Featured Video Plus

Description

A picture is worth a thousand words. How many words is a video worth?

Featured Videos work like Featured Images, just smoother: Paste a video URL into the designated new box on the post edit screen and the video will be displayed in place of a post image.

There are three ways to get the videos onto your page:

1. Automagically! If your theme makes use of WordPress’ native featured image functionality you are set: Automatic insertion, lazy loading or lightbox overlays, its your choice. If this does not work you can either
2. insert the [featured-video-plus]–Shortcode in your posts or
3. manually make use of the PHP-functions in your theme’s source files.

For more details, check the installation page.

Theme compatibility
Sadly many themes do not follow the WordPress standards and implement their own fancy functions for displaying featured images – those very likely break this plugin. Check out the FAQ. Another common problem are sliders: Videos, in general, do not like sliders at all.

See the plugin in action on yrnxt.com. There is a button in the sidebar to switch between the different featured video display modes: Automatic, lazy and overlay.

Besides Local Videos you can use videos from a whole lot of external providers like YouTube, Vimeo and Dailymotion. SoundCloud and Spotify (including playlists) are supported as well. Check the WordPress Codex for a complete list. If some provider is not listed you can always just use an embed code or whatever HTML you like.

After installing the plugin check your site’s Media Settings (Settings -> Media in the administration interface): The plugin adds quite some little helper options there. Change to lazy or overlay mode, tweak video sizing, individualize the look of the most prominent providers’ video players and turn on autoplay or video looping. By default videos try to dynamically fit their parent containers width and adjust their size responsively.

Support
I do read all support questions in the forums but cannot reply to all of them. The plugin is an unpaid side project and full support would require more time than I can invest for free for over 20k active installs. If you really need help, consider buying me a cookie – best way to attract my attention and to support future enhancements.

Screenshots

Installation

Installation

1. Visit your WordPress Administration interface and go to Plugins -> Add New
2. Search for Featured Video Plus, and click Install Now below the plugin’s name
3. When the installation finished, click Activate Plugin

The plugin is ready to go. Now edit your posts and add video links to the Featured Video box on the right! Plugin specific settings can be found under Settings -> Media.

Theme integration

If the automatic integration fails you can always fallback to either using the shortcode or adjusting your themes sourcecode manually:

Shortcode

[featured-video-plus]
[featured-video-plus width=300]

PHP-functions

the_post_video( $size )
has_post_video( $post_id )
get_the_post_video( $post_id, $size )
get_the_post_video_url( $post_id )
get_the_post_video_image( $post_id )
get_the_post_video_image_url( $post_id )

All parameters are optional. If no $post_id is given the current post’s ID will be used. $size is either a string keyword (thumbnail, medium, large or full) or a 2-item array representing width and height in pixels, e.g. array(560,320).

When editing your theme’s sourcecode keep in mind that a future update through www.ads-software.com might overwrite your changes. Consider creating a child theme to prevent that.

FAQ

Installation Instructions

Installation

1. Visit your WordPress Administration interface and go to Plugins -> Add New
2. Search for Featured Video Plus, and click Install Now below the plugin’s name
3. When the installation finished, click Activate Plugin

The plugin is ready to go. Now edit your posts and add video links to the Featured Video box on the right! Plugin specific settings can be found under Settings -> Media.

Theme integration

If the automatic integration fails you can always fallback to either using the shortcode or adjusting your themes sourcecode manually:

Shortcode

[featured-video-plus]
[featured-video-plus width=300]

PHP-functions

the_post_video( $size )
has_post_video( $post_id )
get_the_post_video( $post_id, $size )
get_the_post_video_url( $post_id )
get_the_post_video_image( $post_id )
get_the_post_video_image_url( $post_id )

All parameters are optional. If no $post_id is given the current post’s ID will be used. $size is either a string keyword (thumbnail, medium, large or full) or a 2-item array representing width and height in pixels, e.g. array(560,320).

When editing your theme’s sourcecode keep in mind that a future update through www.ads-software.com might overwrite your changes. Consider creating a child theme to prevent that.

Why do I just get text back after adding an URL to the Featured Video input?

If the plugin just returns text instead of the actual video the pasted url is probably not valid or not from a valid video provider. Try inserting the raw embed code instead or check the docs to see which providers are supported.

How do I use my local videos?

Click the small media icon in the Featured Video input box on the post edit screen and upload your video or choose it from the media library. WordPress does not support all formats tho, check this table for details.

Why do I not see a featured video or image on the frontend at all?

