I’m working on a WordPress project and need to add multiple rows to my database table at once. I want to know if there’s a proper way to do bulk inserts using WordPress database functions like $wpdb->insert or $wpdb->query with prepared statements.
Basically I want to achieve something like this SQL query but using WordPress methods:
INSERT INTO products (name, price, category)
VALUES
('Laptop', '999.99', 'Electronics'),
('Mouse', '25.50', 'Accessories'),
('Keyboard', '75.00', 'Accessories')
Is there a built-in WordPress way to handle this kind of multi-row insertion, or do I need to loop through each record individually? I’m concerned about performance since I might need to insert hundreds of records at once.
I ran into this exact issue last year when migrating product data. WordPress doesn’t have native bulk insert functionality, but you can build a custom solution using $wpdb->query() with prepared statements. What I did was construct the VALUES clause dynamically by iterating through my data array and using $wpdb->prepare() for each row, then concatenating them with commas. You’ll need to be careful with the placeholders though - make sure you’re using the right format specifiers (%s, %d, %f). The performance difference compared to individual inserts is significant, especially with larger datasets. Just remember to wrap it in a transaction if your table engine supports it for better reliability.
WordPress database class doesn’t provide a dedicated bulk insert method, but I’ve found success using $wpdb->query() with a single prepared statement. The trick is building your INSERT query string manually while maintaining security through proper escaping. I typically construct an array of value sets first, then implode them into the final query. For example, I’ll iterate through my data array and create individual value strings like (‘value1’, ‘value2’, ‘value3’) for each row, making sure to escape everything properly with esc_sql() or use $wpdb->prepare() creatively. This approach has worked well for me when importing CSV files with thousands of records - much faster than individual $wpdb->insert() calls which can timeout on larger datasets.
yeah, you’re right! wpdb lacks a true bulk insert method, but you can craft your own SQL statement with wpdb->query(). just combine your values and use wpdb->prepare() for security. it’s def faster than doing it one by one, believe me!