Categories play a vital role in organizing your WordPress posts. However, there might be instances when you prefer not to categorize a post and leave the category field empty. In such cases, WordPress automatically assigns the default category as “Uncategorized” to the post. In this guide, I’ll walk you through three simple methods to hide or remove uncategorized category on WordPress. Those options help you eliminate the display of “Uncategorized” text links on your posts or sidebar widgets.

Method One: Changing the Default Category

WordPress now has the option to change the default category for your posts. Follow these steps to update the default category for your blog posts:

  1. Log in to your WordPress admin dashboard.
  2. Navigate to the “Settings” > “Writing” page.
  3. On this page, you’ll find an option to change the Default Category for your posts. Simply select the category you prefer as the new default.

Method Two: Renaming the Default Category (SEO-Friendly)

If you’d like to avoid displaying the “Uncategorized” category altogether, you can rename it to something more meaningful. Here’s how:

  1. Navigate to the “Categories” page under the “Posts” section in your admin panel.
  2. Locate “Uncategorized” in the list of categories and click on “Edit.”
  3. First, change the category name to your desired name and save your changes.
  4. Next, modify the category slug to match the new name and save your changes again.

From now on, your posts will now display this new category name instead of “Uncategorized.”

Method One: Preventing the Display of Uncategorized Links

To achieve this, follow these steps:

  1. Open the ‘functions.php’ file located in your theme folder. (See: How to edit functions.php)
  2. Add the following code snippet to the file: 
    add_filter('get_the_categories', 'remove_uncategorized_links', 1);
function remove_uncategorized_links( $categories ){
  foreach ( $categories as $cat_key => $category ){
    if( 1 == $category->term_id ){
      unset( $categories[ $cat_key ] );
    }
  }
  return $categories;
}

This code will remove the “Uncategorized” item from any category list or dropdown, preventing it from being displayed on your website.

 

Conclusion

By following these three methods, you can effectively manage and customize the categorization of your WordPress posts. If you found this tip helpful, please consider sharing it to support my efforts. Thank you!