My filters aren't showing on the page
If your WooCommerce Product Filters aren't appearing on your site, then this is usually due to some specific causes. This guide walks you through each solution.
1 - Check your plugin and license status
Verify that WooCommerce Product Filters is properly activated and compatible with your setup:
- Check plugin activation: Go to Plugins in your WordPress dashboard and confirm WooCommerce Product Filters is listed as Active. If it shows as inactive, click Activate. If activation fails, you may have a license issue.
- Check license activation: The filters will only appear on the front end of your website if your license key is active. Check this in the WordPress admin at Products → Product Filters.
- Verify WooCommerce compatibility: Go to Dashboard → Updates and check you're on a recent version of WooCommerce and WooCommerce Product Filters, and that no updates are available for either plugin.
2. Check the page actually contains products to filter
WooCommerce Product Filters only appears on a page where it can detect a WooCommerce product listing. If the current page has no matching products, or if the products are being output by a method the plugin doesn't recognisethen nothing will appear.
Start by opening your shop page or category archive directly (for example yoursite.com/shop or yoursite.com/product-category/your-category). If filters show on the default shop but not on a custom page, the issue is with the custom page's setup, then carry on to Solution 3 (below). If filters don't show on the default shop either, check that the category you're looking at actually contains products and that the products aren't all filtered out by another condition.
3. Check your page builder can support filters
Some page builders display products in a way that WooCommerce Product Filters can't hook into:
- If you're building with Elementor or Divi then you need to use the dedicated widget provided by WooCommerce Product Filters.
- No special widget is needed for the WordPress block editor, Fusion or Bricks builder and you can use any method to display the filters.
- For other page builders such as Cornerstone, you should try the shortcode method but if this doesn't work then it unfortunately may not be possible to use your chosen builder with WooCommerce Product Filters.
4. Incorrect filter setup
Ensure that WooCommerce Product Filters is set up correctly:
- Check category and product count: Filters only appear if your selected product category has products assigned to it. Navigate to Products → Categories in the WordPress admin, select the category where you're displaying filters, and verify the product count is not zero.
- Check index status: WooCommerce Product Filters needs to index your products and filters before it can display the filters correctly. To make sure it's not still performing an index, visit a page on the front end of your site where filters should appear, and make sure you're logged in as an Administrator or Store Manager. If an index is running then a notice will appear on the page telling you to wait until the index is complete.
- Check filter setup:
- Go to Products → Product Filters in the WordPress admin and make sure you have created at least one filter group which contains at least one filter.
- If you're expecting the filters to appear above your shop pages, then go to Products → Product Filters → Settings and ensure that you have selected a filter group for the "Shop filters" setting. If this setting is empty or contains an invalid group then the filters won't appear. (Note: If you're using Elementor or Divi then you should use the dedicated widget instead.)
- If you're expecting the filters to appear within a sidebar, then ensure that you have added the "Product Filters" widget to a sidebar which is visible on the relevant page, and that the widget settings have a valid filter group selected.
7. Clear all caches
Even when everything is configured correctly, a caching layer can serve an older version of the page that doesn't include the filters.
Clear the following, in order:
- Your browser cache. Cmd+Shift+R on Mac or Ctrl+F5 on Windows does a hard refresh. If you'd rather not, open the page in an incognito/private window instead.
- Any caching plugin on the site (WP Rocket, LiteSpeed Cache, W3 Total Cache, Autoptimize and similar). Each has a "Clear all caches" option in the WordPress admin bar or its own settings page.
- Your hosting provider's server cache. For example Kinsta, SiteGround, WP Engine, Cloudways and others all have their own cache layer in addition to anything inside WordPress. Look in your hosting dashboard for a "Purge cache" or "Clear cache" button.
- If you use Cloudflare or another CDN, purge its cache from the Cloudflare dashboard.
6. Fix CSS visibility issues
Filters might be hidden due to CSS or JavaScript issues. In this case, the filters are rendering, but styling or scroll behavior could be obscuring them.
Ask your developer to check the filters aren't being hidden via CSS, and that your filters aren't being hidden behind a sticky header or navigation bar.