I need to do multi-level ordering in a query. The issue is with ordering one value DESC and the other ASC as in SQL. The following SQL seems to give me what I want when I run it in terminal:

SELECT DISTINCT * FROM wp_posts 
INNER JOIN wp_postmeta 
ON wp_posts.ID = wp_postmeta.post_id 
WHERE wp_posts.post_type = 'post' 
AND wp_postmeta.meta_key = 'pb_issue_featured'
AND wp_posts.post_status = 'publish' 
ORDER BY wp_postmeta.meta_value DESC, wp_posts.menu_order ASC;

The pb_issue_featured is a boolean value. The end result I need is the query to display posts that have a meta value of 1 for this field at the top, then all the others bellow. Then the second tier ordering is the designated menu_order (I'm using the post types order plugin).

The issue is that my boolean value needs to be ordered high to low (1 to 0) but the menu_order is the opposite. What is ordered first with the plugin has a menu order of 1. So using the built in 'orderby' in WP_Query doesn't work. Anyone have suggestions? I looked into the 'posts_orderby' filter but couldn't get it to take. Wasn't really sure where it should be applied or how I could troubleshoot it. It just didn't re order the way I had it.

Thanks for the help! I will post the actual WP_Query if it's relevant but I wanted to keep this as short as possible.

The query args:

$args = array(
        'post_type' => 'post',
        'meta_key' => 'pb_issue_featured',
        'orderby'   => 'meta_value',
        'order' => 'DESC',
        'post_status' => 'publish',
        'posts_per_page' => $posts,
        'paged' => $paged,
        'meta_query' => array(
            array(
                'key' => 'headline',
                'value' => 1,
                'compare' => '!=' 
                )
            )
        );
$q = new WP_Query($args);

I need to do multi-level ordering in a query. The issue is with ordering one value DESC and the other ASC as in SQL. The following SQL seems to give me what I want when I run it in terminal:

SELECT DISTINCT * FROM wp_posts 
INNER JOIN wp_postmeta 
ON wp_posts.ID = wp_postmeta.post_id 
WHERE wp_posts.post_type = 'post' 
AND wp_postmeta.meta_key = 'pb_issue_featured'
AND wp_posts.post_status = 'publish' 
ORDER BY wp_postmeta.meta_value DESC, wp_posts.menu_order ASC;

The pb_issue_featured is a boolean value. The end result I need is the query to display posts that have a meta value of 1 for this field at the top, then all the others bellow. Then the second tier ordering is the designated menu_order (I'm using the post types order plugin).

The issue is that my boolean value needs to be ordered high to low (1 to 0) but the menu_order is the opposite. What is ordered first with the plugin has a menu order of 1. So using the built in 'orderby' in WP_Query doesn't work. Anyone have suggestions? I looked into the 'posts_orderby' filter but couldn't get it to take. Wasn't really sure where it should be applied or how I could troubleshoot it. It just didn't re order the way I had it.

Thanks for the help! I will post the actual WP_Query if it's relevant but I wanted to keep this as short as possible.

The query args:

$args = array(
        'post_type' => 'post',
        'meta_key' => 'pb_issue_featured',
        'orderby'   => 'meta_value',
        'order' => 'DESC',
        'post_status' => 'publish',
        'posts_per_page' => $posts,
        'paged' => $paged,
        'meta_query' => array(
            array(
                'key' => 'headline',
                'value' => 1,
                'compare' => '!=' 
                )
            )
        );
$q = new WP_Query($args);

• wp-query
• mysql
• order

• Well, you should post the WP_Query, to see if it is formed right. – Marin Bînzari Commented Aug 13, 2013 at 5:53
• There it is in all it's glory. I'm currently not ordering by anything but that boolean meta value b/c it was the only way to get that level or sorting working. The site also uses 'headline' posts which take precedence over 'featured' posts. Thus I exclude them in this query – ian Commented Aug 13, 2013 at 6:02

3 Answers 3

Try this:

$args = array(
        'post_type' => 'post',
        'meta_key' => 'pb_issue_featured',
        'orderby'   => 'meta_value',
        'order' => 'DESC',
        'posts_per_page' => $posts,
        'paged' => $paged,
        'paged' => 1,
        'meta_query' => array(
            array(
                'key' => 'headline',
                'value' => 1,
                'compare' => '!=' 
                )
            )
        );

add_filter( 'posts_orderby', 'filter_query' );
$q = new WP_Query($args);
remove_filter( 'posts_orderby', 'filter_query' );

function filter_query( $query ) {
    $query .= ', wp_posts.menu_order ASC';
    return $query;
}

ORDER BY ID ASC

$args = array(
    'order' => 'ASC',
    'orderby' => 'ID',
);

or

ORDER BY ID DESC

$args = array(
    'order' => 'DESC',
    'orderby' => 'ID',
);

when using something like elementor plugin and have a custom field with date name, add the following action to elementor-pro/elementor-pro.php in plugin editor.

add_action( 'elementor/query/my_custom_filter', function( $query ) {
 
    $query->set( 'meta_key', 'date' );
    $query->set( 'orderby', 'meta_value' );
    $query->set( 'order', 'DESC' );
    $query->set( 'posts_per_page', 2 );     
    
} );