AI Overcomplicating WordPress? Here's How to Get Simple Answers
Z
Zack Saadioui
8/12/2025
Sick of GPT-5 Turning Simple WordPress Questions into a Novel? Here's How to Fix It.
Hey there. So, you're trying to get a straight answer about a WordPress thing from GPT-5, or whatever AI you're using, & it feels like you've asked it to write the next great epic. You ask for a simple code snippet to change a post title, & you get back a ten-part philosophical treatise on the nature of WordPress hooks, complete with a custom-built class that could probably power a small space station.
Yeah, I've been there. It's... frustrating.
Turns out, these new AI models, for all their power, can be a bit like an overeager intern. They're brilliant, but they don't always have the common sense to keep it simple. They overcomplicate things, "hallucinate" code that doesn't exist, & sometimes just completely miss the point. There's even a running joke on Reddit about how asking a simple WordPress question can lead to some wildly complex answers. One minute you want to know how to enqueue a script, the next you’re staring at a solution that involves three different design patterns & a custom API. It's a real problem, especially when you're just trying to get a quick fix & move on with your day.
But here’s the good news: you can tame the beast. It’s not about the AI being “dumb,” it’s about learning how to talk to it. The secret, honestly, is all in how you ask the question. It's a skill called "prompt engineering," & it's the difference between getting a headache & getting a perfect, copy-paste-ready solution.
Let's dive into how to stop the overcomplication & get the simple, correct answers you need for your WordPress woes.
The Golden Rule: Garbage In, Garbage Out (of the AI)
This is the most important thing to remember. The quality of the AI's answer is DIRECTLY tied to the quality of your prompt. An AI doesn't "know" what you mean the way a human developer does. It only knows the words you type. If you're vague, it's going to guess, & its guess might be to build you a digital skyscraper when all you needed was a brick.
A study from SitePoint really hit this home for me. They showed the difference between a prompt for a person & a prompt for an AI.
For a person, you might say: "Can you change the post titles so blog posts have a prefix, but pages don't?"
For an AI, you need to be WAY more specific: "Using WordPress, I need a PHP code snippet for my
1
functions.php
file. The code should use the
1
the_title
filter hook. Inside the function, it needs to check if the post type is 'post' & if we are in the main loop on the blog index. If it is, it should add the prefix 'Blog Post: ' to the post title. It should not affect page titles or titles in the admin area. Please ensure the output is properly escaped."
See the difference? It's night & day. The second prompt leaves almost nothing to chance. That's the level of detail we're aiming for.
Your New Prompting Toolkit: The No-Nonsense Guide
Okay, so "be more specific" is a good start, but what does that actually look like in practice? Here are the techniques I use every single day to get what I need from GPT-5 without the fluff.
1. Assign a Role: Tell it Who to Be
This is my absolute favorite trick & it works like a charm. Before you even ask your question, give the AI a persona. This puts it in the right "mindset" & helps it access the most relevant parts of its training data.
Instead of just launching into your question, start with something like:
"Act as a senior WordPress developer with 15 years of experience in PHP & plugin development."
"You are an expert in WordPress security. Your task is to..."
"You are a helpful assistant who specializes in creating concise, efficient code snippets for WordPress."
This simple trick, suggested by experts at MIT, frames the entire conversation & dramatically improves the quality of the responses.
2. Provide Crystal Clear Context
Remember that overly specific prompt from earlier? That's all about context. The AI doesn't have your website open in another tab. You have to paint the picture for it.
When asking a WordPress question, ALWAYS include:
The Goal: What are you trying to achieve? (e.g., "I want to add a custom logo to the WordPress login page.")
The Environment: "I'm using WordPress 6.4 with the Astra theme."
The Specifics: Mention the exact file (
1
functions.php
,
1
.htaccess
), the WordPress hook or filter (
1
add_action
,
1
add_filter
), or the function (
1
wp_enqueue_script
) you think is involved. The more technical keywords you can provide, the better.
What you've tried: "I tried adding this code, but I got a white screen." (Then paste the code!)
This helps the AI narrow down the possibilities & avoids it suggesting solutions that are completely irrelevant to your setup.
3. Give it Examples (This is HUGE)
This is a technique called "few-shot prompting," & it’s incredibly powerful. Instead of just telling the AI what you want, show it.
Let's say you want to reformat a date. A weak prompt would be "reformat this date." A better prompt gives an example:
Prompt:
"I have a date string that looks like this:
1
2025-08-12
. I need a PHP function for WordPress that converts it to this format:
1
August 12, 2025
.
Here's another example:
Input:
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2024-12-25
Output:
1
December 25, 2024
Now, write the function."
By providing a clear before-&-after, you're giving the AI a template to follow. It's much less likely to get creative & give you some bizarre, over-engineered solution.
4. Define the Dang Format
Ever get a wall of text when you just wanted a code block? Or a list of bullet points when you wanted a paragraph? You have to tell it what you want the output to look like. Be demanding!
