Imagine if your visitors could simply click a few options in the search filter, like “Price: Low to High,” “Rating: 4 Stars,” or “Color: Blue”… and instantly, the perfect results appear.

Sadly, most filtering tools on the market are either frustratingly complicated, require hiring a developer to set up, or are strictly limited to WooCommerce stores.

It simply shouldn’t be this hard to help your visitors find the content they are looking for.

That’s why today, I’m excited to share the launch of WPFilters, a game-changing plugin that makes adding “Amazon-style” faceted search to WordPress completely seamless.

We built this tool to help you stop losing visitors who can’t find what they need. Whether you have a blog, an eCommerce store, or a directory, WPFilters allows your users to filter posts, products, and custom content by categories, tags, custom fields, and more.

Think of it as the ultimate navigation upgrade that turns your WordPress site into a professional, searchable database in minutes.

Background Story – Why WPFilters?

A few years ago, we acquired SearchWP to fix the broken default WordPress search. Today, it helps over 50,000 site owners show the right results to their audience.

As the community grows, we quickly noticed a consistent pattern in the feedback.

While the search bar was now finding all the right content, our users wanted a way to help their site visitors narrow down those results.

For example, when a visitor searches for a broad term like “breakfast recipes” on a blog or “shoes” on a store, they might get hundreds of results. Users would write to us asking, “How can I let my visitors filter these results and help them get what they look for?”

Most filtering tools on the market expect you to hire a developer just to get them working on your site. That’s when I realized faceted search had become a ‘premium’ feature—something only big companies with big budgets could realistically offer.

That didn’t sit right with me. I believe that powerful website features should be accessible to everyone, not just those who can code.

So, I sat down with the team and set a challenge: Let’s build a filtering solution that is just as powerful as Amazon’s, but as easy to use as the WordPress Block Editor.

That’s exactly what WPFilters delivers. 

Here’s the overview of WPFilters. Watch the video:

What is WPFilters?

WPFilters is a powerful WordPress filtering plugin that allows you to create advanced search filters for your website without writing complex code.

In the developer world, this is called “faceted search.” But for you and your visitors, it simply means instant clarity.

WPFilters lets you build custom filter sets based on categories, tags, or custom data, and place them anywhere on your site. This allows your visitors to drill down through your content to find exactly what they need in seconds.

Instead of scrolling through pages of irrelevant results, they can simply tick a box for “Category,” slide a bar for “Price,” and so on.

Whether you are using the default WordPress search or the powerful SearchWP engine, WPFilters creates the frontend interface that makes browsing your site a joy.

Here is what makes it special:

1. Create “Amazon-Style” Filters with Multiple Input Types

If you look at major sites like Amazon or Airbnb, you’ll notice how easy it is to use their filtering options to discover the right results. 

They use radio buttons for single-choice selections, checkboxes for multiple-choice selections, and visual sliders for price ranges.

This is exactly the experience WPFilters brings to your site. You can assign the perfect input control to match your data, making your site feel like a professional, custom-coded app.

For publishers and blog owners, this goes far beyond what standard categories can do. For example, you can allow your visitors to combine criteria like finding a “Vegan” recipe that is also “Under 30 Minutes” and has a “5-Star Rating.” 

This kind of detailed drill-down helps your readers find exactly what they want instantly, keeping them on your site longer.

WPFilters comes with a wide variety of input types to suit different needs:

• Checkboxes: allow users to select multiple options at once (great for categories or tags).
• Radio Buttons: ideal for when you want users to make a single, exclusive choice.
• Dropdowns (Single & Multi-Select): save screen space while offering powerful sorting options.
• Range Sliders: a visual way to filter numeric data like price, weight, or size.
• Search Bar: let users filter the results list by specific keywords.
• Reset Button: a one-click way for users to clear all filters and start fresh.

Filter by Anything – Categories, Tags, Custom Fields & More

Your WordPress site is full of valuable data, but most of it is hidden from your visitors. Usually, you can only link to a generic Category archive, and that’s it. If you want to let users filter by something specific, like an Author or a Custom Field, you are usually out of luck.

