How I disable WooCommerce reviews (6 methods, 2026)

Here’s the quickest way to disable WooCommerce product reviews: go to WooCommerce → Settings → Products, uncheck Enable product reviews, save, and clear your cache. Done. Works in under a minute.

But that’s not the only way, and depending on your situation, it might not be the right one.

I’ve worked with store owners on review systems, and “disable reviews in WooCommerce” is rarely a one-size-fits-all ask.

Some want reviews everywhere. Some want them off for just a few products. Some want the Reviews tab removed, but reviews are still quietly collecting in the background. Some want the whole feature nuked so it stops loading scripts.

This guide covers every real method: the one-click settings toggle, per-product controls, bulk disabling, a free plugin, two code snippets, and a CSS-only approach for anyone who doesn’t want to touch functions.php.

I’ll also cover what happens to your star ratings, your SEO, and the ugly edge cases nobody warns you about.

When disabling reviews actually makes sense

I’ll be honest: for most ecommerce stores, disabling reviews is the wrong call. Reviews drive conversions. They add long-tail keyword content to product pages. They build trust for first-time buyers. Turning them off usually costs you sales.

But there are real cases where it’s the right move. Here’s when I’d recommend it:

You’re running a B2B or wholesale store: Your buyers are purchasing based on specs, certifications, and MOQ. A 3-star comment from someone who misunderstood the product isn’t helping anyone.

You sell services, memberships, or subscriptions: Product reviews on a consulting package or a monthly subscription feel weird and rarely get left anyway.

Spam is eating your moderation time: If you’re spending an hour a week trashing bot comments, disabling reviews temporarily is fair. A better fix is to limit reviews to verified buyers, but I get why some owners just want the feature turned off.

You’re getting review-bombed by a competitor or brigading group: Turn it off while you sort it out. Disabling reviews is faster than playing whack-a-mole with one-star attacks.

Your store is brand-new with zero reviews across the board: Empty review sections look worse than no review section at all. Disable until you’ve collected at least a few, then turn it back on.

If none of those apply, I’d push back on the decision. Reviews are one of the highest-ROI features WooCommerce ships with. But if you’re set on turning them off, let’s get into how.

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Pick the right method for your situation

Before you jump into steps, match your situation to the method. Using the wrong one wastes time and sometimes breaks things.

Pick one. Don’t stack methods unless you actually need to (that’s where things break).

Method 1: Disable reviews from WooCommerce settings (entire store)

This is the built-in method WooCommerce gives you. It’s the one I recommend for 90% of cases because it’s clean, reversible, and doesn’t require code.

Step 1: Open WooCommerce products settings

In your WordPress dashboard, go to WooCommerce → Settings → Products. You’ll land on the General tab of the Products settings.

Step 2: Uncheck “Enable product reviews”

Scroll to the Reviews section. You’ll see a checkbox labeled Enable product reviews. Uncheck it.

Click Save changes at the bottom of the page.

What this actually does:

• Removes the Reviews tab from every product page on your store
• Hides the review form across the whole store
• Removes the WooCommerce Recent Reviews widget from your dashboard
• Leaves all existing review data untouched in the database (so you can re-enable later without losing anything)

Step 3: Clear cache and verify

Open your site in an incognito window and load any product page. The Reviews tab should be gone. The star ratings under product titles on your shop page should be gone too.

If you still see them: clear your caching plugin (WP Rocket, W3 Total Cache, LiteSpeed, etc.), your CDN cache (Cloudflare, Bunny, etc.), and your browser cache.

Caching is the #1 reason the change looks like it didn’t work.

Method 2: Disable reviews on individual products

Use this when reviews are great for most of your catalog, but one specific product is causing trouble. Think: the one product that keeps getting spammed, or a pre-order item with no reviews yet.

Step 1: Open the product in edit mode

Go to Products → All Products, find the product, and click its title to open the editor. If you just want the quick fix, hover over the product and click Quick Edit instead. That saves you a page load.

Step 2: Find the Advanced tab in Product Data

Scroll to the Product data meta box (it’s usually below the main description). Click the Advanced tab on the left side of that box.

Step 3: Uncheck “Enable reviews”

You’ll see a checkbox labeled Enable reviews. Uncheck it, then click Update in the top-right to save the product.

One thing to watch for: if this product already has reviews, the star rating will still show up in the catalog grid even after you disable new reviews. The Reviews tab disappears. The stars next to the product title don’t. To kill the stars, you’ll need to delete the existing reviews for that product (Products → Reviews → find them → Trash).

