comment_exists( string $comment_author, string $comment_date, string $timezone = 'blog' ): string|null
- Since
- 2.0.0, 4.4.0
- Source
wp-admin/includes/comment.php:26
Description
For best performance, use $timezone = 'gmt', which queries a field that is properly indexed. The default value for $timezone is 'blog' for legacy reasons.
Compatibility
- WordPress
- since 4.4.0
- 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
$comment_authorstring- Author of the comment.
$comment_datestring- Date of the comment.
$timezonestringoptional- Timezone. Accepts 'blog' or 'gmt'. Default 'blog'.Default:
'blog'
Return value
string|null- Comment post ID on success.
Performance profile
How much work a call to comment_exists() 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
- Heavy
- Scaling
- Constant
- Instructions
- 28–29
- Plugin surface
- None
- Called by
- 0
Reaches the database via ->get_var().
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 29.
Nothing here hands control to plugin code.
Nothing in core calls this; the cost is only what you spend yourself.
What it touches
- sqldatabase query
->get_var()called directly
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 comment_exists() can have, taken from its control-flow graph on PHP 8.5.
| When | Instructions | Calls it makes |
|---|---|---|
| always | 28–29 | stripslashes(), stripslashes(), ->prepare(), ->get_var() |
Across PHP versions
Compiles the same on PHP 7.4, 8.1, 8.2, 8.3, 8.4, 8.5 and 8.6-dev: 29 instructions, 28–29 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.
Source code
function comment_exists( $comment_author, $comment_date, $timezone = 'blog' ) { global $wpdb; $date_field = 'comment_date'; if ( 'gmt' === $timezone ) { $date_field = 'comment_date_gmt'; } return $wpdb->get_var( $wpdb->prepare( "SELECT comment_post_ID FROM $wpdb->comments WHERE comment_author = %s AND $date_field = %s", stripslashes( $comment_author ), stripslashes( $comment_date ) ) );}Changelog
Introduced in 2.0.0. Unchanged from 6.7.7 through 7.1.0.
Signature, return type and hooks compared across 5 parsed releases.
$timezone parameter.from the docblockAbout this page
- Parsed data
- Generated from the wordpress-develop 7.0.4 tag, from
src/wp-admin/includes/comment.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.