How can I get most popular posts without using any plugins in WordPress.I this post will describes how to get most popular posts without any plugins.
Method-1
Create a custom WordPress Query to get popular posts by limiting 10.
<ul class="popular-posts">
<?php
$popular_posts_list = new WP_Query('orderby=comment_count&posts_per_page=10');
while ($popular_posts_list->have_posts()) {
$popular_posts_list->the_post();
?>
<li>
<?php
if ( has_post_thumbnail() ) { // check if the post has a post thumbnail.
?>
<a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title(); ?>">
<?php the_post_thumbnail('thumb', array('alt' => ''.get_the_title().'', 'title' => ''.get_the_title().'')); ?>
</a>
<a class="popular-post-title" href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a>
<?php
} // end if
else {
?> <a class="popular-post-title" href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a>
<?php
} // end else
?>
</li>
<?php
} // end while
?>
</ul>
$popular_posts_list = new WP_Query('orderby=comment_count&posts_per_page=10');
while ($popular_posts_list->have_posts()) {
$popular_posts_list->the_post();
}
Note
May be you have to displayed an error as following.
Fatal error: Call to undefined function: has_post_thumbnail() in …yourpage.php on line 32
So your theme has to call add_theme_support('post-thumbnails'); in an after_setup_theme action.
Otherwise the post-thumbnail functions aren’t included.
1-Go to /wp-content/themes/yourTheme folder.
2-Open the functions.php file.
3-Add add_theme_support('post-thumbnails'); at the end of the page or anywhere and save the file.
4-Reload your site.
Method-2
Simply executes the mysql query and get results.
That’s only!