WPFilters unlocks all that data and turns it into clickable filters. You aren’t limited to just standard categories; if the data exists in WordPress, you can filter by it.

This includes standard categories, tags, or any custom taxonomy (like product categories, genres, and more).

If you use Advanced Custom Fields to store extra details WPFilters automatically detects these fields and lets you use them as filters instantly.

Display Filters Anywhere with Flexible Embedding Options

Every WordPress site is built differently. Some of you love the modern Block Editor, while others prefer page builders like SeedProd or Divi. We built WPFilters to fit seamlessly into your existing workflow, no matter how your site is set up.

Once you have configured your filters, you have complete freedom over where to display them. If you use the WordPress Block Editor (Gutenberg), simply search for the WPFilters Elements block and drop it anywhere on your page. It integrates natively with the editor settings.

Alternatively, if you use page builders, like SeedProd or want to use Classic Editor, you can use the unique shortcode provided for each filter. Just copy and paste it wherever you want to embed it.

If you’re a developer, WPFilters also gives you access to ready-to-use PHP snippet so you can hard-code filters directly into your template files.

Smart Control Over User Experience (UX)

If a filter list is too long or shows options that have no results, it can actually frustrate your visitors. WPFilters comes with several smart controls to ensure your filters look clean and professional.

You have full control over the behavior and layout of your filter elements:

• Collapsible Sections: If you have long lists of filters, you can make the sections collapsible. This saves valuable screen space, especially on mobile devices.
• Item Counts: Automatically display the number of results next to each filter option (e.g., “Marketing (12)”), so users know exactly how many posts exist before they click.
• Hide Empty Options: You can choose to hide options that have zero results. This prevents the annoying experience of a user clicking a category only to see a “No results found” message.
• “See More” Links: Keep your sidebars tidy by showing only the first few options and hiding the rest behind a “See More” link.
• Horizontal Layouts: Instead of a standard vertical list, you can display checkboxes or buttons side-by-side, which is perfect for top-bar filters.

Built by the Team Behind SearchWP

WPFilters is built by the same team behind SearchWP, the leading search plugin trusted by thousands of WordPress website owners.

For years, SearchWP has been the gold standard for fixing WordPress search relevance (the backend). We helped you ensure that when a user searches for “blue shoes,” they actually find blue shoes.

But we realized that finding the right results is only half the battle. Presenting them in a way that is easy to browse is just as important.

That’s why we built WPFilters.

We wanted to bring the same level of code quality and reliability that you expect from SearchWP to the frontend of your site. While WPFilters works beautifully with the default WordPress search, it is designed to be the perfect companion for SearchWP.

Together, they give you a complete, enterprise-grade search experience—improving both relevance and usability—without the need for expensive SaaS subscriptions or custom development.

What’s Coming Next?

This launch is just the beginning.

We are truly building something special here, and we want you to be a part of it. Our goal is to make WPFilters the best filtering solution for WordPress, and the best way to do that is by listening to you.

We have an exciting roadmap ahead, but we want to ensure we are building exactly what you need. If you have ideas for new filter types, integrations, or features that would make your life easier, please send us your suggestions.

We are listening, and we look forward to continuing to serve you for years to come.

Yours Truly,

Syed Balkhi
Founder of WPBeginner

The post Introducing WPFilters: The Easiest Way to Add Advanced Search Filtering to WordPress first appeared on WPBeginner.

Often, it’s because the booking form felt overwhelming, or your scheduling tool sent customers off-site to finish the booking — breaking the flow and costing you conversions.

Now imagine an appointment booking plugin that handles everything right within WordPress. That means you can manage time slots, payments, reminders, and custom workflows… without relying on expensive third-party tools.

That’s why I am excited to launch Sugar Calendar Bookings. It’s a full-featured, appointment-scheduling tool designed for small businesses and built specifically for WordPress.

Whether you’re a coach, consultant, agency, salon, clinic, or any service provider, managing appointments is now easier, faster, and completely under your control.

