Changing Field Type with existing data

• whatsupskip

• February 12, 2016 at 3:09 pm

I thought this would be a very common question, but I can’t find anything in the documentation or the forum.

Can a Field Type be changed after data has been entered?
What happens to the existing data?

I want to change a field type from TextArea to Wysiwyg Editor. Given that later should be a super set of the TextArea type it should work, but past experience has taught me not to assume the answer.

I found you cannot change the Field Name once data has been entered as the records still remain in the data base. The Field Name is not simply changed.

• James

• February 12, 2016 at 4:09 pm

Hi @whatsupskip

When you changed the field type, the data will still be there as long as you don’t update the post/page. ACF will check if the existing data is compatible with the new field type and just ignore it if it isn’t compatible.

In your case, it should be compatible because both TextArea and Wysiwyg editor uses string to store the data.

I hope this makes sense.

• whatsupskip

• February 15, 2016 at 8:26 am

Thanks for your help.