Content is King when it comes to finding stuff on the internet. The most popular websites are those with well-thought-out designs and interactive elements. Think polls, quizzes, podcasts, and videos, etc. This tutorial focusses on the latter. Learn how you can embed videos in WordPress blog posts and pages in less time than it took to write this paragraph.
WordPress Video Restrictions
You can legally embed millions of old and new online videos into your WordPress website. Those permitted belong to video-sharing whitelists. The top 7 include:
- YouTube
- Dailymotion
- SoundCloud
- TED
- Vimeo
- tv
There are others, so build your own list if you want to. The advantage of embedding audio-visual over uploading files is that you don’t use your server bandwidth. WordPress oEmbed support also allows other media types, e.g., tweets, images, audio, slideshows, and music, etc.
Embed Video from the Gutenberg Visual Editor
Log in to your WP Dashboard.
From the side menu, select Posts -> All Posts.
Find the post you want to embed the video into, and click the Edit link below its title.
Put the cursor where you want to display the video in the post.
OK, let’s now go and get the video link.
How to find video links
All the video sharing sites above provide URLs to embed their videos. Just look for the share link on the page close to the player. Here’s how that looks over at YouTube.
Click SHARE link to reveal the video link.
A share popup box appears. Click the Copy link to save the URL to your clipboard.
Return to your open post in the WordPress editor.
Click the + symbol in the text window or from the top toolbar to access Add Blocks.
Select YouTube from the Popup or type youtube into the search box if you don’t see it.
Point to note: The + symbol in the text area brings up the Add New Block popup. The + symbol in the menu bar (top left) opens a scrollable side column where you can view all blocks.
Paste the video link into the YouTube URL box and press the Embed Button.
You’ve now embedded a video from YouTube into your WordPress post.
Click the video’s play button to check the audio quality and visual display.
Above the video is a toolbar that gives you a few extra options.
The YouTube Video Block tool buttons are, from left to right:
- Change block type or style
- Move Up/Down
- Change Alignment
- More options
You can see the list of More Options in the popup menu below.
The procedure is the same for embedding any video link into your WordPress post or page.
Type video into the search box to see all your options.
Add Video to Sidebars Using Widgets
You can also embed video into your sidebars using widgets.
Go to Appearance -> Widgets from the Dashboard side menu.
From the Widgets screen:
- Drag-and-drop a Text widget from the Available Widgets area into your sidebar
- Click the text widget down arrow to open the settings
- Copy and Paste the video URL into widget content areas
WordPress fetches the embed video code right away and displays a preview player.
Add a title and click Save. The video should now display in your sidebar.
Click the Manage with Live Preview button (top left).
You can also make further changes from within the Live Preview area if you need to.
Missing sidebar?
If you don’t see your video, it could be that your sidebar is de-selected. Some themes allow you to hide sidebars in their customised settings. The menus and wording may differ, but it’s not hard to figure out once you access the template’s settings.
The example below is for the Academy Pro theme. To access customisations:
Go to Appearance -> Customize from the Dashboard side menu.
To access the Academy Pro theme settings:
- Click Theme Settings
- Click Site Layout
- Select the preferred layout from the dropdown menu
The Live Preview area lets you see the results before you save the changes.
Click the Publish button once you’re happy with the video display.
Closing Comments
The tutorial here uses YouTube to illustrate, but you can also embed video from other popular sites. For most users, the WordPress embed feature is perfectly adequate. However, there are plugin options available should you need extra customisations and tighter controls.