For the videos to be automatically displayed you need to define a Featured Image. Depending on your featured video settings this image will never be shown if a video is set. If your theme does not support featured images the plugin also has no chance of working out of the box.

Why does the frontend still display the featured image although I added a featured video to the post?

Sadly not all themes work out of the box. Themes need to make use of WordPress’ native Post Thumbnail functionality (specifically get_the_post_thumbnail() and/or the_post_thumbnail()) – these functions are where the plugin can hook into the theme and modify what is displayed. Consider contacting the theme’s creator or modifying the theme’s sourcecode in order to add the plugin’s PHP-functions.

How can I make the videos fit into their designated space in my theme?

Take a look at your media settings and try using a fixed width instead of responsive sizing.

How can I make the plugin work with infinite scrolling?

While the plugin tries to handle infinite scrolling automatically, it does not work for all configurations. In those cases you will want to manually call initFeaturedVideoPlus() using JavaScript everytime new articles have been loaded. Most infinite scroll plugins should have some kind of post-load hook.

Can I help translating the plugin?

Yes, please! Check out the official Featured Video Plus Translation Project.

Reviews

Great Plugin but not longer Supported because of PHP7.4 Switch

klpmgg February 16, 2023 1 reply

Hello Guy′s Can you please update the obsolete code to a newer version, since Wordpress and also the website hosters in Germany don’t provide longer support for Php7.4, you need to update the code to PHP8.0-PHP8.1, then it will work great again ! Please do this for us, we have sooo many youtube videos embedded with this plugin and run out of time to use Php7.4. This means that our hoster will end support in March. You need to customize this plugin please – it was the only thing that ever worked perfectly! great work – thank you soo much for your work!

Very useful

shashwathi January 20, 2023

Very useful

Still working!

dwlorimer July 6, 2020

This plugin still works for me on WP 5.4.2. So easy. Worked out of the box, except for a couple theme css adjustments I had to make.

Works great!

ajiaim April 13, 2020

I was ready to pay for a plugin that does this, I’m so glad I came across this! Old but still works perfectly!

Working! Holly Crap!?

Duke Snoogens April 11, 2020

So far so good! I said it hasn’t been update in 3 major releases, but so far its working for me (v5.4). I tried others and they didn’t support Vimeo formats nor could I link them externally. So far I love this plug-in. Four stars because It auto plays in single posts (or did i miss something?); would to control that, but F it this thing still rocks! Does a butternut cookie suffice? ??

Superb!

mikeypowel1 December 20, 2019

At last! This is a brilliant plugin that works in Elementor with no extra faff. Perfect for portfolio pages and posts.

Contributors & Developers

Changelog

2.3.3: 2016-12-17

• Fix frontend ajax requests. (*)

2.3.1 & 2.3.2: 2016-12-16

• Fix for illegal video message when using oEmbed. (*, *)
• Fix for are you sure error on post creation. (*, *)

2.3.0: 2016-12-15

• Now compatible with Video SEO! (*, *, *)
• Fix AJAX vulnerability reported by @jamesgol.
• Disallow raw embeds (iframe, object, embed) by default for new videos — can be enabled in the settings. Could have been misused if somebody had gained access to an editor account beforehand. Reported by @jamesgol.
• “Single” now actually means single posts and pages. (*, *)
• Fix some problem with fixed size specifications. (*, *, *, *)

2.2.3: 2016-07-19

• Fix for bad iframe src attributes. (*)
• Fix a problem with image type detection. (*, *)

2.2.2: 2015-09-15

• Fix for not correctly hidden preload images. (*, *, *)
• Replace features videos more reliably on AJAX requests. (*)

2.2.1: 2015-09-08

• Now compatible with infinite scroll! (*, *, *)
• Fix bad overlay sizing when loading from cache. (*)
• Fix local video responsiveness in recent WordPress videos.
• The has_post_video function is now pluggable.
• The get_the_post_video_url function post id argument is now optional (*).