Add instructions to your prompt like:
"Provide the answer ONLY as a PHP code snippet. No explanation needed."
"List the possible causes in a numbered list."
"Please explain the steps, then provide the complete, commented code in a single block."
"Give me the answer in a JSON format with the keys 'plugin_name', 'version', and 'author'."
This is especially important for coding tasks. A video I saw on debugging WordPress with AI highlighted the frustration of getting incomplete code. Forcing it to give you the complete file or a single, clean code block can save a ton of back-&-forth.
5. Break Down Big Problems
If you have a complex task, don't throw it all at the AI in one giant, messy prompt. It will get overwhelmed or confused, just like a person would. Break the problem down into smaller, logical steps.
Let's say you want to create a custom plugin.
Step 1: "Act as a WordPress plugin developer. Write the basic boilerplate for a new WordPress plugin. Include the plugin header, a main plugin file, & a function to handle activation."
Step 2 (after you get the first part): "Great. Now, in the main plugin file, add a function that creates a custom post type called 'Projects'. It should have a title, editor, & featured image support."
Step 3: "Okay, now write a function that registers a new shortcode,
1
[my_projects]
, that will display the 5 most recent 'Projects' in a grid."
This iterative process, as recommended by OpenAI themselves, keeps the AI focused on one thing at a time & gives you a chance to correct it at each step. It feels slower, but it's almost always faster in the long run.
Taming the Beast of Verbosity: Getting Concise Answers
Okay, so we've covered how to get better answers. But what about getting shorter answers? Sometimes you just want the code, not the life story of the person who invented the PHP
1
echo
command.
Use Magic Words: Start your prompt with commands like "Summarize:", "Translate:", "List:", "Give me the code for:".
Set a Length: You can literally tell it how long you want the answer to be. "Explain this in two sentences." or "Keep the summary under 100 words."
The "Be Concise" Command: Don't be afraid to just add "Be concise" or "Provide a brief answer" to your prompt.
Chain-of-Thought (with a twist): A popular technique is to ask the AI to "think step-by-step". This forces it to lay out its logic, which can be great for complex problems. But for simple ones, it can add clutter. So, for simple questions, AVOID this. Just ask for the answer directly.
There's even a cool, more advanced technique researchers are using called ANSPRE (Answer-Prefix Generation). It involves giving the AI the beginning of the answer you want. For example: "The WordPress hook to modify post content before it's displayed is called _." This guides the AI to fill in the blank concisely instead of writing an essay. Pretty neat, right?
What About When You're Stuck in a Back-&-Forth Loop?
Sometimes, no matter how good your prompt is, the AI just gets stuck. It gives you code, you tell it the error, it "fixes" it, but the error is still there. This is a common pain point for developers using AI for debugging.
Here's how to break the cycle:
Paste the EXACT Error Message: Don't paraphrase it. Copy the entire PHP error, including the file path & line number, & paste it into the chat.
Provide the Surrounding Code: Give it the function or block of code where the error is happening. Don't make it guess.
Start a New Chat: Sometimes, the AI's "memory" or context in a long conversation gets cluttered. If you're going in circles, just start a fresh chat with your best, most specific prompt. It's the AI equivalent of "turning it off & on again."
Use a Different Model: Not all AIs are created equal. Some people on Hacker News noted that there might be different versions of GPT-5, like a "Pro" version that gives better answers. If you're on a free plan, you might be getting a faster, less-capable model. It can be worth trying a different service like Claude or Gemini to see if you get a better result.
How This Applies to More Than Just Code
These principles aren't just for debugging PHP. They're for everything. Whether you're asking for marketing ideas, content outlines for your blog, or help with customer support, being specific, providing context, & defining the format is key.
This is something we think about a lot at Arsturn. We help businesses build their own custom AI chatbots, trained on their own data. When a visitor comes to your site & asks a question, you want the answer to be instant, accurate, & to the point. You don't want your chatbot overcomplicating a simple question about your return policy. The same principles of providing clear, high-quality data to train the AI apply. A well-trained chatbot, like one built with Arsturn, acts like an expert employee, providing personalized customer experiences & boosting engagement because it has the right context to give simple, helpful answers 24/7. It can turn your website from a static brochure into an interactive, lead-generating tool.
Wrapping it Up
Look, GPT-5 & other AI models are incredible tools that are changing how we build for the web. But they're not magic. They're powerful, pattern-matching machines that need clear instructions. The frustration of getting an overcomplicated answer for a simple WordPress question is totally valid, but it's also fixable.
By learning to "speak AI"—by being specific, giving context, assigning roles, using examples, & defining your desired output—you can turn that overeager, essay-writing intern into a sharp, efficient, senior-level assistant. It takes a little extra effort upfront, but it will save you SO much time & frustration down the road.
Hope this was helpful. Give these tips a try on your next WordPress head-scratcher & let me know what you think. You might be surprised at how much smarter the AI suddenly seems.