Wordpress rewrite rules page slug to a custom template

Question

I want to create in my Wordpress website a dynamic page to show popular posts, and other stuff

I need to handle /popular request in a custom template file without creating a Wordpress page, and name the template file page-popular.php

I tried

add_action( 'init', 'rewrite_init' );
function rewrite_init()
{
    add_rewrite_rule( 'popular/?', 'index.php?popular=true', 'top' );
}

Then I tried to check if the query string popular is set, I failed

Answer 1

If I've understood your question correctly: you don't want to create a new Page (via Pages in wp-admin), but you do want to use a custom page template file - is that correct?

In that case, this topic probably answers your question:

https://wordpress.stackexchange.com/a/9959/17826