Simply put, it’s the best Calendly alternative for WordPress that gives complete control over your bookings, branding, and customer experience.

Background Story – Why Sugar Calendar Bookings?

If you’ve ever tried adding an online booking system to your WordPress site, then you already know how frustrating the experience can be. Many service business owners start with tools like Calendly because they seem simple at first, but quickly, the problems become impossible to ignore.

These tools often slow down your site, create a clunky mobile experience, and send customers off-site to finish their booking… all of which ultimately hurts your conversions. Even worse, these tools also lock essential features like accepting payments behind expensive monthly plans, which just eat into your budget.

As someone who has run an agency myself, I knew this wasn’t good enough — not for small businesses, not for service providers, and not for WordPress site owners who depend on conversions.

That’s why I decided to build Sugar Calendar Bookings. 

Sugar Calendar Bookings is a beautifully simple appointment booking and scheduling system designed specifically for WordPress. 

It gives you everything you need to run your service business smoothly: 24/7 bookings, online payments, automated reminders, custom availability rules, cancellations, staff notifications, and a clean booking calendar — all inside your WordPress dashboard.

There’s no need for third-party accounts, no external booking pages, and no confusing setup. Customers book directly on your site, pay instantly, and receive automated confirmations — while you stay fully in control of your appointments, branding, and customer experience.

Here’s the overview of Sugar Calendar Bookings. Watch the video:

Below are some of the powerful features that make Sugar Calendar Bookings stand out.

Set Up Your Services in Minutes

Sugar Calendar Bookings makes it incredibly easy to set up your services without any technical skills. You can add pricing, duration, and descriptions in just a few clicks, so customers always know exactly what they’re scheduling.

You can also organize your services with colors and tags, keeping everything clean and easy to manage — whether you’re offering a single service or an entire list of options.

Simple, Beautiful, No-Code Booking Forms

With Sugar Calendar Bookings, adding a booking form to your WordPress site takes just a few seconds. You can place it anywhere using WordPress blocks, shortcodes, or Elementor widgets.

Your customers get a clean, easy-to-use booking experience where they can pick a date, choose a time slot, and confirm their appointment in a matter of seconds. 

Every form is fully mobile-friendly, so clients can book from their phone, tablet, or computer without any friction. It’s a smooth, straightforward process that feels exactly the way a modern booking experience should.

Flexible Scheduling That Fits Your Business

Your time is valuable, so Sugar Calendar Bookings gives you full control over exactly when customers can schedule appointments. You can set business hours, block off holidays, add buffer times, and create rules for how far in advance clients can book.

Everything works automatically. Customers only see time slots that fit your schedule, so you never have to deal with unexpected requests or manual rescheduling.

Accept Payments Instantly or On-site

With Sugar Calendar Bookings, getting paid is seamless. You can accept online payments through Stripe or allow customers to pay in person if that’s what works best for your business. Everything happens in one smooth flow—clients pick a time, complete the payment, and receive confirmation instantly.

There are no complicated setups or third-party accounts required.

 Payments go directly into your Stripe account, and each booking is automatically marked as paid inside your WordPress dashboard. It’s a simple, reliable system that helps you get paid faster while giving customers a frictionless booking experience.

Automated Email Notifications and Reminders

Sugar Calendar Bookings takes the stress out of managing appointments by keeping everyone informed automatically. The moment a customer books, changes, or cancels an appointment, both you and your team receive instant email notifications. 

Your clients also get helpful reminders so they never forget their upcoming booking.

This means fewer no-shows, fewer back-and-forth messages, and a much smoother experience for everyone involved. Everything runs on autopilot, so you can focus on serving your clients instead of chasing them down.

Keep Your Appointments Organized with the Built-In Calendar

Sugar Calendar Bookings keeps all your appointments neatly organized right inside your WordPress dashboard. Every new booking appears instantly on your calendar, complete with customer details, payment status, and the service they selected. 

You can quickly filter appointments, view your schedule at a glance, and stay on top of what’s coming up without juggling spreadsheets or external tools.

