that the user fills in a form, adds the item and it is saved to the db. After that the user is redirected and a custom msg is shown. The whole script works fine, except for the last redirect.

class Submit_Test {

    function __construct() {
        add_action( 'init', array( $this, 'init' ) );
    }

    public function init() {
        add_action( 'admin_menu', array( $this, 'create_admin_menu' ) );    
    }

    public function create_admin_menu() {           
        add_menu_page( 'Plugin test', 'Menu', 'manage_options', 'plugin_test', array( $this, 'item_list' ) );
    }

    public function item_list() {
        if ( isset( $_REQUEST['actions'] ) ) {
            $this->add_item();
        } 

        if ( isset( $_GET['success'] ) ) {
            $this->show_success_notifications();
        }

        if ( $_GET['action']['add_item'] ) { 
            ?>
                <form method="post" action="" accept-charset="utf-8">
                    <input type="submit" name="actions" class="button-primary" value="add_item" />
                </form>
            <?php
        } else {
            ?>
                <ul>
                    <li><a href="http://localhost/wp-latest/wp-admin/admin.php?page=plugin_test">Current Item</a></li>
                    <li><a href="http://localhost/wp-latest/wp-admin/admin.php?page=plugin_test&action=add_item">Add Item</a></li>
                </ul>
            <?php
        }   
    }

    public function add_item() {
        if ( wp_redirect( admin_url( 'admin.php?page=plugin_test&success=item_saved' ) ) ) {
            echo 'redirect success';    
        } else {
            echo 'no';
        }

         exit();
    }

    public function show_success_notifications() {  
        echo 'yes'; 
    }   
}

new Submit_Test;

Any ideas on how to get the redirect to work, and what i'm doing wrong? I'm out of ideas on what could be the problem here.

Answer 1

wp_redirect() does not exit automatically and should almost always be followed by exit.

Have you tried adding an exit after wp_redirect? It could be as simple as that

Answer 2

You are hooking in too late to use wp_redirect, your code isn't being executed until the admin_menu hook fires, which is after headers have already been sent to the browser and therefore too late to redirect the user.

Create a new function that fires on the admin_init hook and listen for your action there to redirect.

public function init() {
    add_action( 'admin_menu', array( $this, 'create_admin_menu' ) );
    add_action( 'admin_init', array( $this, 'do_actions' ) ); 
}

public function do_actions() {
    if ( isset( $_REQUEST['actions'] ) && $_REQUEST['actions'] == 'MY_UNIQUE_ACTION_NAME' ) {
        $this->add_item();
    } 
}