`acf/load_field_groups` is applied on every `acf_get_field_groups()` call, outside the field group cache

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Assessment

Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Newbie friendliness
64/100
Issue type
Bug
Clarity
Mostly clear
Activity status
Active
Tech stack
php, wordpress
Domain
backend, performance

Research direction

Start in includes/class-acf-internal-post-type.php by comparing get_posts() with get_post(), then trace acf_get_field_groups() and flush_post_cache(). Reproduce with the supplied counting mu-plugin and verify that the filtered field-group array is reused within a request, cache invalidation still occurs on updates, and the existing filter behavior remains correct.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Description

Describe the bug

ACF_Internal_Post_Type::get_posts() applies acf/load_{$hook_name_plural} outside its cache, so every acf_get_field_groups() call re-runs every callback on that filter over every registered field group. The singular path does the opposite: get_post() checks the store first, applies acf/load_{$hook_name} once, and stores the filtered result.

includes/class-acf-internal-post-type.php in 6.8.10, line 381:

public function get_posts( $filter = array() ) {
    $posts = array();

    // Each of these is already cached, and already filtered, by get_post().
    $raw_posts = $this->get_raw_posts();
    if ( $raw_posts ) {
        foreach ( $raw_posts as $raw_post ) {
            $posts[] = $this->get_post( $raw_post['ID'] );
        }
    }

    $posts = apply_filters( "acf/load_{$this->hook_name_plural}", $posts, $this->post_type ); // runs on every call

against line 96, which caches the filtered result:

    // Check store.
    $store = acf_get_store( $this->store );
    if ( $store->has( $id ) ) {
        return $store->get( $id );   // filtered result, returned without re-filtering
    }
    ...
    $post = apply_filters( "acf/load_{$this->hook_name}", $post );
    $store->set( $post['key'], $post );

So the per-group work is cached and the whole-set work is not, even though the whole-set filter is the more expensive place to be.

To Reproduce

  1. Install ACF on a site with some field groups. No other plugins are needed, and no particular field group content: the number of groups scales the cost, it does not cause it.
  2. Add the snippet under Code below as a mu-plugin.
  3. Open any post in the block editor, /wp-admin/post.php?post=<id>&action=edit.
  4. Read the log: acf/load_field_groups applied 13 times.

With ACF PRO 6.8.10 as the only active plugin, and 75 field groups, I get 13 applications on that screen. The callers are mostly ACF_Rest_Api::get_field_groups_by_object_type() and get_field_groups_by_id() during the block editor's REST preload, plus ACF_Form_Post::add_meta_boxes(). The exact count varies by screen and by what else is registered, but it is consistently well above one.

Expected behavior

acf/load_field_groups is applied once per request per internal post type, and repeat calls to acf_get_field_groups() reuse the filtered array, in the way get_post() already reuses the filtered single field group.

Screenshots or Video

Not applicable: this is a performance defect rather than a visual one. Profiler figures are under Additional context.

Code

No field group export is needed to reproduce this, but I am happy to attach one if it helps. This is the counting snippet from step 2:

<?php
add_filter( 'acf/load_field_groups', function ( $field_groups ) {
    $GLOBALS['n'] = ( $GLOBALS['n'] ?? 0 ) + 1;
    return $field_groups;
}, 1 );

add_action( 'shutdown', function () {
    error_log( sprintf( '%s: acf/load_field_groups applied %d times', $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'], $GLOBALS['n'] ?? 0 ) );
} );

Version Information:

  • WordPress Version 7.1
  • PHP Version 8.1
  • ACF Version: ACF PRO 6.8.10
  • Browser: not browser-dependent, reproduced with curl and WP-CLI

Additional context

The filter's documented contract invites consumers to do real work in it, and they do. ACFML, WPML's ACF integration, translates every field group's strings on acf/load_field_groups. Because the filter re-runs, that translation runs once per application rather than once per request, and on a list screen the applications scale with the number of rows:

Rows per page acf/load_field_groups applications
5 10
10 20
20 (WordPress default) 40
50 100

Two per row, so the cost of a screen is bounded only by the editor's own Screen Options setting. Profiled with Xdebug on a posts list screen:

  • WPML\FP\Obj::__callStatic: 290,628 calls in a single request, plus 1.14 million count() calls, nearly all of it reached through this filter.
  • acf_get_field_groups() inclusive cost: 2,711ms profiled, from 10 calls.

Memoising the filter result for the duration of the request, in a site mu-plugin wrapping ACFML's callback, took that to 681ms profiled, and on the wall clock:

Screen Before After Change
edit.php 0.723s 0.497s −31%
post.php 0.848s 0.607s −28%
nav-menus.php 1.725s 0.846s −51%

Interleaved across three rounds, nine requests per state, against a noise floor of ~0.01s. Rendered output is byte-identical before and after across ten admin and front-end pages in two languages, which is the evidence that the repeated applications were redundant: same input, same output, thrown away and recomputed.

That is a site-level workaround for something only ACF can fix properly, and it only helps sites that have someone maintaining a mu-plugin.

A possible fix: cache the filtered array the way get_post() caches the filtered post, in a request-scoped acf_get_store() keyed by post type, cleared in flush_post_cache(), which already deletes the plural cache key and is already called from update, delete, trash and untrash.

Request-scoped rather than the persistent object cache, because a callback's output can legitimately vary within a request: ACFML's varies by the current language. For that case the key needs to be extensible, something like an acf/load_field_groups/cache_key filter defaulting to the post type, so a multilingual integration can add the language rather than having to opt out of caching altogether. $filter is applied after the hook, in filter_posts(), so it does not belong in the key.

Related: #1028, ACF_Local_JSON::scan_files() re-reading acf-json/ four times per request, is the same class of defect in the same subsystem but a different code path. The two do not compound: with the memoisation above in place, the scan count is unchanged at four.

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