How to get 3 random blog posts

[johnnyr209]

How would I generate 3 random Blog posts? Here is what I have so far

{% set posts = ????? %}
{% for post in posts %}
<div >
<a href="{{ post.absolute_url }}">
<img data-src="{{ resize_image_url(post.featured_image, 350 ) }}" alt="{{ post.name }}" title="{{ post.name }}" >
</a>

<h3>
<a href="{{ post.absolute_url }}" class="">{{ post.name }}</a>
</h3>
</div>
{% endfor %}

[albertsg · Accepted solution]

Hi @johnnyr209, you could use the following functions to get blog posts:

- https://developers.hubspot.com/docs/cms/hubl/functions#blog-recent-posts 

- https://developers.hubspot.com/docs/cms/hubl/functions#blog-popular-posts 

And then to make it random, you could use the random filter (https://developers.hubspot.com/docs/cms/hubl/filters#random).

Your code could look like this:

{% set posts = blog_recent_posts("default", 30) %}
{% for post in posts|random %}
{% if loop.index <= 3 %}
<div >
<a href="{{ post.absolute_url }}">
<img data-src="{{ resize_image_url(post.featured_image, 350 ) }}" alt="{{ post.name }}" title="{{ post.name }}" >
</a>

<h3>
<a href="{{ post.absolute_url }}" class="">{{ post.name }}</a>
</h3>
</div>
{% endif %}
{% endfor %}

Notice that loop.index will prevent the loop from displaying more than 3 articles.

In the previous example, blog_recent_posts will return 30 elements but it has a limit of 200, so play with that number as you wish (just keep in mind performance, maybe it's no needed to get 200 articles and loop through them all to just show 3)

[johnnyr209 · Accepted solution]

So suffle seams to work instead of random

{% for post in posts|shuffle%}

[albertsg]

Nice catch! I didn't realize |random returns only 1 item 😅 

[johnnyr209]

The code seams to be pulling a random post but it only displays 1 and not 3.

[albertsg · Accepted solution]

Hi @johnnyr209, you could use the following functions to get blog posts:

- https://developers.hubspot.com/docs/cms/hubl/functions#blog-recent-posts 

- https://developers.hubspot.com/docs/cms/hubl/functions#blog-popular-posts 

And then to make it random, you could use the random filter (https://developers.hubspot.com/docs/cms/hubl/filters#random).

Your code could look like this:

{% set posts = blog_recent_posts("default", 30) %}
{% for post in posts|random %}
{% if loop.index <= 3 %}
<div >
<a href="{{ post.absolute_url }}">
<img data-src="{{ resize_image_url(post.featured_image, 350 ) }}" alt="{{ post.name }}" title="{{ post.name }}" >
</a>

<h3>
<a href="{{ post.absolute_url }}" class="">{{ post.name }}</a>
</h3>
</div>
{% endif %}
{% endfor %}

Notice that loop.index will prevent the loop from displaying more than 3 articles.

In the previous example, blog_recent_posts will return 30 elements but it has a limit of 200, so play with that number as you wish (just keep in mind performance, maybe it's no needed to get 200 articles and loop through them all to just show 3)