WP CLI Get Current Theme

I thought retrieving the currently active theme on a WordPress website with WP CLI would involve the wp theme command but I was wrong. The correct command to get the currently active theme is wp option get current_theme.

Example

$ wp option get current_theme
Bootstrap4 Genesis

What You Can Get from wp theme

When we run wp theme list

+----------------------+----------+--------+---------+----------------+-------------+
| name                 | status   | update | version | update_version | auto_update |
+----------------------+----------+--------+---------+----------------+-------------+
| bootstrap4-genesis   | active   | none   | 1.3.2   |                | off         |
| genesis              | parent   | none   | 3.5.0   |                | off         |
| twentytwentyfour     | inactive | none   | 1.2     |                | off         |
+----------------------+----------+--------+---------+----------------+-------------+

We can see the active theme but it isn’t easy to grab it programmatically (though we can grab it by setting the output to json and using the jq utility, see following example).

Thanks for calling this out Ryan Neilson.

Alternative Command to Retrieve Current Theme

wp theme list --status=active --format=json | jq '.[0].name'

Get List of Active Themes in a WordPress Multisite

This is a helpful command based on Loop Through WordPress Multisite Blogs with WP CLI to display all of the site names and the active theme on that site.

for URL in $(wp site list --field=url); do 
  wp option get blogname --url=$URL;
  wp option get current_theme --url=$URL;
  echo "-----------------------------";
done

Sal Ferrarello (@salcode)

Sal is a PHP and JavaScript developer with a focus on the WordPress platform. He is a conference speaker with a background including Piano Player, Radio DJ, Magician/Juggler, Beach Photographer, and High School Math Teacher. Sal can be found professionally at WebDevStudios, where he works as a principal engineer.