Method 3: Disable reviews on multiple products at once (Bulk Edit)

Got 50 products you want to disable reviews on, but not the whole store? Don’t edit them one at a time. Use Bulk Edit. This is the method I see most owners miss. It takes two minutes.

Step 1: Select the products

Go to Products → All Products. Use the checkboxes to select the products on which you want to disable reviews. You can filter by category or type first to narrow the list.

Step 2: Apply Bulk Edit

From the Bulk actions dropdown above the list, choose Edit and click Apply. A panel opens with bulk edit options.

Step 3: Change Comments to “Do not allow”

In the bulk edit panel, find the Comments dropdown. Change it from “No change” to Do not allow. Click Update.

Every product you selected now has reviews disabled. No code, no plugin, no editing products one by one.

Method 4: Use the “Disable WooCommerce Reviews” plugin

If you want reviews fully gone, including the scripts that load on every product page, a dedicated plugin is the cleanest no-code approach. The Disable WooCommerce Reviews plugin on WordPress.org is under 3KB and does one job well.

What it removes:

• The Reviews tab from every product page
• The Enable reviews option under the Advanced product data tab
• The reviews meta box from product post types
• The WooCommerce Recent Reviews dashboard widget and frontend widget.

Install and activate it from your WordPress dashboard: Plugins → Add New → search “Disable WooCommerce Reviews”. That’s the full setup. No settings page, no configuration.

To reverse it, just deactivate the plugin.

I’d pick this over Method 1 when you want to stop WooCommerce from loading review-related scripts entirely (a small page-speed win), or when a client asks you to disable reviews and you don’t want them accidentally flipping the setting back on in WooCommerce settings.

Method 5: Disable reviews with code (functions.php)

This is the developer route. It’s overkill for most people, but it’s bulletproof and doesn’t depend on settings that can be overwritten by a theme or another plugin.

The safer way: Code Snippets plugin

Before you touch functions.php directly, let me save you some pain: install the free Code Snippets plugin instead. Editing functions.php live is how sites go down. A syntax error takes your whole store offline. Code Snippets sandboxes your code so errors don’t crash the site.

Install Code Snippets, go to Snippets → Add New, name it “Disable WooCommerce Reviews,” paste the code below (no opening <?php tag), set the scope to “Run snippet everywhere,” and click Save Changes and Activate.

Option A: Remove review support from the product post type

This is the cleanest snippet. It removes comment support from products entirely, which kills reviews at the root:

function wiser_disable_woo_reviews() {
remove_post_type_support( ‘product’, ‘comments’ );
}
add_action( ‘init’, ‘wiser_disable_woo_reviews’ );

Option B: Remove only the Reviews tab from product pages

If you want to keep reviews functional for internal tracking but just hide the tab customers see, use this instead:

add_filter( ‘woocommerce_product_tabs’, ‘wiser_hide_reviews_tab’, 98 );
function wiser_hide_reviews_tab( $tabs ) {
unset( $tabs[‘reviews’] );
return $tabs;
}

This is the snippet I use when a store owner wants to collect reviews quietly (for email follow-ups or internal product scoring) without displaying them.

Option C: Remove the star rating block from product pages

If you want to keep the Reviews tab but hide the stars under the product title:

function wiser_remove_product_rating() {
remove_action( ‘woocommerce_single_product_summary’, ‘woocommerce_template_single_rating’, 10 );
}
add_action( ‘init’, ‘wiser_remove_product_rating’ );

Mix and match. The tab filter plus the rating removal gives you a fully clean product page while keeping the review data alive in your database.

Method 6: Hide the Reviews tab with CSS only

This is the lightest touch, and it’s useful when you want to hide reviews on a staging site, test a design change, or work with a client who doesn’t want code changes.

Go to Appearance → Customize → Additional CSS and paste:

.woocommerce-tabs .reviews_tab,
#tab-reviews {
display: none !important;
}

.woocommerce .product .star-rating {
display: none !important;
}

Save and publish the Customizer changes. The Reviews tab and star ratings are now hidden visually.

One warning: CSS hiding is cosmetic. Customers can’t submit reviews through the hidden form, but if someone guesses the URL pattern or you have a widget elsewhere, review functionality is still technically active under the hood. For a real disable, pair CSS with Method 1 or use Method 4 instead.

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What happens to your SEO and rich snippets after disabling reviews

This is the part most guides skip, and it’s usually the question I get asked right after the methods. Let’s get into it.

Direct SEO penalty

none. Google doesn’t penalize stores for not having reviews. You’re not going to lose rankings because you turned off a feature.

Indirect SEO impact

noticeable, but gradual. Reviews add fresh user-generated content to product pages. They pull in long-tail keywords from how customers actually describe your product.

