I can't get pagination to work in WP query - wordpress

Question

This is what my current wordpress post query looks like:
<?php
$new_loop = new WP_Query( array(
'post_type' => 'news',
'posts_per_page' => 5
) );
?>
I want to add the following pagination to it:
<?php the_posts_pagination( array(
'mid_size' => 2,
'prev_text' => __( 'Prev'),
'next_text' => __( 'Next'),
) ); ?>
I googled for various solutions. Everywhere it said to add "paged" to the array, like so:
<?php
$paged = get_query_var( 'paged' ) ? get_query_var( 'paged' ) : 1;**
$new_loop = new WP_Query( array(
'post_type' => 'news',
'paged' => $paged,**
'posts_per_page' => 5 // put number of posts that you'd like to display
) );
?>
However, this does not work. How can I get the pagination to work in a custom wordpress post query?

Answer 1

I think you're missing the argument: 'current' => max( 1, get_query_var( 'paged' ) )
After you run your loop, you can add this function in your theme(functions.php or elsewhere):
if ( ! function_exists( 'custom_pagination' ) ) {
function custom_pagination( $args = array(), $class = 'pagination' ) {
if ( $GLOBALS['wp_query']->max_num_pages <= 1 ) {
return;
}
$args = wp_parse_args(
$args,
array(
'mid_size' => 3,
'prev_next' => true,
'prev_text' => __( 'Previous', 'theme' ),
'next_text' => __( 'Next', 'theme' ),
'screen_reader_text' => __( 'Posts navigation', 'theme' ),
'type' => 'array',
'current' => max( 1, get_query_var( 'paged' ) ),
//'total' => $the_query->max_num_pages,
)
);
$links = paginate_links( $args );
?>
<nav aria-label="<?php echo $args['screen_reader_text']; ?>">
<ul class="pagination">
<?php
foreach ( $links as $key => $link ) {
?>
<li class="page-item <?php echo strpos( $link, 'current' ) ? 'active' : ''; ?>">
<?php echo str_replace( 'page-numbers', 'page-link', $link ); ?>
</li>
<?php
}
?>
</ul>
</nav>
<?php
}
}
Then finally call it in whatever template you need to:
custom_pagination();