How to customize the_archive_title()?

Question

In my child theme's archive.php, I have the following code for displaying the title of my archive pages:

<?php
    the_archive_title( '<h1 class="page-title">', '</h1>' );
?>

But that displays my titles as "Category: Category Title" instead of simply the title without the prepended "Category: ".

My first instinct was to override get_the_archive_title() from wp-includes/general-template. But from what I've read, apparently I'm not supposed to ever alter wordpress core stuff, even with overrides from a child theme.

So what is the best-practice way to control the output of the_archive_title()?

Answer 1

If you look at the source code of get_the_archive_title(), you will see that there is a filter supplied, called get_the_archive_title, through which you can filter the output from the function.

You can use the following to change the output on a category page

add_filter( 'get_the_archive_title', function ( $title ) {

    if( is_category() ) {

        $title = single_cat_title( '', false );

    }

    return $title;

});

Answer 2

The accepted answer works to remove the Category: prefix from category archive titles, but not other taxonomy or post types. To exclude other prefixes, there are two options:

1. Rebuild the title for all the variants used in the original get_the_archive_title() function:

   // Return an alternate title, without prefix, for every type used in the get_the_archive_title().
   add_filter('get_the_archive_title', function ($title) {
       if ( is_category() ) {
           $title = single_cat_title( '', false );
       } elseif ( is_tag() ) {
           $title = single_tag_title( '', false );
       } elseif ( is_author() ) {
           $title = '<span class="vcard">' . get_the_author() . '</span>';
       } elseif ( is_year() ) {
           $title = get_the_date( _x( 'Y', 'yearly archives date format' ) );
       } elseif ( is_month() ) {
           $title = get_the_date( _x( 'F Y', 'monthly archives date format' ) );
       } elseif ( is_day() ) {
           $title = get_the_date( _x( 'F j, Y', 'daily archives date format' ) );
       } elseif ( is_tax( 'post_format' ) ) {
           if ( is_tax( 'post_format', 'post-format-aside' ) ) {
               $title = _x( 'Asides', 'post format archive title' );
           } elseif ( is_tax( 'post_format', 'post-format-gallery' ) ) {
               $title = _x( 'Galleries', 'post format archive title' );
           } elseif ( is_tax( 'post_format', 'post-format-image' ) ) {
               $title = _x( 'Images', 'post format archive title' );
           } elseif ( is_tax( 'post_format', 'post-format-video' ) ) {
               $title = _x( 'Videos', 'post format archive title' );
           } elseif ( is_tax( 'post_format', 'post-format-quote' ) ) {
               $title = _x( 'Quotes', 'post format archive title' );
           } elseif ( is_tax( 'post_format', 'post-format-link' ) ) {
               $title = _x( 'Links', 'post format archive title' );
           } elseif ( is_tax( 'post_format', 'post-format-status' ) ) {
               $title = _x( 'Statuses', 'post format archive title' );
           } elseif ( is_tax( 'post_format', 'post-format-audio' ) ) {
               $title = _x( 'Audio', 'post format archive title' );
           } elseif ( is_tax( 'post_format', 'post-format-chat' ) ) {
               $title = _x( 'Chats', 'post format archive title' );
           }
       } elseif ( is_post_type_archive() ) {
           $title = post_type_archive_title( '', false );
       } elseif ( is_tax() ) {
           $title = single_term_title( '', false );
       } else {
           $title = __( 'Archives' );
       }
       return $title;
   });
   

2. Or, simply strip anything that looks like a title prefix (which may alter actual titles which contain a word followed by the colon character):

   // Simply remove anything that looks like an archive title prefix ("Archive:", "Foo:", "Bar:").
   add_filter('get_the_archive_title', function ($title) {
       return preg_replace('/^\w+: /', '', $title);
   });
   

Answer 3

Another option is:

<?php echo str_replace('Brand: ','',get_the_archive_title()); ?>

Replace Brand: with whatever text you are wanting to get rid of.

Its worth looking into the difference between get_the_archive_title() and the_archive_title() the_archive_title() returns an array get_the_archive_title() returns a string

Answer 4

You could use

echo '<h1 class="page-title">' . single_cat_title( '', false ) . '</h1>';

Answer 5

Ben Gillbanks has a nice solution that handles all post types and taxonomies:

function hap_hide_the_archive_title( $title ) {
// Skip if the site isn't LTR, this is visual, not functional.
// Should try to work out an elegant solution that works for both directions.
if ( is_rtl() ) {
    return $title;
}
// Split the title into parts so we can wrap them with spans.
$title_parts = explode( ': ', $title, 2 );
// Glue it back together again.
if ( ! empty( $title_parts[1] ) ) {
    $title = wp_kses(
        $title_parts[1],
        array(
            'span' => array(
                'class' => array(),
            ),
        )
    );
    $title = '<span class="screen-reader-text">' . esc_html( $title_parts[0] ) . ': </span>' . $title;
}
return $title;
}
add_filter( 'get_the_archive_title', 'hap_hide_the_archive_title' );

Answer 6

You can use post_type_archive_title() to get the title of an archive without the "Archives:" text.

Answer 7

Use this instead the_archive_title(). Works with CPTs and custom taxonomies.

<?php
$term = $wp_query->get_queried_object();
$term_title = $term->label //works with CPTs (Books)
?? $term->name //works with custom taxonomy terms (gets Small in size/small)
?? "untitled";
?>
<h1><?php echo $term_title; ?></h1>