Retrieve WordPress root directory path?

Question

How can I retrieve the path to the root directory in WordPress CMS?

Answer 1

Note: This answer is really old and things may have changed in WordPress land since.

I am guessing that you need to detect the WordPress root from your plugin or theme. I use the following code in FireStats to detect the root WordPress directory where FireStats is installed a a WordPress plugin.

function fs_get_wp_config_path()
{
    $base = dirname(__FILE__);
    $path = false;

    if (@file_exists(dirname(dirname($base))."/wp-config.php"))
    {
        $path = dirname(dirname($base))."/wp-config.php";
    }
    else
    if (@file_exists(dirname(dirname(dirname($base)))."/wp-config.php"))
    {
        $path = dirname(dirname(dirname($base)))."/wp-config.php";
    }
    else
        $path = false;

    if ($path != false)
    {
        $path = str_replace("\\", "/", $path);
    }
    return $path;
}

Answer 2

You can use get_site_url() function to get the base url of the wordpress site.

For more information, please visit http://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/get_site_url

Answer 3

Looking at the bottom of your wp-config.php file in the wordpress root directory will let you find something like this:

if ( !defined('ABSPATH') )
    define('ABSPATH', dirname(__FILE__) . '/');

For an example file have a look here:
http://core.trac.wordpress.org/browser/trunk/wp-config-sample.php

You can make use of this constant called ABSPATH in other places of your wordpress scripts and in most cases it should point to your wordpress root directory.

Answer 4

This an old question, but I have a new answer. This single line will return the path inside a template: :)

$wp_root_path = str_replace('/wp-content/themes', '', get_theme_root());

Answer 5

Try this function for get root directory path:

get_template_directory_uri();

Answer 6

echo ABSPATH; // This shows the absolute path of WordPress

ABSPATH is a constant defined in the wp-config.php file.