Custom Drupal Views: Filters, Plugins, and REST Export

From our practice: a client wants a price range filter, but Drupal only offers a text field. Or need to display products from a custom table, but Views only works with entities. In such cases we develop custom plugins — and it's faster than it seems. Over 8 years of experience in Drupal allows us to implement such tasks turnkey in 2–3 days. The performance of a custom solution is 3 times higher than similar via Preprocess or template hacks. And if a REST API for external systems is needed — Views provides ready JSON export with CORS configuration in half an hour.

Why Views Requires Customization?

Standard Views covers 80% of tasks — filters, sorts, pagination, export. The remaining 20% are custom logic: filter by related entities with aggregation, output data from external API, non-standard row format. Without code these tasks are either unsolvable or require template hacks that kill performance. A custom plugin works 3 times faster than a similar solution via Preprocess. For example, a typical problem is INP (Interaction to Next Paint) above 200 ms when rendering a complex list. A proper row plugin with node tag caching reduces INP to 50 ms.

How to Create a Custom Filter in Half a Day?

The fastest way is hook_views_query_alter(). Suppose you need to filter products by price from and to. Pass GET parameters price_from and price_to, add conditions to the query. This does not require creating a plugin, but the logic remains in the module. For reusability we write a filter plugin with @ViewsFilter annotation. This approach ensures clean architecture and the ability to test the filter separately. We use PHP 8.3+ with typing and strict types — this reduces bugs at review stage.

What If Standard Views Doesn't Work with a Custom Table?

If your data is stored in a separate table (e.g., product_stats), Views won't see it by default. You need to register the table via hook_views_data(): specify base field, relationships to node_field_data, and data types for each column. After that the table becomes available in UI. Then write filter and sort plugins if the data type is non-standard. In one project we connected a custom table with stock and discounts exactly this way — it took 4 hours including tests.

How We Do It: Tech Stack and Case Study

We use Drupal 10/11, PHP 8.3+, Drush for config export. Example from our practice: an online store needed a custom block "Discounted products" with a filter by discount percentage and sorting by stock quantity. Standard Views cannot work with custom table product_stats. We registered the table via hook_views_data(), wrote a filter plugin for discount percentage and a sort plugin for stock. Result: block renders in 40 ms, cached by node tags.

Configuration of such View in YAML:

# views.view.discount_products.yml
id: discount_products
label: 'Discounted products'
module: views
description: ''
base_table: product_stats
base_field: id
display:
  default:
    display_options:
      fields:
        title:
          id: title
          table: node_field_data
          field: title
          relationship: nid
        price:
          id: price
          table: node__field_price
          field: field_price_value
        discount_percent:
          id: discount_percent
          table: product_stats
          field: discount_percent
        stock:
          id: stock
          table: product_stats
          field: stock_quantity
      filters:
        status:
          value: '1'
        discount_percent:
          id: discount_percent
          table: product_stats
          field: discount_percent
          operator: '>=,'
          value: { min: '', max: '' }
          expose:
            operator: 'discount_percent_op'
            identifier: discount
      sorts:
        stock_quantity:
          order: ASC
      pager:
        type: some
        options: { items_per_page: 10 }
      relationships:
        nid:
          id: nid
          table: product_stats
          field: node_id
          relationship: node_field_data
          required: true
      style:
        type: html_list
        row:
          type: fields
  block_1:
    display_plugin: block

Hook for custom filter:

<?php

use Drupal\views\ViewExecutable;
use Drupal\views\Plugin\views\query\QueryPluginBase;

function my_module_views_query_alter(ViewExecutable $view, QueryPluginBase $query): void {
    if ($view->id() !== 'discount_products') {
        return;
    }

    $discount = \Drupal::request()->query->get('discount');

    if (!empty($discount['min'])) {
        $query->addWhereExpression(0, 'product_stats.discount_percent >= :min', [':min' => (float) $discount['min']]);
    }

    if (!empty($discount['max'])) {
        $query->addWhereExpression(0, 'product_stats.discount_percent <= :max', [':max' => (float) $discount['max']]);
    }
}

Row plugin for product card:

<?php

namespace Drupal\my_module\Plugin\views\row;

use Drupal\views\Plugin\views\row\RowPluginBase;
use Drupal\views\ResultRow;

/**
 * @ViewsRow(
 *   id = "product_card",
 *   title = @Translation("Product card"),
 *   help = @Translation("Renders products as cards"),
 *   display_types = {"normal"},
 * )
 */
class ProductCardRow extends RowPluginBase {

  public function render(ResultRow $row): array {
    $node = $row->_entity;
    $view_builder = \Drupal::entityTypeManager()->getViewBuilder('node');

    return [
      '#theme' => 'product_card',
      '#node' => $node,
      '#title' => $node->getTitle(),
      '#price' => $node->get('field_price')->value,
      '#discount' => $row->discount_percent,
      '#stock' => $row->stock_quantity,
      '#url' => $node->toUrl()->toString(),
      '#cache' => [
        'tags' => $node->getCacheTags(),
        'contexts' => ['user.roles'],
      ],
    ];
  }

}

Programmatic use of View:

<?php
use Drupal\views\Views;

$view = Views::getView('discount_products');
$view->setDisplay('block_1');
$view->setExposedInput(['discount' => ['min' => 20, 'max' => 50]]);
$view->execute();
$results = $view->result;

foreach ($results as $row) {
    $node = $row->_entity;
    // render
}

Registration of custom table for Views:

<?php
function my_module_views_data(): array {
  $data = [];
  $data['product_stats']['table']['group'] = t('Product Stats');
  $data['product_stats']['table']['base'] = [
    'field' => 'id',
    'title' => t('Product statistics'),
    'help' => t('Custom table with discount and stock'),
  ];
  $data['product_stats']['node_id'] = [
    'title' => t('Node ID'),
    'relationship' => [
      'base' => 'node_field_data',
      'base field' => 'nid',
      'id' => 'standard',
      'label' => t('Node'),
    ],
    'filter' => ['id' => 'numeric'],
    'sort' => ['id' => 'standard'],
    'field' => ['id' => 'numeric'],
  ];
  $data['product_stats']['discount_percent'] = [
    'title' => t('Discount percent'),
    'filter' => ['id' => 'numeric'],
    'sort' => ['id' => 'standard'],
    'field' => ['id' => 'numeric'],
  ];
  $data['product_stats']['stock_quantity'] = [
    'title' => t('Stock quantity'),
    'filter' => ['id' => 'numeric'],
    'sort' => ['id' => 'standard'],
    'field' => ['id' => 'numeric'],
  ];
  return $data;
}

Approach Comparison: hook vs plugin

Work Process: From Analysis to Deployment

What's Included in Custom Views Development

• Custom plugins for filters, sorts, fields, and rows
• REST Export display with CORS configuration
• Integration with custom database tables
• Documentation on usage and further customization
• Compatibility guarantee with latest Drupal versions

Timeline and Cost

Timeline depends on complexity: a simple custom filter — from half a day, a complex project with custom table and REST — 2–3 days. Cost is calculated individually. On average such customizations save up to 60% of budget compared to template hacks. Contact us — we will assess your project. Get a consultation on architecture and optimization.

For more on Views API see the official Drupal documentation. Order development — get a ready solution with compatibility and performance guarantee.