Scott Reilly

This plugin prevents WordPress from allowing and handling any search requests from the front-end of the site. Specifically, this plugin:
<ul>
<li>Prevents the search form from appearing if the theme uses the standard <code>get_search_form()</code> function to display the search form.</li>
<li>Prevents the search form from appearing if the theme uses a <code>searchform.php</code> template</li>
<li>Prevents the search item from appearing in the admin tool bar when shown on the front-end.</li>
<li>Disables the search widget.
<ul>
<li>Removes the Search widget from the list of available widgets</li>
<li>Deactivates any search widgets currently in use in any sidebars (they are hidden, not deleted; they’ll reappear in their original locations if this plugin gets deactivated)</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Disables the search block.
<ul>
<li>Removes the Search block from the list of available blocks</li>
<li>Deactivates any search blocks currently in use, such as in posts or as a widget (they are disabled, not deleted; they’ll reappear if this plugin gets deactivated and the associated placeholder block doesn’t get deleted)</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>With or without a search form, the plugin prevents any direct or manual requests by visitors, via either GET or POST requests, from actually returning any search results.</li>
<li>Submitted attempts at a search will be given a 404 File Not Found response, rendered by your site’s 404.php template, if present.</li>
<li>Disables output of <code>SearchAction</code> in SEO schema by the <a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wordpress-seo/" rel="ugc">Yoast SEO</a> plugin.</li>
</ul>
The plugin only affects search on the front-end of the site. It does not disable searching in the admin section of the site.
Links: <a href="https://coffee2code.com/wp-plugins/disable-search/" rel="nofollow ugc">Plugin Homepage</a> | <a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/disable-search/" rel="ugc">Plugin Directory Page</a> | <a href="https://github.com/coffee2code/disable-search/" rel="nofollow ugc">GitHub</a> | <a href="https://coffee2code.com" rel="nofollow ugc">Author Homepage</a>

Disable Search


In 2024, numerous bots are crawling sites, generating significant search spam. Generally, site search incurs high costs, primarily because we end up paying for CPU resources consumed by spam.



If site search is not crucial for your website, I recommend activating this plugin.



Thank you, Scott, for maintaining this simple yet effective plugin!


The most effective way to avoid search spam

Disable the built-in front-end search capabilities of WordPress.

Prevent virtual directory listing services from listing the contents of directories, and/or show a page in place of a directory’s listing.
The Apache web server can be configured to automatically display the listings of the contents of a web site’s file directory if no index file (i.e. index.html or index.php) is present. This can expose files and information to visitors. Of course the web server could be configured to not do this (the recommended approach), but sometimes you don’t have permission (you’re on a shared host), the know-how, or you want to selectively disallow virtual directory listings. That’s where this plugin can help.
If you want to test if your site has virtual directory listings enabled, try visiting http://www.YOURSITE.com/wp-includes (obviously, change the domain to match your own). If you see a listing of PHP files then virtual directory listing is enabled for your site.
This plugin can prevent visitors from seeing the contents of certain (or all) directories on your site (assuming your web server generates virtual directory listings). It also allows you to use a WordPress page as the index for a directory
By default, the following directories are protected:
<ul>
<li>wp-includes/</li>
<li>wp-content/</li>
<li>wp-content/plugins/</li>
<li>wp-content/themes/</li>
</ul>
It does NOT protect any other directory by default. You can change this via the plugin’s admin settings page.
TIP: When this plugin is activated (and more specifically, ater the permalink structure is updated as per the instructions below), WordPress will generate the themed 404 – Not Found page. If you were to create a Page with the same name as one of the directories being disabled (i.e. ‘wp-includes’ or ‘wp-content’) then that page will be displayed instead of the 404 error message. If you want to display a page for the ‘plugins’ and ‘themes’ directory, you must create them as children pages of a ‘wp-content’ page.
NOTE: This plugin only works for the Apache web server.
Links: <a href="http://coffee2code.com/wp-plugins/disable-directory-listings/" rel="nofollow ugc">Plugin Homepage</a> | <a href="http://coffee2code.com" rel="nofollow ugc">Author Homepage</a>

Disable Directory Listings

Prevent virtual directory listing services from listing the contents of directories, and/or show a page in place of a directory's listing.

Disable Search vs Disable Directory Listings