How to Check If Sidebar Has Widgets in WordPress

Are you looking for a way to check if sidebar has widgets areas? This is good if you want to hide section when there aren’t any widgets in it. While there’s probably a plugin for this, we have created a quick code snippet that you can use to check if sidebar has widgets in WordPress.

Instructions:

All you have to do is add this code to your theme’s functions.php file or in a site-specific plugin:

function is_sidebar_active($index) {
    global $wp_registered_sidebars;
    $widgetcolums = wp_get_sidebars_widgets();
    if ($widgetcolums[$index])
        return true;
    return false;
}

To check the sidebar, you can add this code in your index.php file.

if( is_sidebar_active( 'sidebar-name' ) ):
    // code
endif;

Note: If this is your first time adding code snippets in WordPress, then please refer to our guide on how to properly copy / paste code snippets in WordPress, so you don’t accidentally break your site.

If you liked this code snippet, please consider checking out our other articles on the site like: 12 best WordPress podcast plugins and How to create a WordPress donation form.