The Loop

The Loop is PHP code used by WordPress to display posts. Using The Loop, WordPress processes each post to be displayed on the current page, and formats it according to how it matches specified criteria within The Loop tags. Any HTML or PHP code in the Loop will be processed on each post.


When WordPress documentation says "This tag must be within The Loop", such as for specific Template Tags or plugins, the tag will be repeated for each post. For example, The Loop displays the following information by default for each post:

• Title (the_title())
• Time (the_time())
• Categories (the_category()).

You can display other information about each post using the appropriate Template Tags or (for advanced users) by accessing the $post variable, which is set with the current post's information while The Loop is running.

The loop starts here:

<?php if ( have_posts() ) : while ( have_posts() ) : the_post(); ?>

and ends here:

<?php endwhile; else : ?>

               <p><?php _e( 'Sorry, no posts matched your criteria.' ); ?></p>

<?php endif; ?>

This is using PHP's alternative syntax for control structures, and could also be expressed as:

<?php

if ( have_posts() ) {

               while ( have_posts() ) {

                               the_post();

                               //

                               // Post Content here

                               //

               } // end while

} // end if

?>