_get_meta_table( string $type ): string|false
- Since
- 2.9.0
- Source
wp-includes/meta.php:1290
Compatibility
- WordPress
- since 2.9.0
- PHP
- 7.4–8.6-dev
- 6.7.7
- 6.8.8
- 6.9.7
- 7.0.4
- 7.1.0
Present in every tracked release (6.7.7 to 7.1.0), and compiles on PHP 7.4 through 8.6-dev.
Parameters
$typestring- Type of object metadata is for. Accepts 'blog', 'post', 'comment', 'term', 'user', or any other object type with an associated meta table.
Return value
string|false- Metadata table name, or false if no metadata table exists
Performance profile
How much work a call to _get_meta_table() does, and what it touches: the algorithmic scaling, the Zend instruction count per call across PHP versions, the hooks it hands control to, and the core code that calls it. Measured from the compiled opcodes, not a stopwatch, so every number is identical on any machine running the same PHP version, and every function in core is ranked by cost.
- Cost class
- Trivial
- Scaling
- Constant
- Instructions
- 6–7
- Plugin surface
- None
- Called by
- 8
Touches nothing outside its own arguments.
No loop in the body: the same number of instructions runs whatever you pass in.
Executed per call on PHP 8.5, depending on the branch taken. The body compiles to 8.
Nothing here hands control to plugin code.
8 places in core call this, so the cost is paid more often than your own code shows.
What one call costs · 1 distinct outcome
One number would be a lie: the work depends on which branch runs. These are every distinct cost _get_meta_table() can have, taken from its control-flow graph on PHP 8.5.
| When | Instructions | Calls it makes |
|---|---|---|
| always | 6–7 | none |
Across PHP versions
Compiles the same on PHP 7.4, 8.1, 8.2, 8.3, 8.4, 8.5 and 8.6-dev: 8 instructions, 6–7 executed per call, 1 branch. The work does not change between versions.
An instruction is not a fixed amount of time, so a matching count is not necessarily the same speed; what it rules out is a difference in the work itself.
Used by · 8
- WP_Meta_Query::get_sql()Generates SQL clauses to be appended to a main query.
- add_metadata()Adds metadata for the specified object.
- delete_metadata()Deletes metadata for the specified object.
- delete_metadata_by_mid()Deletes metadata by meta ID.
- get_metadata_by_mid()Retrieves metadata by meta ID.
- update_meta_cache()Updates the metadata cache for the specified objects.
- update_metadata()Updates metadata for the specified object. If no value already exists for the specified object ID and metadata key, the metadata will be added.
- update_metadata_by_mid()Updates metadata by meta ID.
Source code
function _get_meta_table( $type ) { global $wpdb; $table_name = $type . 'meta'; if ( empty( $wpdb->$table_name ) ) { return false; } return $wpdb->$table_name;}Changelog
Introduced in 2.9.0. Unchanged from 6.7.7 through 7.1.0.
Signature, return type and hooks compared across 5 parsed releases.
About this page
- Parsed data
- Generated from the wordpress-develop 7.1.0 tag, from
src/wp-includes/meta.php, and regenerated for each WordPress release so it tracks the code rather than a snapshot of it. - Corrections
- Something wrong on this page? Report it and it gets fixed in the next regeneration.