How do I implement selective refresh with a customizer setting?

I have a section in a page template in the theme I’m making that displays content based on a page the user selects in the customizer using the dropdown-pages control. Right now it’s just using the standard default refresh transport, but since that’s kind of clunky reloading the whole iframe, I was wondering if it was possible to use the new selective refresh feature. But I’m not sure how to implement it. Anyone know if this is possible and if so how to do it?

Here is the code in my page template that displays the content:

<?php if ((get_theme_mod( 'intro_page' )) != '') {

$intro_id = get_theme_mod( 'intro_page' );

$intro_header = get_the_title( $intro_id );

$intro_excerpt = get_the_excerpt( $intro_id );

$intro_link = get_the_permalink( $intro_id );

$intro_linktext = get_post_meta( $intro_id, 'emm_cta_text', true );

echo '<h1>' . esc_html($intro_header) . '</h1>' . '<p>' . esc_html($intro_excerpt) . '</p>';

if( ! get_post_meta( $intro_id, 'emm_cta_text', true ) ) {
echo '<p><a class="cta" href="' . esc_url($intro_link) . '">Learn More</a></p>';
}else{
echo '<p><a class="cta" href="' . esc_url($intro_link) . '">' . esc_html($intro_linktext) . '</a></p>';
}
} ?>

Here is the code for the setting in customizer:

$wp_customize->add_setting( 'intro_page' , array(
'sanitize_callback' => 'absint',
) );

$wp_customize->add_control( 'intro_page', array(
'label'    => __( 'Page to use for intro section', 'veritas' ), 
'section'  => 'intro',
'settings' => 'intro_page',
'type'     => 'dropdown-pages',
'priority' => 1
) );

Create a function to output the selectively refreshed template code

(I wrapped the HTML within <div class="cta-wrap"> to make it easier to target this particular block of markup.)

function wpse247234_cta_block() {
    if ( ( get_theme_mod( 'intro_page' ) ) != '' ) {
        $intro_id       = get_theme_mod( 'intro_page' );
        $intro_header   = get_the_title( $intro_id );
        $intro_excerpt  = get_the_excerpt( $intro_id );
        $intro_link     = get_the_permalink( $intro_id );
        $intro_linktext = get_post_meta( $intro_id, 'emm_cta_text', true );

        echo '<div class="cta-wrap">';
            echo '<h1>' . esc_html( $intro_header ) . '</h1>' . '<p>' . esc_html( $intro_excerpt ) . '</p>';

            if ( ! get_post_meta( $intro_id, 'emm_cta_text', true ) ) {
                echo '<p><a class="cta" href="' . esc_url( $intro_link ) . '">Learn More</a></p>';
            } else {
                echo '<p><a class="cta" href="' . esc_url( $intro_link ) . '">' . esc_html( $intro_linktext ) . '</a></p>';
            }
        echo '</div>';
    }
}

Update your template with a call to the newly created function above:

wpse247234_cta_block();

Set up the Customizer

function wpse247234_customize_register( $wp_customize ) {

    $wp_customize->add_section( 'intro', array (
            'title'    => __( 'intro', 'text-domain' ),
            'priority' => 999,
    ) );

    $wp_customize->add_setting( 'intro_page' , array(
            'sanitize_callback' => 'absint',
            'transport' => 'postMessage'
    ) );

    $wp_customize->add_control( 'intro_page', array(
            'label'    => __( 'Page to use for intro section', 'text-domain' ), 
            'section'  => 'intro',
            'settings' => 'intro_page',
            'type'     => 'dropdown-pages',
            'priority' => 1
    ) );

    $wp_customize->selective_refresh->add_partial( 'intro_page', array(
        'selector'            => '.cta-wrap',
        'container_inclusive' => true,
        'render_callback'     => 'wpse247234_cta_block',
        'fallback_refresh'    => false, // Prevents refresh loop when document does not contain .cta-wrap selector. This should be fixed in WP 4.7.
    ) );
}
add_action( 'customize_register', 'wpse247234_customize_register' );

Styling the item as it’s being refreshed

While the partial is refreshing, the affected element will have the class customize-partial-refreshing added to it. You can style it like so:

.cta-wrap.customize-partial-refreshing {
    // styles...
}

Helpful links

• Selective Refresh in the Customizer
• Theme Options – The Customizer API
• Taking a look at how Twenty Sixteen v1.3 handles selective refresh was helpful in getting this example to up and running.