WordPress: turn off comments - so disable the feature
Comments under a WordPress article can be a lot: unconstructive, offensive or just a lot of work. Switching off the comment function helps here. We show you how to deactivate and, if necessary, reactivate comments, depending on what you are doing with your blog.
Toggle WordPress comments on and off
You can turn the comment function on and off in Wordpress as well as activate it for individual articles:
- If you only want to switch off the comments for certain articles because the discussion is too unconstructive and the moderation is too complex, you can do this directly on the edit page of the article.
- Open this as usual via the administration page in the backend.
- Here you search for the module "Discussions". This is usually located under the input window for the article itself.
- Sometimes the module is hidden. To check this, click on "Show options" at the top and activate the module if necessary.
- Here you can check or uncheck "Allow comments" to allow or prevent comments. You can also set trackbacks and pingbacks separately.
Turn off WordPress comments generally
However, to change the default settings for newly created items, you have to go to the settings.
- Here you search for the discussion settings.
- This menu also contains the standard settings for articles.
- The third point "Allow visitors to comment on new posts" activates the comment function. Place a checkmark to generally allow comments or remove it to prevent them.
- Note that this change does not affect items that have already been created. With these you have to change the settings individually as described above.
- In addition, the settings of individual articles overwrite the standard settings set here. This means that if you deactivate comments by default, you can still activate them on the respective edit page for an article and vice versa.
Note: To deactivate the comments, you first have to log into your dashboard. Here we explain how to find Wordpress admin access again easily.