It’s a clean, simple way to manage your day that keeps everything centralized and easy to access so you always know exactly what your schedule looks like.

Built by the Team Behind Sugar Calendar

Sugar Calendar Bookings is built by the same team behind Sugar Calendar, the lightweight event calendar plugin trusted by thousands of WordPress users for its simplicity, speed, and reliability.

Our mission has always been to eliminate scheduling chaos in WordPress — starting with events, and now with appointments. Sugar Calendar Bookings gives service businesses a seamless way to accept bookings, take payments, and stay organized right within your WordPress site.

I’m incredibly excited about what this unlocks for small businesses, freelancers, agencies, coaches, clinics, salons, and anyone who needs a simple, powerful way to manage appointments.

If you’ve ever wished you could automate bookings, reduce no-shows, collect payments upfront, and deliver a frictionless scheduling experience on your website, then Sugar Calendar Bookings is the solution you’ve been waiting for.

Here’s all it takes to get started:

✅ Add your services with pricing and duration
✅ Set your business hours, buffer times, and blackout dates
✅ Customize your booking form to match your brand
✅ Start accepting appointments and payments 24/7

Alternatively, you can install the free version from WordPress.org to explore the basics before upgrading.

We’re truly building something special here, and this is only the beginning. If you have ideas on how we can make Sugar Calendar Bookings even more helpful for your business, I’d love to hear from you.

As always, thank you for your continued support of WPBeginner. I look forward to helping you grow your business with a smoother, smarter, stress-free booking experience.

Yours Truly,

Syed Balkhi
Founder of WPBeginner

The post Introducing Sugar Calendar Bookings – The Easiest Way to Accept Appointments in WordPress first appeared on WPBeginner.

This release focuses heavily on improving your workflow. You’ll find new ways to collaborate with your team, cleaner ways to draft content, and native blocks that replace the need for extra plugins.

We’ve explored all the new features, and in this guide, we’ll walk you through what’s new in WordPress 6.9 with screenshots and tips on how to use them.

Here is a quick overview of the changes in WordPress 6.9:

• Collaborate with Block-Level "Notes" 💬
• Hide Blocks on the Front End (Block Visibility)
• A Smoother Drag and Drop Experience
• New Blocks to Better Organize Content
• Improved Email Handling and Inline Images
• Command Palette Available Everywhere ⌨️
• AI Developments in WordPress 6.9
• Performance and Speed Upgrades 🚀
• Other Developer Changes:

Collaborate with Block-Level “Notes” 💬

WordPress 6.9 is taking a big step toward better team collaboration. The new “Notes” feature lets you attach comments directly to individual blocks, just like in Google Docs.

Previously, you had to use Slack or third-party plugins to discuss edits. Now, you can simply click the three-dot menu on any block and select ‘Add note’ to leave feedback.

Your team members can reply to notes, tag others, and resolve the thread once the changes are made.

You can also view a list of all notes on a page by clicking the Notes button in the top toolbar.

This is a huge improvement for editorial workflows. Best of all, these notes are private to the editor and will never be seen by your website visitors.

Hide Blocks on the Front End (Block Visibility)

Have you ever wanted to draft a section of a page but not show it to the public yet? In the past, you needed a plugin for this.

WordPress 6.9 adds a native Hide on Frontend option. This lets you keep blocks in your editor while making them invisible to visitors.

To use it, just click the three-dot menu on a block and select ‘Hide’.

The block will vanish from the visual canvas, but you can still find it using the Document Overview (List View).

From there, you can toggle visibility back on whenever you are ready to publish.

This is perfect for preparing seasonal content (like Black Friday banners) in advance or drafting updates without creating a whole new page.

A Smoother Drag and Drop Experience

For many beginners, moving blocks around the editor used to feel a bit clunky. You had to grab a specific “handle” to move things.

WordPress 6.9 introduces Direct Drag and Drop. You can now click and drag blocks more intuitively within the editor without needing to find the small drag handle.

This makes the Block Editor feel much more like a true visual page builder, significantly speeding up your design process.

New Blocks to Better Organize Content

This release eliminates the need for several common plugins by adding new, powerful blocks to the core library.

