How to Test a Blog Post for Update vs. Publish Status — Unique

You can make use of dynamic hook

do_action( "{$old_status}_to_{$new_status}", $post );

in wp_transition_post_status() to target exact combination. So in your case it would be something like draft_to_publish.

I am not sure why exactly your attempt is failing though, without thoroughly debugging it.

Related Posts:

  1. Do action on publish or update?
  2. add action only on post publish – not update
  3. How to prevent posts from being published too close to each other?
  4. Is it possible to Schedule Attachments in WordPress?
  5. Elegant way to include only published posts with get_objects_in_term()?
  6. WordPress plugin to publish to multiple remote WordPress blogs
  7. Post publish only hook?
  8. Publish pending article from front end with a button?
  9. How to add a “publish” link to the quick actions
  10. How to limit user to publish post per day and per role?
  11. How to batch update post content with custom post meta value
  12. When a user creates a post (pending), send a confirmation link that allows them to publish
  13. In what sequence are the hooks fired when a post is “published”?
  14. Restrict the Number of Posts an Author can Publish (over time)?
  15. Add javascript when post is published
  16. featuring old articles without messing up with the archive
  17. Publish posts only after the condition is met
  18. Hiding by default specific post status on backend list?
  19. Detect Post Type when publish_post is ran
  20. How can I display a specific user’s first published post?
  21. Does WordPress remove draft status automatically?
  22. What Can I Use To Add A Custom Button Between Publish button and Move To Trash?
  23. Prevent post from being published if no category selected
  24. Send email to user that his post has been rejected
  25. Limit number of posts a user can make per minute?
  26. How do I allow users to follow a post and then allow admins to email all users who have followed that post?
  27. Syndicated Posts when Updated Lose HTML tags
  28. Every possible way to get data (posts) from WordPress
  29. publish_post conflicts with save_post
  30. Notification to Admin or Author upon new post [duplicate]
  31. Post update RSS notification plugin
  32. What differences are there between a Privately Published post and a Draft post?
  33. How to run a function when post is edited or updated using publish post action?
  34. How can I create custom button in post.php
  35. How to rename “Publish” metabox title in post screen
  36. WordPress version 3.8 – Preview button not working for editor
  37. Create post for every user?
  38. Image Insert into posts and pages not working after 3.2.1 update
  39. count the total number of comments the user has received for his published posts
  40. Automatically Updating Publish Date Bug
  41. How can I schedule a PAGE to go live at a future date/time?
  42. How to give capability (publish contributors posts) to author role?
  43. Print a message if excerpt is empty after posts have been publish/update!
  44. check if wordpress is updating or publishing a post
  45. Check if checkbox is marked on publish/update post
  46. Decide user that can publish a post
  47. How to switch wordpress post status between publish and schedule in MySQL?
  48. Prevent scheduled post being published if date/time is past current date/time
  49. Calling Different Custom Post Timestamps in a table
  50. Can’t update old posts 3.5.2
  51. Copy post to separate database with “add_action(….)”
  52. transition_post_status hook doesn’t have any POST data when publish with Gutenberg [closed]
  53. How do I manage my users post before publish?
  54. do more action after I publish a post
  55. Assign published posts to another user automatically
  56. Display password protected posts to logged in users
  57. Stop wordpress from creating empty/null entries
  58. WordPress bulk category select when publishing post
  59. Posts Missing in Dashboard after update
  60. How can I tell if a post has been published at least once?
  61. Send email for pending post
  62. Post: how to set created date after post has been published [closed]
  63. Add delay to publish post
  64. Publish a Silent Post without updating Feed
  65. How can my plugin display a populated new post window
  66. MySQL: Possible to replace all of wp_posts.post_content(id#) via UPDATE + REPLACE + SELECT?
  67. How to set a Post’s default visibility to ‘Private’ in Gutenberg?
  68. WordPress doesn’t save or publish new posts
  69. Hook when post is set from published to draft?
  70. Send email to user when I publish a new post
  71. My posts are getting to Auto draft when I try to Publish
  72. How to publish a post if condition is met?
  73. WordPress get tags in “publish_post” hook
  74. How publish post from pending status
  75. post is not showing more than 3949 words
  76. Bulk Post update_post_meta
  77. Create blog post from external source and set publication date
  78. update post category in a new table on frequent change of category
  79. I want to send push notification just after publish a new post
  80. How to handle a post before publishing?
  81. Return All Post from publish to draft [duplicate]
  82. I am creating a front end dashboard where I need to show all the posts by the current user. So, I need to show posts in publish
  83. Action while post is being published
  84. How can add custom commands in post-new.php in wordpress
  85. WordPress Post Updating is Not Working
  86. Post/Page Preview Template
  87. Convert custom fields to post categories
  88. Most viewed post for the last 2 days using WP_Query
  89. How to display featured image without it appearing in post?
  90. List authors with the last post title and order by last post date
  91. Problem with quotes
  92. Anyone know a php snippet for showing the first 200 characters of the most recent post?
  93. Disaply products from category
  94. Multisite Issue on Subdomain’s article pages
  95. Is there a global page/post/product/anything ID?
  96. Thumbnail With Next/Prev Links Not Showing Next Post?
  97. Insert new post for each user infinite loop error
  98. Last three posts not being put in order by date. How to fix this?
  99. WordPress sub-posts and permalinks
  100. When and how will php code in a user made WordPress page be executed?