Title: Query posts GROUP BY post_parent
Last modified: July 6, 2021

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# Query posts GROUP BY post_parent

 *  [Maxell_WP](https://wordpress.org/support/users/maxell_wp/)
 * (@maxell_wp)
 * [4 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/query-posts-group-by-post_parent/)
 * Hi, I am trying to get recently modified posts grouped by post_parent ID..
 * $arg = array(
    ‘post_type’ => ‘episode’, ‘post_status’ => ‘publish’, ‘order’ 
   => ‘DESC’, ‘orderby’ => ‘post_modified’, ‘groupby’ => ‘post_parent’, // Is this
   possible ‘paged’ => $paged );
 * I want to display recent 32 posts, only 1 most recently updated post from each
   PARENT post, I tried so many things, but doesn’t work. Any help would be appreciated.
   thanks

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

 *  [Sarah Snow](https://wordpress.org/support/users/arasae/)
 * (@arasae)
 * [4 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/query-posts-group-by-post_parent/#post-14633008)
 * Hi there,
 * Have you considered using a shortcodes plugin to achieve this? Some of these 
   plugins are more complicated than others, but there are a few that display a 
   number of posts (number set by you!) by categories, tags, parent, etc:
 * [https://wordpress.org/plugins/search/shortcodes+posts/](https://wordpress.org/plugins/search/shortcodes+posts/)
 * I might take a look at some of the features of popular ones in that link above.
   It may take some setup, but you may be able to add multiple shortcodes to a single
   page, set to display either the parent post like you mentioned or categories 
   as a work-around.
 *  Thread Starter [Maxell_WP](https://wordpress.org/support/users/maxell_wp/)
 * (@maxell_wp)
 * [4 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/query-posts-group-by-post_parent/#post-14634580)
 * Thanks Sara, but its a simple query, I would not prefer using any plugin for 
   this. I also tried to group result with direct query, below is my query:
 * `$wpdb->get_results("SELECT * FROM wp_posts WHERE post_type='episode' GROUP BY
   post_parent ORDER BY post_modified DESC LIMIT 32;");`
 * it doesn’t sort with post_modified DESC, but if I remove GROUP BY post_parent,
   it perfectly displays all recently updated posts. Is there any way to handle 
   this ? Following query works if I remove GROUP BY…
 * `$wpdb->get_results("SELECT * FROM wp_posts WHERE post_type='episode' ORDER BY
   post_modified DESC LIMIT 32;");`
 * The only workaround I did was running query on 1000 posts and then adding post_parent
   to one array and for final out code checking with if parent is in excluded IDs,
   then not add in final output.. something like below:
 * `if (!in_array($ep_parent_media_id, $excluded_cats)) {`
 * but to get only 32 posts I have to query 500 posts if there are more than 200
   updated posts under one drama. This is wrong.. There must be a very simple way,
   but due to my limited knowledge on WP I cant get it work, any experienced developer
   can write max 10 lines of code and fix it.. Lets hope someone replies….
 * thanks for your suggestions though 🙂
    -  This reply was modified 4 years, 11 months ago by [Maxell_WP](https://wordpress.org/support/users/maxell_wp/).
    -  This reply was modified 4 years, 11 months ago by [Maxell_WP](https://wordpress.org/support/users/maxell_wp/).
 *  [Dion](https://wordpress.org/support/users/diondesigns/)
 * (@diondesigns)
 * [4 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/query-posts-group-by-post_parent/#post-14635792)
 * You can achieve what you want with a modified query, but you must first clear
   the `ONLY_FULL_GROUP_BY` SQL mode. That’s well beyond the scope of this site;
   perhaps dba.stackexchange.com would be a better place to ask.
 * Also note that you’re sorting on a non-indexed datetime column, so your query
   has the potential to cause server issues.
 *  Thread Starter [Maxell_WP](https://wordpress.org/support/users/maxell_wp/)
 * (@maxell_wp)
 * [4 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/query-posts-group-by-post_parent/#post-14644659)
 * So basically no one knows how to achieve this.. this is one of the reasons I 
   just delete WP after wasting so much time..

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

The topic ‘Query posts GROUP BY post_parent’ is closed to new replies.

 * In: [Developing with WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/wp-advanced/)
 * 4 replies
 * 3 participants
 * Last reply from: [Maxell_WP](https://wordpress.org/support/users/maxell_wp/)
 * Last activity: [4 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/query-posts-group-by-post_parent/#post-14644659)
 * Status: not resolved

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