I created custom post types & custom taxonomies for these.

Example: actors (taxonomy) for movies (post type).

Now I want to show up in my widget some terms and a more link for the actors terms archive.

How do I get the taxonomy archive link / url?


Use get_term_link

e.g. to print out a list of actors terms linking to the archives:

$terms = get_terms('actors');
echo '<ul>';
foreach ($terms as $term) {
    echo '<li><a href="'.get_term_link($term).'">'.$term->name.'</a></li>';
echo '</ul>';


If what you really mean is the equivilant of the custom post type archive, that lists all the posts of that type, but for taxonomy terms, e.g. a page that acts as an archive listing the various taxonomy terms available, then you're out of luck. There are no taxonomy archives in WordPress for terms, only posts assigned to a given term.

To produce a page listing the taxonomy terms you can use code similar to the above. Then put it in a page template and use that page as your taxonomy term archive.

The reason why is that the problem lies in the post loop, almost every single page template is intended to have one, and if you look at the template heirarchy, if the necessary templates aren't found, it all goes back to index.php, and index.php has a post loop that displays posts, not a term loop. This and the many different ways and ideas of how terms should be listed means there is no consensus. What about date archives? Should there be an archive listing months and years? Timelines? Panels tiles clouds etc

  • The tip you gave was what i searched for. My approach was so use a page template, but i seems to be a very customized way. But if there are no possibilities for a taxonomy archive i have to implement it like you suggested. thanks – mrzmyr Apr 10 '12 at 1:51
  • 2
    There is none. The problem lies in the post loop, almost every single page template is intended to have one, and if you look at the heirarchy if the necessary templates aren't found, it all goes back to index.php, and index.php has a post loop that displays posts, not a term loop. – Tom J Nowell Apr 10 '12 at 10:01

There is no simple way to get this from scouring. And everyone who answers everywhere thinks you want to link to a TERM in the TAXONOMY... While you're looking to get a link to the TAXONOMY archive... For which I have found absolutely nothing.

Basically, like many people, you want a get_taxonomy_archive_link method.

Except, for one reason or another, it simply does not exist. I consider this a MAJOR failure on Wordpress's side.

There is no answer to your question. Not one that actually works within the WP framework as a proper solution. Sure, you can piece together get_bloginfo() for your needs, but there is absolutely no logical reason within WP that get_taxonomy_archive_link doesn't exist.

That all being said, I always add the following function to my themes:

 * Pass in a taxonomy value that is supported by WP's `get_taxonomy`
 * and you will get back the url to the archive view.
 * @param $taxonomy string|int
 * @return string
function get_taxonomy_archive_link( $taxonomy ) {
  $tax = get_taxonomy( $taxonomy ) ;
  return get_bloginfo( 'url' ) . '/' . $tax->rewrite['slug'];

it seems that you're asking for a link to an archive with "all posts which has any term from the taxonomy Actors". everyone here replied as if you asked for the link to a specific term archive because what you're asking doesn't make sense in the wordpress world.

I am surprised by the answer of pixelbacon and the fact that it has 6 upvotes... That function returns an url which leads nowhere... wordpress doesn't have a way to interpret that url nor to make the query which would have to be behind that request.

in the database a Taxonomy has relations with the terms, and the terms have relations with the posts. A single post doesn't have relations with the taxonomy. The only thing that connect them is the fact that a post-type could support a Taxonomy.

Let's write down in words what you're trying to display in that page: "Show me all the posts of the post_type 'post', which has ANY term from the taxonomy Actors."

this basically translate to: "show me all posts of the post_type 'post' (which supports the taxonomy Actors)".

Therefore the only difference from a general post_type archive (show all posts from a given post_type) would be IF you have posts which don't have any Actor term assigned and you DO want to exclude them.

If that's the case, then you can create a custom page, make a generic query to all posts, then in the loop you check if the post has any Actors term with wp_get_post_terms(get_the_ID(), 'actors'), and eventually exclude it if doesn't have any.


The archive link for any taxonomy follows this pattern:


For example, the category "news" on "myblogsite.com" would have the following archive URL:


So the "Harrison Ford" archive in your actors taxonomy would be:

  • so is it possible to use the http://{siteurl}/{taxonomy} for the taxonomy archive ? – mrzmyr Apr 10 '12 at 1:47
  • You still need to specify the term within the taxonomy to generate the archive for. – EAMann Apr 10 '12 at 4:05
  • This is not always correct. A user can change the {taxonomy} portion of that structure in the permalink settings. For example, if you have the category, uncategorized, the default url is http://{siteurl}/category/uncategorized. But if you change the category_base in the permalink settings to topics, for example, it would be http://{siteurl}/topics/uncategorized. So a more accurate formula for categories would be http://{siteurl}/{get_option('category_base')}/uncategorized – Sam Oct 4 '18 at 19:07

When you create your custom taxonomy, you can add attribute rewrite to it. This attribute could set rewrite slug for your taxonomy which you can use for link:

register_taxonomy('actors', 'movies', array(
    // ...
    'rewrite' => array( 'slug' => 'actors' ),
    // ...

So to create a link to create the taxonomy archive link you can use following pattern:


use get_term_link() :)


This may be of use: archive link for the taxonomy: get_the_term_list(). From the codex:

Returns an HTML string of taxonomy terms associated with a post and given taxonomy. Terms are linked to their respective term listing pages.

so it needs to be linked to a post ID, but does the job of archiving taxonomy terms.

  • thats not what i looked for. check Tom's post: i was looking for archive link for the taxonomy itself. – mrzmyr Apr 10 '12 at 1:53

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