Using WordPress ‘get_category_parents()’ PHP function

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The get_category_parents() WordPress PHP function retrieves the category parents of a given category with a specified separator.

Usage

get_category_parents($category_id, $link = false, $separator = '/', $nicename = false, $deprecated = array())

Custom example:

echo get_category_parents(3, true, ' > ');

Output:

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Parameters

  • $category_id (int) – Required. The ID of the category.
  • $link (bool) – Optional. Whether to format with a link. Default is false.
  • $separator (string) – Optional. How to separate categories. Default is '/'.
  • $nicename (bool) – Optional. Whether to use the nice name (slug) for display. Default is false.
  • $deprecated (array) – Optional. Not used. Default is array().

More information

See WordPress Developer Resources: get_category_parents()

Note: The $nicename parameter refers to the slug, not the human-readable display name.

Examples

Basic usage

This code retrieves the parent categories of the current category without links, separated by /.

echo get_category_parents($cat);

This code retrieves the parent categories of the current category with links, separated by >.

echo get_category_parents($cat, true, ' > ');

Using slug for display

This code retrieves the parent categories of the current category using the slug for display.

echo get_category_parents($cat, false, '/', true);

This code retrieves the parent categories of a specific category with links, separated by |.

echo get_category_parents(5, true, ' | ');

Retrieving parent categories for a custom category ID

This code retrieves the parent categories of a custom category ID without links, separated by /.

echo get_category_parents(12, false, ' / ');