Need a Wordpress breadcrumb navigation trail for your Wordpress theme, but do not want to rely on a plugin?

If you want your Wordpress theme to stand out from the crowd it is worth considering implementing a breadcrumb navigation trail. A breadcrumb trail can make it easier for your site visitors to identify what page they are currently viewing.

Plugins like Breadcrumb NavXT are available that will automatically produce a breadcrumb trail for you. However, if you are looking for an easier method that does not require a plugin the below solution should help.

Breadcrumb.php code

Copy the below code into a new file called breadcrumb.php – make sure this file is in your root theme folder.

<div id="breadcrumb">
  <?php /* If this is the homepage */ if (is_home()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a></p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php /* If this is a tag archive */ if (is_tag() ) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo; <a href="#" rel="bookmark" title="Posts Tagged &#8216;<?php single_tag_title(); ?>&#8217;">Posts Tagged &#8216;
    <?php single_tag_title(); ?>
    &#8217;</a></p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php /* If this is a category archive */ if (is_category()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo; <a href="#" title="<?php single_cat_title(); ?>">
    <?php single_cat_title(); ?>
    </a> </p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php if /* If this is a page */ (is_page()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo;
    <?php
	global $wp_query;
	if (empty($wp_query->post->post_parent) ) {
		$parent = $wp_query->post->ID;
		echo '';
	} else {
		$parent = $wp_query->post->post_parent;
		echo '<a href="'.get_permalink($parent).'">'.get_the_title($parent).'</a> &raquo;';
	}
?>
    <a href="<?php echo get_permalink() ?>" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: <?php the_title(); ?>">
    <?php the_title(); ?>
    </a></p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php if /* If this is a blog post */ (is_single()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo;
    <?php the_category(', ') ?>
    &raquo; <a href="<?php echo get_permalink() ?>" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: <?php the_title(); ?>">
    <?php the_title(); ?>
    </a></p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php if /* If this is a search page */ (is_search()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo; <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a></p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php /* If this is a 404 page */ if (is_404()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo; <a href="#" title="404 Error page">404 Error</a></p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php /* If this is a yearly archive */ if (is_year()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo; <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>/archives" title="archives"><span>archives</span></a> &raquo; <a href="#" title="Year">
    <?php the_time('Y'); ?>
    </a></p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php /* If this is a monthly archive */ if (is_month()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo; <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>/archives" title="archives"><span>archives</span></a> &raquo; <a href="#" title="Month">
    <?php the_time('F, Y'); ?>
    </a></p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php /* If this is a daily archive */ if (is_day()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo; <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>/archives" title="archives"><span>archives</span></a> &raquo; <a href="#" title="Month">
    <?php the_time('F jS, Y'); ?>
    </a></p>
  <?php } ?>
  <?php /* If this is a author archive */ if (is_author()) { ?>
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>" title="home"><span>home</span></a> &raquo; <a href="<?php bloginfo('siteurl'); ?>/archives" title="archives"><span>authors</span></a> &raquo;
    <?php the_author_posts_link(); ?>
    <?php
if(isset($_GET['author_name'])) :
$curauth = get_userdatabylogin($author_name);
else :
$curauth = get_userdata(intval($author));
endif;
?>
    <a title="<?php echo $curauth->display_name; ?>'s posts" href="#"><?php echo $curauth->display_name; ?></a> </p>
  <?php } ?>
</div>
<!-- end breadcrumb -->

Call the above template anywhere in your theme files (usually in header.php) using the following code:

<?php include (TEMPLATEPATH . "/breadcrumb.php"); ?>

The end HTML result will look something like this:

<div id="breadcrumb">
  <p> <strong>You are here:</strong> <a href="http://yoursitename.com" title="home"><span>home</span></a></p>
</div><!-- end breadcrumb -->

Known issues!

This does not work for Grandchild categories. In my experience, grandchild categories are used very rarely. If you have found a workaround or any improvements to this code let me know.