How to Make a Separate RSS Feed for Each Custom Post Type in WordPress

Beyond pages and posts, WordPress lets you make custom post types according to the unique needs of your content. For instance, you may want to create a custom post type for movie reviews, products, or testimonials. This can help you more effectively organize your site and improve the user experience.

If you want to take it a step further, you can also set up an RSS feed for each of your custom post types. Offering specialized feeds to your website visitors allows them to engage with your material in a more customized way.

In this guide, we’ll walk you through the process of setting up separate RSS feeds for custom post types in WordPress. Let’s get started!

Creating Separate RSS Feeds for Custom Post Types in WordPress

By default, WordPress generates several RSS feeds for your website.

For instance, all your recent blog posts appear in your site’s main RSS feed. This feed can be accessed by adding /feed/ to your domain name like this:

https://example.com/feed/

What most beginners don’t know is that WordPress generates separate RSS feeds for each archive page.

For instance, it has separate RSS feeds for categories, tags, authors, and custom post types.

Let’s say you have a custom post type called movies on your website. You can view all content created in that post type by visiting the post type archive page:

https://example.com/movies

To view the RSS feed, you only need to add /feed/ next to the custom post type archive URL.

https://example.com/movies/feed/

Alternatively, you can view the feed by adding the post type parameter to your main WordPress RSS feed. For example:

https://example.com/feed/?post_type=movies

This URL will then only fetch the custom post type called movies.

We use custom post types for our Glossary and WordPress hosting sections. They both have RSS feeds enabled and can be used by users who want to subscribe to those specific sections.

Add a Link to The Custom Post Type RSS Feed

Now that you know how to access the RSS feeds for any custom post type on your WordPress website, you can use that URL to create links to your custom post type feeds.

For instance, you may want to display an icon or a plain text link on the custom post type archive page so that your visitors can easily subscribe to those posts.

1. Add a Link to The Custom Post Type RSS Feed in Block Themes

If you are using a block theme with full site editing support, here is how to add the link.

First, you need to add a custom code snippet to your WordPress website using the WPCode plugin.

Note: There is also a free version of WPCode, which you can use to add this code snippet.

First, you need to install and activate the WPCode plugin and then go to the Code Snippets » + Add New Snippet page.

From here, click on the ‘Use Snippet’ button below the ‘Add Your Custom Code (New Snippet) option.

On the next screen, provide a name for your code snippet. This could be anything that helps you identify the snippet. After that, choose ‘PHP Snippet’ under the Code Type.

Finally, add the following code into the Code Preview box:

    if (is_post_type_archive('movies')) {
            $post_type = get_queried_object();
            // Get RSS Feed URL
            $rss_feed_url = get_post_type_archive_feed_link($post_type->name);
            // Output the shortcode content
            return '<p>Subscribe to <a href="' . esc_url($rss_feed_url) . '">' . $post_type->label . '</a></p>';
        }
    }
// Register the shortcode
add_shortcode('custom_post_type_rss_link', 'custom_post_type_rss_link_shortcode');

Don’t forget to replace ‘movies’ with the name of your custom post type.

Here is how it would look as a snippet in the WPCode plugin:

Now turn on the ‘Active’ switch and ‘Save/Update’ your snippet.

This code automatically detects if a user views the specific custom post type archive page and then displays a link to subscribe.

It then creates a shortcode that you can use in your block theme or widgets to display the link.

Next, you need to visit the Appearance » Editor page to launch the site editor. After that, choose the Templates » Archive option from the left menu.

Next, add the Shortcode block where you want to display the RSS feed link.

Ideally, you would want to show it at the top, just below the Archive Name.

Inside the Shortcode block, you need to add the following shortcode:

[custom_post_type_rss_link]

After that, don’t forget to save your changes.

You can now visit your custom post type archive page to view the RSS feed link in action.

2. Add a Link to The Custom Post Type RSS Feed in Classic Themes

The easiest way to do this is by creating a separate template for your custom post type in your WordPress theme.

Connect to your WordPress website using an FTP client and navigate to the /wp-content/themes/your-current-theme/ folder.

Now, if your custom post type is called movies, then you can create an archive-{post_type}.php file in your WordPress theme folder.

After that, you can simply copy the contents from your theme’s archive.php template and start customizing your new template.

You can simply add a plain HTML link to your post type archive feed using the following code:

<p><strong>Subscribe to: <a href="https://example.com/movies/feed/">Movies</a></strong></p>

Don’t forget to change the URL to your post type feed URL.

Now, the problem with this code is that you will have to create a new template file just for that particular post type.

This next method will allow you to dynamically generate the post type RSS feed link for all your archive pages.

Simply add the following code to your theme’s archive.php template file.

<?php if ( is_post_type_archive() ) { 
$post_type = get_post_type( get_queried_object_id() );?> 
				<p><strong>Subscribe to: <a href="<?php echo get_post_type_archive_link( $post_type  ); ?>feed/"><?php post_type_archive_title(); ?></a></strong></p>
<?php } ?>		

This code will simply add a link below the post type’s archive page title, encouraging users to subscribe to this particular content type.

Bonus Tip: Add Custom Post Type to Your Main RSS Feed

Custom post type RSS feeds are not easily discoverable by feed readers, and most of your users may find your site’s RSS feed more easily.

This means that users subscribed to your main RSS feed will miss out on the content you publish in your custom post type.

You can easily fix this by adding content from your custom post type to appear in your site’s main RSS feed.

To do that, you will need to add a custom code snippet to your WordPress blog. We recommend using WPCode to add custom code snippets in WordPress.

First, you need to install and activate the free WPCode plugin. For more details, see our article on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Once the plugin is activated, visit the Code Snippets » + Add Snippet page from the WordPress admin sidebar.

From here, you need to click the ‘Use Snippet’ button under the ‘Add Your Custom Code (New Snippet)’ option.

You will now be directed to the ‘Create Custom Snippet’ page, where you can start by typing a name for your code snippet.

This name won’t be displayed anywhere and is just used for identification purposes.

Next, choose the ‘PHP Snippet’ option from the ‘Code Type’ dropdown menu on the right.

After that, you are ready to add your custom code snippet.

Simply copy and paste the following code into the Code Preview box:

function myfeed_request($qv) {
    if (isset($qv['feed']) && !isset($qv['post_type']))
        $qv['post_type'] = array('post', 'movies', 'books');
    return $qv;
}
add_filter('request', 'myfeed_request');

After adding the code, type the name of the custom post type next to where ‘[‘post_type’]’ is written in the code. In our example, we have ‘post’, ‘movies’, and ‘books’.

This custom post type will be added to your main WordPress RSS feed.

Next, you need to scroll back to the top of the page and toggle the ‘Inactive’ switch to ‘Active’.

Finally, don’t forget to click the ‘Save Snippet’ button to save and execute the code on your WordPress website.

That’s all, your custom post type content will now be added to your site’s main RSS feed.

We hope this article helped you learn how to create a separate RSS feed for custom post types in WordPress. You may also want to see our tutorial on optimizing your WordPress RSS feeds and our expert picks for the best WordPress RSS plugins.

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