WordPress – Bulk Edit Filenames in the Media Library

This is a complete guide to bulk edit filenames in the WordPress Media Library.

Video Guide

Text Guide

After checking this tutorial, you will be able to bulk rename images on your WordPress site for SEO optimization. And the best part, is that you’ll use an intuitive spreadsheet on WordPress, which makes bulk changing filenames an easy task.

Great news: You won’t have to change images manually on your posts, pages, products or any other content. We will create 301 redirects to the new URLs.

One of the greatest benefits you get when you bulk rename images and files on WordPress is that your site can get better rankings on Google if you include key phrases and keywords on the filenames.

What you need to properly bulk edit file names on WordPress

Normally, you can’t rename files on your WordPress Media Library. You can change alt texts, captions, URLs, etc. But you can’t rename image files, for example.

Fortunately, the WP Sheet Editor – Media Library allows you to bulk change image names with a few clicks. You just have to run some search filters, and apply a quick change to all your filenames. For example, you can copy the title of the associated post or product to the file name field automatically, without having to edit each file name.

Once you install and activate the plugin on your WordPress site, you can follow this quick setup guide to learn how to generate the Media Library Spreadsheet.

You also need the Redirection plugin, which will pair up with WP Sheet Editor to create automatic 301 redirections so that you avoid broken image links.

Besides, you need to download and install our free WP Sheet Editor – Redirection extension, which will add the settings you need to automatically create 301 redirections.

Here’s what the Media Library Spreadsheet looks like:

After settings up the spreadsheet, you’ll be ready to bulk edit WordPress filenames on the Media Library.

Attach images

You need to click on Attach Images, and then click on Start to make sure the values in the “Attached to this post” column are correct.

How to find the images to bulk rename them

The Media Library Spreadsheet allows you to view and manage your WordPress Media Library files effectively.

You can use the Search tool to find images or files to rename them quickly.

The “Search” tool is really simple to use. Each field has a clear name of what it can help you find.

For example, in this screenshot, you can see that the basic filters allow you to find your media library files using the following parameters:

• Contains keyword in the title.
• The file was Uploaded by these users
• It contains a Keyword in title of associated post
• Files associated to a specific post type like posts, products, pages, etc.
• The files are filtered by Taxonomies in associated post: post category or tag, product category, tag or attribute, etc.

You just need to enter the search term the field’s name suggests.

The advanced filters are also easy to use. You can enable them by ticking the Enable advanced filters checkbox.

This is how the advanced filters work:

1. Field | Operator | Value: You can use these fields to find files with any search criteria. For example, you can find all files whose format is “image” by entering Format | CONTAINS | image.
2. Is image used as featured image: Use it to search for all the images that are being used as featured images for posts.
3. NOT Contains this keyword: Use this field to find all files that don’t contain a specific keyword in the title.
4. Find these IDs | Find these URLs: You can find specific file IDs or specific file URLs.
5. Date range from | to: Use this to find all files uploaded on a specific date range.

You can filter your images as you want. In this case, we’ve filtered all the images.

How to bulk edit filenames / bulk rename images

The Bulk Edit tool allows you to edit thousands of files and images at a time. This gives you unlimited possibilities when it comes to bulk editing filenames because you can copy any fields’ values into the File Name field.

Here are some examples of what you can do to bulk rename filenames:

• Bulk copy the associated post or product title to the filename
• Append or prepend words or phrases to the file names in bulk
• Copy file title to filename
• Set the same filename to all images
• Etc.

For example, if you want to bulk edit filenames by copying the associated post or product title to the file name field, you need to select the following values in the Bulk Edit tool:

• Select the rows that you want to update: Edit all the rows from my current search (including non-visible rows)
• What field do you want to edit: File name
• Select type of edit: Copy from other columns
• Copy from this column: Attached to this post
• Hit Execute Now.

How will my automatically 301 redirects be created?

Something really important is that WP Sheet Editor, together with the Redirection plugin and the WP Sheet Editor – Redirection extension, allows you to automatically create 301 redirections when you apply changes to the file names in bulk.

If you have any doubts about this process, you can consult this guide.

As you see, bulk editing file names is really easy with the Media Library Spreadsheet plugin.