WordPress Admin Panel search posts with custom post meta values along with title

Question

Trying to modify default admin search by including search by custom post type fields,

Below is my code,

function custom_search_query( $query ) {
    $custom_fields = array(
        // put all the meta fields you want to search for here
        "rg_1job_designation",
        "rg_2job_designation"
    );
    $searchterm = $query->query_vars['s'];
    // we have to remove the "s" parameter from the query, because it will prevent the posts from being found
    $query->query_vars['s'] = "";
    if ($searchterm != "") {
        $meta_query = array('relation' => 'OR');
        foreach($custom_fields as $cf) {
            array_push($meta_query, array(
                'key' => $cf,
                'value' => $searchterm,
                'compare' => 'LIKE'
            ));
        }
        $query->set("meta_query", $meta_query);
    };
}
add_filter( "pre_get_posts", "custom_search_query");

But it's not working.

i have a post title -> John & Designation -> Designer On search by Designer can get 1 result, But on search of John result is empty (This should also fetch one result). Now the default search for title is lost want to use that too.

Did anyone know what's wrong in my code?

Answer 1

With this code you can search in post list in WordPress Admin Panel with custom post meta values along with title and other default fields.

Please, add below code in functions.php file:

if (!function_exists('extend_admin_search')) {
    add_action('admin_init', 'extend_admin_search');

    /**
     * hook the posts search if we're on the admin page for our type
     */
    function extend_admin_search() {
        global $typenow;

        if ($typenow === 'your_custom_post_type') {
            add_filter('posts_search', 'posts_search_custom_post_type', 10, 2);
        }
    }

    /**
     * add query condition for custom meta
     * @param string $search the search string so far
     * @param WP_Query $query
     * @return string
     */
    function posts_search_custom_post_type($search, $query) {
        global $wpdb;

        if ($query->is_main_query() && !empty($query->query['s'])) {
            $sql    = "
            or exists (
                select * from {$wpdb->postmeta} where post_id={$wpdb->posts}.ID
                and meta_key in ('rg_1job_designation','rg_2job_designation')
                and meta_value like %s
            )
        ";
            $like   = '%' . $wpdb->esc_like($query->query['s']) . '%';
            $search = preg_replace("#\({$wpdb->posts}.post_title LIKE [^)]+\)\K#",
                $wpdb->prepare($sql, $like), $search);
        }

        return $search;
    }
}