Smart Youtube is a WordPress Youtube plugin that allows you to easily insert Youtube videos/playlists into your post, comments and in your RSS feed. The plugin is designed to be small and fast and not use any external resources.
From version 2.0 Smart youtube also supports playback of high quality videos, works on iPhone, produces xHTML valid code (unlike YouTube embed code), allows you to view videos in fullscreen and most recently has support for YouTube playlists.
The videos will be embedded in your RSS feed as well, and if this is not support by the reader you can choose to have video link and/or video preview screenshot displayed instead.
Main Features
- Embed YouTube videos with ease
- Embed YouTube playlists
- Supports latest high quality video protocols (360p and HD quality 720p)
- Allows full YouTube customization (colors, border, full screen...)
- Supports video deep linking (starting at desired point with &start=time parameter, use &start=num parameter)
- Works on iPod and iPhone
- Provides a sidebar widget for videos as well
- Produces xHTML valid code
- Very fast and light, no extra scripts needed
Example
You can discuss all plugin related issues in the wordpress plugin forums.
Screenshot
Download
Installation & Usage
- Upload the whole plugin folder to your /wp-content/plugins/ folder.
- Go to the Plugins page and activate the plugin.
- Use the Options page to change RSS feed options
- When you want to display Youtube video in your post, paste the video link with httpv:// (notice the 'v')
Example: httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00000000
0000000 part is your video REF#
The video will be automatically embedded to your post in the proper way.
If you want to post a high/HD (DVD quality, 720p) quality video you would use httpvh:// ('vh' for video high resolution)
To embed a playlist use extension 'vp' (eg. httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=528026B4F7B34094)
To use video deep linking just add &start=time parameter at the end of url. For example httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWfksMD4PAg&start=30 will start the video 30 seconds in.
Additionally, you can set how do you want the video to be displayed in your RSS feed. Smart Youtube can show the preview image of the video (automatically grabbed from Youtube), the link to the video, or both. I recommend enabling only the preview image.
Changelog
v3.5
- Changes to Iphone video embed
v3.4
- Completely rewritten the plugin
- Added new HD video support (use vh now for all high quality videos)
- Added video privacy option
v3.2
- Added title to widget, fixed HTML code issue with widget
v3.1.1
- param closed properly for HTML validation (thanks Jan Eberl)
v3.1
- wmode transparent parameter updated to better handle transparancy
V3.0
- Added video template, option to set sidebar video size, fixed sidebar widget code, fixed video syntax issue
v2.8
- Supports Playlists
v2.7
- Added support for sidebar widget videos
v2.6:
- Added option to disable search box
v2.5:
- Support for 720p HD (DVD quality) YouTube videos. Use httpvhd://
v2.4:
- Supports video deep linking. Just add &start=time parameter at the end of url. For example httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWfksMD4PAg&start=30 will start the video 30 seconds in
v2.3:
- xHTML valid code is now an option because it breaks videos in some browsers and feeds
v2.1:
- Smart Youtube videos are compatible with iPhone.
- Fullscreen enabled
v2.0:
Suport for high quality videos from youtube
v1.91:
Rewritten old parts of plugin and general tweaks.
v1.9:
Added video autoplay option.
v1.8:
Solved problem with HTML validation, added full video in RSS feed.
v1.6:
Solved problem with WordPress handling special characters.
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653 Comments
I cant change colour or size off my videos any idea ? :/
Great plugin! - Please add support for it on the BuddyPress Acitivity page, currently it just shows the url (which won't work because of the httpv and httpvh)
Is there anyway to manually put in your own thumbnail?
Thanks :)
Love the plugin, it works well.. almost. I cannot get the youtube videos to work on the main page. They work when you click on the post but otherwise its just blank
Hey Vladimir, feature request for you. Was wondering if it was possible for you to have the plugin take the URL for the Youtube thumbnail for the video and place it into a user defined custom field. The plugin "YoutubeThumb2CustomField" but no longer works in WP 3.0 (network).
Hi,
Thanks for this wonderful plugin. Have one bug to report.
I have selected the option "Display video link in RSS feed"
But when I embed playlists, the url displayed is wrong. what I get is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=code of my playlist]
Instead I should get http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=code of my playlist]
Hope you'll correct this in your next release.
No their not I get video not supported on most of the YouTube videos and I can't reply to comments the iPhone is garbage
Is there a way to add a YouTube video to fit the browser window using the below method:
Say a YouTube Video URL is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr3x_RRJdd4
To watch this clip in a resizable browser window without switching to Full Screen, just rewrite the above URL a http://www.youtube.com/v/vr3x_RRJdd4
love to see vimeo support! i have video intensive site...love Vimeo...hate not seeing clips on iPhone
Hi
I'm using WP 3 and I don't seem to have an 'options' page for the plugin?
Am I just not looking hard enough?
Thanks for the plugin though - works fine as it is.
Dave
i dont have options page either. please help.
thanks
Hi Travis
I found it in the end - look on the left hand side of the admin panel right at the bottom and you should see the setting there. Good luck! D
I'm working on a site, and I'm trying out your plugin here: http://das.tikimojo.com
It seems to work pretty nicely! However, sometimes when I click the play button in the embedded youtube player, it does play the youtube video. Instead the player displays this message across a black background:
"an error occurred, please try again later"
...and then reloads the page with the youtube page for that video, which then plays.
I can't seem to find a way to replicate this every time. Any idea if this is a Youtube problem?
Any way to turn off related videos. I tried" &rel=0" after the URL but it is just ignored.
I love this plugin. The only thing I wish it would do is to link back to the post on my site instead of linking to the video on Youtube. I used to go through the process of putting a clickable thumbanil of the video manually into my posts so Facebook and email readers would click it and come watch on my site. Traffic to my site dropped since folks who read me in RSS or on Facebook now click through to there to watch. Any chance of getting that in the future? Vimeo supposrt would be awesome as well.
Vlad,
Great plugin! Been using it for a while. One question, is there anyway to call the plugin with a piece of php rather than within the post content? I'd like to keep all the video links in meta keys so that I can rearrange where the video is placed in the content, across all posts, anytime I want by just changing the theme template. Today, if I want to do that I have to edit every post and move the httpv line. Thanks!!
I'll have this figured out for next major release.
I'm not sure you need to add anything to make this work other than a bit of documentation.
I had a similar need to Ben, but I wanted to echo a playlist on my sidebar. (I don't use the widget system - a hold over from an old theme that I really need to update.) I use a simple wrapper function to call the already invoked class:
function showSmartYouTube($url, $side) {
global $smart_youtube;
return $smart_youtube->check($url, $side);
}
where $url is a normal Smart Youtube formatted video url.
Thanks for writing such a great plug-in, it's really save me a lot of time.
this is the easiest way to insert youtube video in the post
Great, I have one question as well. I am using httpvh:// to embed videos but they are not in HD? Is there any thing I can do?
Video links and thumbnails do not show up in Google Reader. Is there any solution to this?
PS - awesome plugin. It works fine on WordPress 3.0
There is actually, I am thinking to add Vimeo support with other providers in the future.
I have used this plugin before. How come it dosent work on the website I have listed?
Is there any chance that this could also work with Vimeo?