How to find and replace in a WordPress post (no plugin)
Replace a word or a link across a WordPress post or page without installing a WordPress plugin or touching the database.
Search-and-replace plugins for WordPress work on the whole database – powerful, but overkill (and risky) when you just need to fix a term in the post you are editing. There is a lighter way that works right in the editor.
Step by step
- Install the free SwapText Chrome extension – nothing to install on your site.
- Open the post in the editor and click inside the text (Classic editor, a Gutenberg paragraph, or the Code editor for the whole post).
- Open SwapText with
Alt + Shift + R, type the text to find and its replacement, and press Enter. - Check the result and click Update in WordPress to save.
Tip for Gutenberg
Gutenberg splits a post into blocks. To change the whole post at once, switch to Code editor (⋮ menu → Code editor) and run SwapText there – or use Pro’s All text boxes on the page option.
Regex for power users (Pro)
Turn on Regex to reformat patterns, for example (\d+) EUR → €$1 changes “19 EUR” into “€19” everywhere in the post.
SwapText adds find & replace to every text box in Chrome – Gmail, WordPress, forms and more. Free, with one-click undo.