1. The Accordion Block

You can finally create collapsible content sections natively. The new Accordion block allows you to add multiple text panels that expand and collapse.

Pro Tip: The Accordion block supports Anchors. This means you can create direct links to specific questions inside your FAQ section, which is great for SEO and the user experience.

2. Terms Query Block

This block lets you display a dynamic list of categories or tags anywhere on your site.

It is highly customizable and updates automatically as you add new content.

3. Math Block

Do you run an educational site? You no longer need an extra plugin to write math equations.

The new Math block supports LaTeX and MathML standards out of the box.

4. Time to Read Block

This small but useful block calculates and displays the estimated reading time of your post.

Adding this to the top of your articles can encourage visitors to start reading.

5. Better Typography with “Fit Text”

A new “Fit text” option is available for paragraphs and headings. It automatically scales your text to fill the container size.

This is fantastic for creating bold, responsive hero sections that look good on all screen sizes.

Improved Email Handling and Inline Images

This is a “behind-the-scenes” update that will help WordPress developers and users who want to customize WordPress emails. WordPress 6.9 has improved the way it sends emails (via the wp_mail function).

The system now supports inline images. This means that emails sent by WordPress—like password resets, new user notifications, or receipts—can now include images directly in the message body.

This improves usability and ensures your emails look professional, rather than showing broken image icons in your subscribers’ inboxes.

Command Palette Available Everywhere ⌨️

The Command Palette is a power-user tool that lets you quickly jump to different parts of your site by pressing Ctrl + K (or Command + K on Mac).

In WordPress 6.9, this feature is now available across the entire WordPress dashboard, not just the Site Editor.

You can use it to instantly search for a specific setting, jump to the Plugins page, or create a new post without clicking through multiple menus.

AI Developments in WordPress 6.9

WordPress 6.9 brings significant AI updates. Here is a summary of those updates:

1. Abilities API

The all-new Abilities API is a registry of everything WordPress can do in a machine-readable format.

For years, WordPress has offered thousands of functions through core software, plugins, and themes — but these were only accessible through code.

The Abilities API provides a shared language that both humans and AI platforms can understand.

Each plugin or theme can “register” what it’s capable of — for example, analyze SEO content, generate reports, or back up your site — along with clear inputs, outputs, and permissions.

2. MCP Adapter

Think of the MCP Adapter as a bridge. It connects the WordPress Abilities API with the MCP specification, giving AI agents a standardized way to “talk” to your website.

This tool includes support for standard connections (like HTTP and STDIO) and comes with built-in error handling. This makes it much easier for developers to build custom AI integrations that are both flexible and reliable.

3. PHP AI Client

The new PHP AI Client makes it much easier for developers to add AI features to their plugins.

It works with all major AI providers, giving developers the freedom to choose the exact model they need. Best of all, it manages your credentials centrally, so you don’t have to enter your API keys separately for every plugin.

Performance and Speed Upgrades 🚀

As with every major release, WordPress 6.9 is faster. The core team has made several changes to improve page load times for visitors:

• Smarter Style Loading: For “Classic Themes,” WordPress now only loads the CSS for the blocks you are actually using on the page, rather than loading everything at once. [#64099]
• Less Render Blocking: Scripts for things like emojis have been moved to the footer, which helps the visible part of your website appear faster (improving your LCP score). [#64076]
• Optimized Background Tasks: Scheduled tasks (Cron jobs) now run at shutdown, so they don’t slow down the page load for your visitors. (#63858)

Other Developer Changes:

• Block Bindings API UI: The interface for connecting block attributes to custom fields has been improved, allowing you to bind or unbind data with a single click.
• PHP 8.5 Support: WordPress 6.9 adds beta support for PHP 8.5, ensuring compatibility with the latest server environments.

We hope this article helped you discover what’s new in WordPress 6.9. We are particularly excited about the Notes feature for collaboration and the improvements to email reliability.

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The post What’s New in WordPress 6.9? (Features & Screenshots) first appeared on WPBeginner.