How to Use a SharePoint Custom Column to Filter News Web Parts
Question details
The user needs to filter a SharePoint News web part using a custom Site Pages column, but the custom column does not appear in the available filter options.
- Product
- SharePoint
- Device & OS
- not provided
- Scenario
- Setting up a News web part on a SharePoint site and attempting to apply custom page property filters to control which news posts are displayed.
- Observed behavior
- The newly created custom column is missing from the News web part filter dropdown because it has not been mapped to a searchable managed property.
Ensure you have Site Owner or SharePoint Administrator permissions, as managing site columns, accessing the search schema, and mapping crawled properties require elevated access.
Map the Custom Site Column to a Managed Property
Make your custom column available for filtering by mapping its automatically generated crawled property to a pre-existing Refinable managed property in SharePoint Search.
SharePoint custom columns are not automatically available as filters in web parts. They must first be crawled by the search engine and manually mapped to a 'managed property' in the site's search schema.
Navigate to Site Settings > Site columns and create a new column. Add this column to your Site Pages library. Edit at least one news post and add data to this column so SharePoint's search crawler can detect it.
Go to Site information > View all site settings > Search Schema. Click on the 'Crawled Properties' tab and search for the internal name of your custom site column.
Switch to the 'Managed Properties' tab and search for an available refinable property that matches your data type (e.g., RefinableString00 for text). Edit the property, scroll to 'Mappings to crawled properties', click 'Add a Mapping', and select your crawled property.
Go to the Site Pages library settings, select 'Advanced settings', scroll down to 'Reindex Document Library', and click the button to force SharePoint to update the search index immediately.
Once the re-indexing is complete (which may take some time), edit your page, edit the News web part, select the 'Page properties' filter, and choose your newly mapped managed property.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Why is my custom column not showing up in the SharePoint News web part filter?
Custom columns only appear in filter options if they are created as Site Columns (not list columns), contain data in at least one item, have been crawled by SharePoint search, and are mapped to a managed property.
How long does it take for a new SharePoint column to become searchable?
It typically takes between 15 minutes to a few hours for SharePoint's continuous crawl to index a new column. You can expedite this process slightly by manually requesting a re-index of the document library.
Can I use a list-level column instead of a site column for filtering news?
No. To filter news across different pages or web parts effectively, you must create a Site Column rather than a list-level column, as site columns automatically generate the reusable crawled properties needed for search mapping.
What managed property should I map my custom text column to?
For text-based custom columns, you should map the crawled property to an available pre-configured 'RefinableString' managed property (e.g., RefinableString00 to RefinableString99) found in your site's Search Schema.
