As of April 2026, Custom Category Templates is a WordPress theme plugin with 3.0K+ active installations and a 4.3/5 rating from 6 reviews. It has been downloaded 61K+ times in total. Requires WordPress 3.4.0+ and PHP false+. Available on WordPress.org since 2011. Last updated 10 years ago — may have compatibility concerns. Download volume is stable this week. Top alternative: Kirki Customizer Framework.
4.3/56 reviews
3.0K+active installs
61K+total downloads
15 yearssince 2011
Overview
Just like the way you can create custom page templates, this plugin enables you to build category archive templates by adding this bit to the top of your file:
<?php
/**
* Category Template: Grid
*/
?>
and when you’re adding or editing categories, you can choose the desired template file.
This plugin is maintained solely for backward compatibility. Try the new Custom Taxonomy Templates instead, it supports all taxonomies and also uses the new term meta feature in WP 4.4.
Screenshots
Ratings & Reviews
4.36 reviews
5 ★
5
4 ★
0
3 ★
0
2 ★
0
1 ★
1
Recent Reviews
WPML
by avanser·10 years ago
Thanks for plugin.
For WPML sites there will be problem, because of WPML bug https://wpml.org/forums/topic/category-templates-issue/
We resolved it by adding 11 priority in
add_filter( ‘category_template’, array( $this, ‘category_template’ ), 11 );
Ignore the Newb
by Cresencio·12 years ago
If you still need someone holding your hand through template development then this plugin might be a bit out of your league.
It works perfectly, just an awesome plugin.
Great job shazdeh.
Very poor
by Clems 1971·12 years ago
This sucks! It would give it a minus figure if I could do that!
As a newbie to WP, this has got to be one of THE WORST plug-in’s I’ve ever seen. Where’s the documentation?
I got this to appear in my drop-down menu when creating a category by pure luck as it doesn’t even mention what page to add the bit of code to.
I’ve no idea how to make any changes to said template or if I even need to look for a specific page or php file to edit. This plug-in has been based on people with experience of WP and hasn’t given any thought to people like me who are new to this.
simple and fast
by Daniele Scasciafratte·13 years ago
yahooo i have resolved 😛
Awesome Plugin to custom Template of category
by keshavnaidu·13 years ago
Tired of looking solution for using custom template of Specific category with thir subcategories… finally got this plugins in WP plugin search..
Thanks a lot.
Download Trends
Today: 4Yesterday: 8This week: 30Period total: 876
Compatibility
| WordPress | 3.4.0+ requiredTested up to 4.4.34 |
| PHP | false+ required |
Version Adoption
v0.2
100.0%
Top Alternatives to Custom Category Templates
Frequently Asked Questions
Changelog
0.2.1
- Fix PHP notices
- i18n support
Contributors
Plugin data sourced from WordPress.org. Analysis and metrics by PluginSift.