How to Disable Comments in WordPress

WordPress holds the comment switch in four separate places, and a full shut-off closes all four — the common surprise being that the Settings checkbox only governs posts you have not published yet.

You are done when a private window on an old post shows no form, and posting directly to /wp-comments-post.php saves nothing. The shut-off lives entirely inside WordPress — no hosting panel needed on WordPress hosting.

Bulk edit is the only built-in way to close live posts: select them on Posts › All Posts, set Comments to “Do not allow”, and repeat screen by screen. The Discussion default never touches them.

1. Go to Posts › All Posts and tick the rows on this screen; the list is paged, so one pass never covers the whole site — filter by date or category on long lists.
2. Choose Edit under Bulk actions and click Apply.
3. Set the Comments control to Do not allow and click Update.
4. Open one of those posts in a private window: the form should be gone. Older comments can still sit on the page until removed.

The same clicks work under Pages — the full bulk-edit walkthrough, including the traps, is in bulk editing WordPress posts.

Three filters in a child theme's functions.php force comments closed and threads hidden across every post type — posts, pages, products and attachments — without touching stored rows.

add_filter( 'comments_open', '__return_false', 20, 2 );
add_filter( 'pings_open', '__return_false', 20, 2 );
add_filter( 'comments_array', '__return_empty_array', 10, 2 );

comments_open forces Closed everywhere, pings_open stops pingbacks, and comments_array hands the template an empty list so old threads stop rendering (the rows stay in the database). Two cautions: put the code in a child theme or a small custom plugin — a parent theme update overwrites its functions.php — and copy the file before editing, because a syntax error blanks the site until you restore it. If the theme still prints “Comments are closed”, that sentence lives in the theme template; remove it in the child theme, as these filters do not touch it.

If the goal is less spam rather than no comments, the same Settings › Discussion screen carries two word lists that filter submissions before they ever publish.

• Comment Moderation: a comment containing any listed word (in content, name, URL, email or IP) is held for your approval instead of appearing at once.
• Disallowed comment keys (labelled Comment Blocklist on older WordPress versions): any listed word sends the comment straight to trash.
• Comment author must fill out name and email plus Comment must be manually approved — the checkboxes just above the lists — cover most manual spam without any plugin.

One word per line, and remember the lists match substrings: listing “spam” also bins “spammer”. The fuller anti-spam toolkit — moderation queues, anti-spam plugins and rate limits — is in stopping WordPress comment spam; this guide remains the full shut-off path.