When you remove them, those signals go away. Over 6-12 months, product pages with no reviews tend to rank for fewer terms than pages with 10+ reviews (depending on niche).

Rich snippets will disappear

If your product pages currently show star ratings in Google search results (those yellow stars), those come from aggregate rating schema pulled from your reviews.

Disable reviews, and the schema goes away. Within a few weeks, Google will stop showing the stars.

Your search click-through rate can drop as a result, because listings with stars usually out-click listings without stars.

What to do about it

If you’re disabling reviews due to spam or negative reviews, the better fix is usually to restrict reviews to verified buyers or switch to a review tool that handles moderation and verification for you.

You keep the SEO and CTR benefits without the spam headache.

Reviews still showing after you disabled them? Here’s how to fix it

You clicked save, cleared the cache, and the reviews are still there. Here’s what’s usually going on.

Problem 1: Existing reviews still appear on product pages

Disabling reviews in WooCommerce stops new ones from being submitted. It doesn’t delete the reviews that are already there.

If you want the existing reviews gone too, go to Products → Reviews, select all, and bulk delete them.

Careful, though: deleted reviews are gone. If you might re-enable reviews later, trash them (recoverable) instead of permanently deleting.

Problem 2: Star ratings still show on the shop page

Even with reviews disabled, WooCommerce will continue to show aggregated star ratings on the shop/catalog grid for products that already have review data in the database.

Delete those reviews (as in Problem 1) to remove the stars, or use the CSS snippet from Method 6 to hide them visually.

Problem 3: The Reviews tab is back after switching themes

If you switched themes and reviews reappeared, your new theme might not declare WooCommerce support correctly or might handle product tabs differently.

Add this to your child theme’s functions.php:

add_action( ‘after_setup_theme’, ‘wiser_add_woocommerce_support’ );
function wiser_add_woocommerce_support() {
add_theme_support( ‘woocommerce’ );
}

Then go back to WooCommerce → Settings → Products and confirm “Enable product reviews” is still unchecked.

Problem 4: You disabled reviews globally but one product still shows them

Edit that product, scroll to Product data → Advanced, and confirm the per-product “Enable reviews” checkbox is unchecked.

Per-product settings can override the global setting in some WooCommerce setups.

Problem 5: The Reviews tab is gone, but the URL /#reviews still loads a form

Some themes hard-code the review form outside the tab system.

If that’s happening on your site, use Method 5, Option A (remove_post_type_support) to disable the feature at the root level instead of relying on tab filters.

How to re-enable reviews if you change your mind

All of these methods are reversible. Here’s the reverse for each:

If you used Method 1 (settings): go back to WooCommerce → Settings → Products, check Enable product reviews, then save. Your old reviews come back automatically because they were never deleted.

If you used Method 2 or 3 (per-product or Bulk Edit): Go to the product (or bulk-select them), open Product data → Advanced, re-check Enable reviews, update.

If you used Method 4 (plugin): Deactivate the Disable WooCommerce Reviews plugin.

If you used Method 5 (code): Delete the snippet from Code Snippets, or remove the code from functions.php.

If you used Method 6 (CSS): Delete the CSS from Additional CSS in the Customizer.

Once reviews are back on, do a hard refresh on a product page to confirm. Existing reviews should reappear instantly.

The better fix for most stores: smarter review management

Most store owners who want to disable reviews don’t actually want the feature gone. They want less spam, better moderation, and reviews that don’t wreck their page design.

That’s what a dedicated review tool fixes. WiserReview adds verification (only real customers can review), AI spam detection, clean WooCommerce widgets that actually match your theme, photo and video reviews, and automated email follow-ups so you’re not manually chasing customers for feedback.

If your reason for disabling reviews is “they look bad,” “I get too much spam,” or “managing them is exhausting,” a proper review tool solves the root problem without sacrificing SEO and conversion benefits.

The free plan handles up to 100 review requests per month, so you can test it before committing.

If your reason is “my store genuinely doesn’t need reviews” (B2B, services, memberships), keep them disabled and don’t overthink it.

Wrap up

Disabling WooCommerce product reviews takes a minute if you pick the right method.

• For most stores, it’s the built-in toggle in Settings → Products.
• For specific products, it’s the per-product checkbox.
• For 10+ products at once, it’s Bulk Edit (the one nobody talks about).

Before you disable: ask yourself whether you actually want reviews gone or better reviews. If it’s the second one, a review tool solves more problems than a disable ever will.

If it’s genuinely the first one, pick your method from the table above, and you’re done.

Whichever way you go, keep the approach reversible. Your future self might disagree with today’s you.

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