Remove empty p tags from WordPress posts

wordpress-remove-emty-p-tags.md

Remove empty p tags from WordPress posts

function wps_clear_content($content)
{
    // clean up p tags around block elements
    $content = preg_replace(array(
        '#<p>\s*<(div|aside|section|article|header|footer)#',
        '#</(div|aside|section|article|header|footer)>\s*</p>#',
        '#</(div|aside|section|article|header|footer)>\s*<br ?/?>#',
        '#<(div|aside|section|article|header|footer)(.*?)>\s*</p>#',
        '#<p>\s*</(div|aside|section|article|header|footer)#',
    ), array(
        '<$1',
        '</$1>',
        '</$1>',
        '<$1$2>',
        '</$1',
    ), $content);
    return preg_replace('#<p>(\s|&nbsp;)*+(<br\s*/*>)*(\s|&nbsp;)*</p>#i', '', $content);
}

Usage

add_filter('the_content', 'wps_clear_content', 20, 1);