{"id":23,"date":"2022-10-06T15:18:30","date_gmt":"2022-10-06T14:18:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/?p=23"},"modified":"2026-05-11T14:53:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-11T13:53:16","slug":"activating-the-options-page-in-advanced-custom-fields","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/activating-the-options-page-in-advanced-custom-fields\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Create a Global Options Page in Advanced Custom Fields"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>If you&#8217;re building a custom WordPress theme, there are often situations where you need editable content that applies across the entire website rather than being tied to a specific page or post.<\/p>\n<p>This is where <a href=\"https:\/\/www.advancedcustomfields.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Advanced Custom Fields (ACF)<\/a> Options Pages become incredibly useful.<\/p>\n<p>An ACF Options Page allows you to create global settings for things like:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Contact details<\/li>\n<li>Social media links<\/li>\n<li>Header content<\/li>\n<li>Footer settings<\/li>\n<li>Site-wide calls to action<\/li>\n<li>Tracking scripts<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>However, when developing a custom theme, you may notice that the Options Page functionality is not enabled by default.<\/p>\n<h2>Enable the ACF Options Page<\/h2>\n<p>To enable the Options Page, add the following code to your theme\u2019s <code>functions.php<\/code> file:<\/p>\n<pre><code class=\"language-php\">if( function_exists('acf_add_options_page') ) {\r\n\r\n    acf_add_options_page();\r\n\r\n}<\/code><\/pre>\n<h2>What This Does<\/h2>\n<p>This checks whether the ACF Pro function exists before attempting to create the Options Page.<\/p>\n<p>Once added, you&#8217;ll see a new <strong>Options<\/strong> item appear in the WordPress admin sidebar.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-46 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/e39336bada93363e943dbef0869be533.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"1906\" height=\"928\" srcset=\"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/e39336bada93363e943dbef0869be533.png 1906w, https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/e39336bada93363e943dbef0869be533-300x146.png 300w, https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/e39336bada93363e943dbef0869be533-1024x499.png 1024w, https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/e39336bada93363e943dbef0869be533-768x374.png 768w, https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/e39336bada93363e943dbef0869be533-1536x748.png 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1906px) 100vw, 1906px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>From there, you can begin creating global custom fields and assign field groups to the Options Page within ACF.<\/p>\n<h2>Example Uses for an ACF Options Page<\/h2>\n<p>A few common uses include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Global header announcements<\/li>\n<li>Footer contact information<\/li>\n<li>Social media URLs<\/li>\n<li>Default SEO fields<\/li>\n<li>Reusable call-to-action content<\/li>\n<li>Company information<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I regularly use Advanced Custom Fields when building custom WordPress websites and bespoke themes for clients. You can view more of my <a href=\"https:\/\/www.garethhardy.com\/\">web design and development work here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>Final Thoughts<\/h2>\n<p>The ACF Options Page is one of the simplest ways to make a custom WordPress theme more flexible and client-friendly.<\/p>\n<p>If you&#8217;re building bespoke themes regularly, it&#8217;s well worth including this by default in your development workflow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you&#8217;re building a custom WordPress theme, there are often situations where you need editable content that applies across the entire website rather than being tied to a specific page or post. This is where Advanced Custom Fields (ACF) Options Pages become incredibly useful. An ACF Options Page allows you to create global settings for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":54,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-development"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57,"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23\/revisions\/57"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/garethhardy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}