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How to disable comments in WordPress

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Although allowing comments can be a great way for visitors to engage with your site content, however sometimes you may decide you want to disable commenting. Whether that is because certain posts don’t require any commenting, or just to prevent potential comment spam on your WordPress site.

There are several ways that this can be achieved within WordPress, which we will cover in this guide. Please continue reading, or use the links below to skip straight to a specific section:

Disable comments on future posts


Disable comments on an individual post


Disable all comments using a plugin


Disable comments in bulk


Disable comments on future posts:

If you would like to disable comments on all posts that you create in the future, this can be done via the WordPress discussion settings page.

Note: This does not disable comments for any previously published post. For that you would need either edit the post individually, in bulk, or using a plugin.

Firstly you will need to log in your WordPress admin area / dashboard – This will normally be at a URL such as mydomain.com/wp-admin  (replacing mydomain.com with your own domain name)

Once logged in, hover over ‘Settings‘ on the left menu, then click on the ‘Discussion‘ option.


On the Discussion settings page, you will want to find the 3rd option down: ‘Allow people to submit comments on new posts‘ and un-tick this.

Note: You can also adjust other settings for commenting on this page, such as whether the WordPress site should notify you when a comment is made, or whether users need to register first before being able to comment.

Once done, click on ‘Save Changes‘ at the bottom of the page.

Comments will then be automatically disabled for any new post that is published.


Disable comments on an individual post:

If you only need to disable commenting on a single post, then the quickest way to do this is via the ‘Discussion’ options within the WordPress post.

Firstly, locate the post that you would like to turn commenting off for, and edit the post.

On the editor page, click on ‘Screen Options‘ at the top of the page.


This will then open a drop down box at the top of the page.

Tick the ‘Discussion‘ option


You will then see a new box appear below the editor for ‘Discussion

Within this box, un-tick the ‘Allow Comments‘ option.

Once done, click on the ‘Update‘ button on the right hand side of the page to save the changes.


Disable all comments using a plugin:

If you would like to disable commenting site wide, on both previous and future posts – the easiest way to do this is by using a WordPress plugin.

In this guide we will be using the ‘Disable Comments’ plugin, however there are other alternatives available should you wish to use something else.

Firstly, from your WordPress dashboard, hover over ‘Plugins‘ on the left menu, then click on the ‘Add New‘ option.


Next, In the Search box in the top left of the screen, enter ‘Disable Comments‘ then press enter. This will search for the plugin from the WordPress plugin repository, and also show related plugins in the search result.

You should see Disable Comments appear as the first result. Click on the Install Now button to install the plugin on WordPress.


Once installed, the button will change to a blue Activate button. Click this to activate the plugin.


Once activated this will take you back to the Installed Plugins page.

You will then need to go to the plugin settings to configure the comment settings.

hover over ‘Settings‘ on the left menu, then click on the ‘Disable Comments‘ option.

Alternatively, you can also click on the ‘Settings’ button below the ‘Disable Comments’ plugin listing on the ‘Installed Plugins’ page.


On the Disable Comments page, you will then be given several options which can be adjusted as needed, such as disabling comments everywhere, or only on Posts, Pages, or Media.

In this guide we will be disabling comments site-wide and have selected the ‘Everywhere‘ option.

Once you have made your selections click on the ‘Save Changes‘ button.

Comments will now be disabled on the WordPress site as per your setting choices.


Disable comments in bulk:

Lastly, if you have several posts that you want to disable comments on (whilst leaving comments enabled on other posts), you can use WordPress to bulk edit.

Firstly, go to your ‘All Posts‘ page.

Then using the tick boxes on the left hand side of the posts, select the ones that you would like to bulk edit.

Once you have selected the posts you would like to edit, click on the drop down box above the posts, and select ‘Edit

Then click on the ‘Apply‘ button


This will then open a drop down box above the posts with various quick edit options.

Click on the ‘Comments‘ drop down box and select ‘Do not allow

Once done, click on the ‘Update‘ button to save changes.

Comments will then be disabled on the posts you have just edited.

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