2.2.0: 2015-07-20

• Shortcodes can now be used as featured content (e.g. [gallery]).
• Added fine tuned autoplay options.
• New option for hiding YouTube video annotations. (*)
• Expose a JS function to manually re-initialize the plugin’s JS behavior like responsive sizing and overlays. Specifically interesting when using FVP in combination with a infinite scroll plugin. (*)
• Fetch high quality thumbnails for YouTube and Dailymotion. (*)
• Fix bug which suppressed the removal of foreign featured images. (*)
• Fix ‘undefined function exif_imagetype’ error. (*, *, *)
• Implement a workaround for a bug with iframes in Google Chrome, see [0], [1]. (*)
• Fix bug which resulted in a invisible video playing in the background when using autoplay and overlay mode. (*)

2.1.2: 2015-06-16

• Fix bug which resulted in missing featured images when a post did not have a featured video. (*, *)

2.1.1: 2015-06-15

• Fix play and loading featured image overlay for some themes. (*)
• Fix broken remove featured image link. (*, *, *)

2.1.0: 2015-06-11

• Display options are now chained using OR – if one of them holds, the replace mode is used.
• Added always use replace mode when viewing single posts and pages option, was implicitly true since 2.0.0. (*)
• Fixed undefined warnings when using WP_DEBUG. (*)
• Fixed double-wrapped .post-thumbnails. (*)
• Lazy loading a video no longer breaks other videos. (*)

2.0.3: 2015-06-01

• Remove usage of PHP short array syntax in order to support PHP versions lower than 5.4 (*)

2.0.2: 2015-06-01

• Fixed undefined warnings when saving posts with fresh featured videos.

2.0.0 & 2.0.1: 2015-06-01

• Requires WordPress 3.7 or higher now! This reflects versions of WordPress which are “officially” supported. The plugin will from now on try to stick to supporting all versions listed there.
• Major code refactor which results in many bugs scrubbed.
• Support for raw embed codes and all WordPress core media providers.
• Updated wp.org icon and cover.

1.9.1: 2014-09-06

• Last update compatible all the way back to WordPress 3.2!
• You can now specify the ‘end‘ parameter for YouTube embeds (*)
• Added option for only displaying videos on single posts/pages (*,*,*)
• Removed hardcoded http protocol for embeds *

1.9: 2014-01-02

• Replaced Video.js with MediaElement.js (ships with WordPress since 3.6 – breaks local videos partially if you use an older WordPress version!)
• Added Spanish translations! Translation by WebHostingHub.com
• Updated FitVids.js to 1.0.3

1.8: 2013-05-16

• Video.js 4.0
• Customize the local video player
• Better autoplay handling
• Remove anchors wrapping videos
• General bug fixes

1.7.1: 2013-04-30

• Fixed manual usage option (*)
• Added featured image mouse over effect for featured video AJAX usage

1.7: 2013-04-30

• Added functionality to display featured video in an lightbox using AJAX on featured image click (*)
• Added functionality to replace featured image with featured video on demand when image is clicked using AJAX (*)
• get_the_post_video_url has a new second parameter (boolean) to get the fallback video’s URL (*)
• Tested with WordPress 3.6

1.6.1: 2013-04-18

• Fixed removing featured image when no featured video is specified (*)

1.6: 2013-04-16

• Added get_the_post_video_url($post_id) PHP-Function
• Added YouTube enablejsapi parameter with playerapiid (fvpid + $post_id) and iframe id (*)
• Added a filter for get_the_post_video: get_the_post_video_filter (*)
• Added option for using the featured image as video thumbnail for local videos
• Fixed local videoJS (*)
• Fixed auto width and height for the Dailymotion and videoJS players
• Fixed YouTube videos for which the plugin cannot access the YouTube API (*)

1.5.1: 2013-03-27

• Fixed Featured Video box on new-post.php
• Enhanced Featured Image ajax behavior

1.5: 2013-03-22

• AJAXified the Featured Video box – just like Featured Images
• Added options for a) disabling VideoJS JS/CSS, b) enabling VideoJS CDN and c) YouTube wmode
• Plugin no longer breaks WP image editor (*)

1.4: 2013-03-15

• WP 3.5 Media Manager seamless integrated
• Time-links now available for YouTube and Dailymotion (append #t=1m2s)
• New autoplay setting
• Specify your Dailymotion Syndication Key
• Added get_the_post_video_image & get_the_post_video_image_url
• Local videos no longer break when domain changes or attachment is edited
• Better Featured Image handling

1.3: 2013-01-16

• Internationalization: Added German translations
• Added customizations for YouTube and Dailymotion
• Revamped video sizing
• Better error handling
• Contextual help on media settings and post edit screen
• LiveLeak (very experimental, they have no API)

1.2: 2013-01-09

• Local Videos: mp4, webm, ogg
• More dynamic user interface
• Minimized JS and CSS

1.1: 2012-12-16

• Dailymotion
• Fixed YouTube time-links
• Enhanced interaction of Featured Videos & Featured Images

1.0: 2012-12-13

• Release