How to Show the Short & Long Description in WooCommerce

WooCommerce products have two descriptions: the short description in the product summary and the long description in the Description tab. When you build a custom product template, these snippets let you print each of them wherever you need.

Short description

The short description is saved as the product’s excerpt. The snippet runs it through the woocommerce_short_description filter, so it gets the same formatting as on the default product page, such as paragraphs and shortcodes.

<?php $short_description = apply_filters( 'woocommerce_short_description', $post->post_excerpt ); ?>
<?php echo $short_description; ?>

This uses the global $post, so place it inside the product loop or on the single product template. Inside a function, declare global $post; first.

Long description with a shortcode

First, add this code to your child theme’s functions.php file. It registers a [product_description] shortcode.

add_shortcode( 'product_description', 'display_product_description' );
function display_product_description( $atts ){
    $atts = shortcode_atts( array(
        'id' => get_the_id(),
    ), $atts, 'product_description' );

    global $product;

    if ( ! is_a( $product, 'WC_Product') )
        $product = wc_get_product($atts['id']);

    return $product->get_description();
}

• The id attribute defaults to the current post’s ID.
• If a global $product object already exists, as on a single product page, the shortcode uses it and ignores id. Otherwise it loads the product with wc_get_product().
• get_description() returns the raw description, without the automatic paragraphs WordPress adds when it displays post content.

Then print the shortcode in your template with do_shortcode():

<?php echo do_shortcode( "[product_description]" ); ?>

You can also place [product_description id="123"] in page content, with 123 replaced by a product ID. Make sure the ID belongs to a product: if it doesn’t, wc_get_product() returns false and the shortcode causes a fatal error.

For product pages laid out around your descriptions and other content, see my WooCommerce development services.

Related articles

• showing category names and descriptions on the product page: the same idea for product categories
• printing the price in a custom product template: another piece of a custom layout
• removing the Additional information tab: when you rework the default product tabs