Co-Authors Plus Integration 1.2.0 – SearchWP Extension

SearchWP Co-Authors Plus Integration is a WordPress plugin extension that improves search accuracy for sites using Co-Authors Plus. Instead of treating authors as a single value, it indexes coauthor metadata defined by Co-Authors Plus, such as names and profile details. This makes it possible to find posts written by specific collaborators with more reliable author matching.

It works with SearchWP’s indexing workflow, adding coauthorplus_ custom fields for each post type. After activation, you rebuild the SearchWP index and trigger a reindex, then search by the configured coauthor data to get results that target the actual posts.

Main Features

• Co-Authors Plus metadata indexing — Indexes multiple authors/collaborators from Co-Authors Plus for search.
• Author field coverage — Indexes user_nicename, display_name, nickname, first_name, last_name, and biography.
• Aggregated matching option — Provides coauthorsplus_any to match across the bundled author fields.
• SearchWP custom fields per post type — Adds new Custom Fields that start with coauthorplus_ in the SearchWP settings dropdown.
• Index rebuild and reindex flow — Requires rebuilding the SearchWP index on the Advanced tab and triggering a reindex.
• Search returns posts, not profile pages — Author data searches return the relevant post(s) rather than an author archive.
• Works with configured Co-Authors Plus authors — Uses the author configuration maintained by Co-Authors Plus.

Benefits

• More discoverable content — Helps visitors find co-authored posts using real author names and details.
• Better author-based filtering — Enables precise searches aligned with how collaborators are defined in Co-Authors Plus.
• More relevant search results — Improves ranking signals by indexing coauthor fields like display_name and first_name.
• Cleaner user experience — Keeps search outcomes focused on posts, avoiding confusing user profile or archive results.
• Flexible matching — Lets you target specific fields or use coauthorsplus_any for broad author term searches.

Who is it suitable for?

• WordPress blogs using Co-Authors Plus for multi-author posts
• Content teams and editorial sites that need author-specific discovery
• Agencies managing collaborative publishing workflows
• Magazine-style or newsroom websites with frequent co-authorship
• Knowledge bases or resource libraries with contributor metadata
• Any site relying on SearchWP for internal search and author filtering