How to manage editorial workflows with custom statuses in WordPress

Write down the stages a post should pass through, such as Idea, Assigned, In Progress, Needs Work, Approved and Published. Keep the list short enough that writers and editors will use it consistently.

Decide who may move content into each stage. WordPress already provides Draft, Pending Review, Scheduled, Published, Private and other built-in statuses, with Pending Review intended for content awaiting a user who can publish it.

For a small team, start with Draft for unfinished work and Pending Review for work ready for an editor. An editor or another user with publishing permission can then publish or return the post for changes.

This manual approach is often enough when you only need one review step. It avoids adding code or another plugin, but it cannot clearly distinguish assigned work, active writing, rejected ideas or approved content waiting for publication.

The code route uses WordPress's register_post_status() function to register each custom status. Register statuses during WordPress's normal initialisation process, and give each one a short machine-readable name and a human-readable label.

Registering a status alone does not add it to the post editor or the Posts screen. WordPress's documentation explicitly warns that the function does not add the status to the Administration Screen, so you also need code for selecting, saving and displaying the status.

Add a control to the post editing screen so an authorised user can select the next status, then save the post with that value. You will also need to decide what each status means for visibility: unpublished workflow stages should normally remain unavailable to the public, while Published should remain the final public state.

Add status labels to the Posts list and provide an admin filter if editors need to find all posts in one stage. Test permissions with a writer and an editor, because a control that appears for everyone can let users bypass the review process.

Run a post through every transition using the actual roles in your team: writer, editor and administrator. Check that a writer cannot publish prematurely, that an editor can return a post for changes, and that changing a status does not accidentally make unpublished content public.

Keep a backup before deploying code. A common failure is registering the status successfully but forgetting the editor control, which leaves posts stuck in Draft or makes the new status visible only through custom queries. Also check scheduled posts, revisions and custom post types separately.

For a team that needs several stages, install and activate PublishPress Statuses Pro, then open its Statuses area in the WordPress admin. Create the stages, choose colours and icons, assign the relevant post types, and set which roles can move content into each status. Its settings include status labels, colours, roles and post types.

The plugin also adds workflow stages and status-based management without requiring you to build the editor controls and dashboard filters yourself. It is the fast option when you need unlimited colour-coded statuses, dashboard filtering or more than the core Draft and Pending Review workflow provides.