How to Add Video to a WordPress Blog Post the Easy Way

Update

Since this post originally published, WordPress seems to have changed the Text tab somewhat.

Luckily, it’s easier than ever now to get videos into your post. You can simply paste the link to the YouTube page containing the video right into the Visual tab and it will “automagically” become the embedded video.

Alternatively, you can use a newer plugin I’ve been using:

http://www.prelovac.com/vladim…

It’s a simple, elegant yet customizable solution.

Original post

You’re new to this whole blogging thing. You want to put a cool video in your post like you see everywhere on the web, but you haven’t figured out how to do it. I got your back. Everything’s easy when you know how, right? So watch this video to see how it’s done the easy way. Here’s what you’ll get out of it:

What NOT to do (the “Add media” buttons are wrong)
Where to get the embed code on a YouTube video
How to customize the embedded movie player
How to embed the movie the easy way, WITHOUT extra plugins

So enjoy (you may want to go full screen but the quality’s not as good as Viddler–since I used YouTube in the video, I wanted to use them for this post).

If you can’t see the video in your email or reader, it’s on YouTube: How to Add Video to a WordPress Post.

Also of Interest

Since I’ve written this post, many people have asked questions in the comments below and I’ve done my best to answer them, so please do check them out and leave a comment yourself if you have a question.

I have a few more posts on video blogging you may also find interesting if you found this one helpful:

Filed Under: Blogging

adeline

how do you add a CNN video to a wordpress post ?

I can add youtube videos with no problem but not CNN videos eventhough CNN has an embed video option. thanks !!!

http://www.cnn.com/video
- http://remarkablogger.com Michael Martine, Blog Consultant
  
  @Adeline – At the moment, I don’t know. Never tried to do anything with CNN video. Anybody else know?
http://www.houseofcat.net Cat Johnson

Thanks Michael. I was having some trouble getting a myspace video into my post. This simple solution did the trick.
Best,
Cat Johnson
Pingback: Hey Guys, Watch This! « Ramblerock’s Weblog
http://mpr-conf.ru JessicaChalO

I like your post. Good stuff. Keep them coming â€¦
http://www.greggjackson.com Gregg

Thank you for making this soooooo simple. God bless you. I couldn’t figure this out for the life of me:-)
Chris

Hi – this is great – but it just doesn’t work for me!

I paste the code in, I can even see the yellow ‘flash’ box in the visual window but as soon as I save it – the code/yellow box visual disappears. I’ve done it over and over again – same thing. Tried two different browsers just incase (Safari and Firefox on a Mac) but no go. Below is the code – it’s not from You Tube but from another site, but should work fine and I actually got this code from another blogger who had used it to embed to her site….

Thanks

Chris
- http://remarkablogger.com Michael Martine
  
  Chris, try doing it without reverting back to the visual tab. Just stay in the html tab. If that doesn’t work, then try a plugin for video like EasyTube.
  
  By the way, this seems to be a “Mac problem.” I’ve seen it before.
  - http://twitter.com/Aromay Alexis Romay
    
    Hi Michael,
    
    Thanks for this video. I did everything, and, like what happened to Chris, the video and its code disappear each time. And the EasyTube pluggin hasn’t been updated in a couple of years. Do you have any other tip?
    
    Thanks in advance!
    - http://remarkablogger.com Michael Martine
      
      Alexis, sorry to hear that. Since this post WordPress seems to have changed the Text tab somewhat.
      
      Luckily, it’s easier than ever now to get videos into your post. You can simply paste the link to the YouTube page containing the video right into the Visual tab and it will “automagically” become the embedded video.
      
      Alternatively, you can use a newer plugin I’ve been using:
      
      http://www.prelovac.com/vladimir/wordpress-plugins/smart-youtube
      
      It’s a simple, elegant yet customizable solution.
      - http://twitter.com/Aromay Alexis Romay
        
        Thanks, Michael. I tried your solution, but it doesn’t seem to work on WordPress.com blogs. In any case, I appreciate your taking the time to provide a solution.
        
        Best,
        Alexis
      - http://remarkablogger.com Michael Martine
        
        Correct, almost anything involving running code will not work on WordPress.com. It’s a very controlled environment. Especially plugins.
      - http://twitter.com/Aromay Alexis Romay
        
        Thanks, again!
Craig

Awesome post. I’m installing my first WP blog and this was really helpful. Do you have any tips on embedding a video file? Rather than embedding a video that is posted on YouTube? Thank you!
- http://remarkablogger.com Michael Martine
  
  Craig, you need to use a media plugin, such as PodPress or Longtail. Another possibility is the Kaltura plugin/service. If you google them you’ll find plenty of info.
http://www.mariemejamme.com MArieme

Thank you very much.
you are awesome. I now how to do it. x

Best!
http://www.graciousrain.com Launi

Is there a way to add the videos from my own camera? No matter what I’ve tried, it says the file is too big.
- http://remarkablogger.com Michael Martine
  
  Launi, it is possible to increase the file size for uploads, however, it’s often not easily done (it’s technical) and it may not give you what you want. The reason for this is that videos which are on our cameras are often not in a good format for the web. They need to be compressed to a smaller file size and converted into a different file format. I would highly suggest you use YouTube or Viddler. Upload your videos to their services, then grab the embed codes for your blog post. Let them handle the hosting and bandwidth (and provide an extra gateway for traffic, too).
Ashlyn

What if it’s not a video on YouTube? Just a video you want to upload from your computer? Sorry if that’s what you answered in the video — browser wouldn’t let me see it.
- http://remarkablogger.com Michael Martine
  
  This is where things get interesting. And by interesting I mean difficult. If you want to upload video to a web server, you need a media player. There are WordPress plugins for that.
  
  But then something which you’d think would be simple–uploading a video to your website–actually is not simple. Because if you get a traffic spike your server may not be able to handle the bandwidth demands. So uploading video to an online data storage service like Amazon AWS is how it’s frequently done.
  
  If you wanted videos behind a paywall, such as for a membership site, for example, then you would need to do this because you’ll need to keep your videos for members only.
  
  There are other sites besides YouTube for letting someone else store videos and stream them for you. Hopefully they’re acceptable/available to you. I prefer having my videos hosted and streamed on another service and not on my own site because it’s faster and easier. It’s more beneficial to me and to my audience. Except for when you’re blocked outside the country, but you can use free online proxy services to get around that (google that exact phrase to find some).
  
  Hope this help.
Jim

Maybe I’m missing something, Michael, but whenever I include a YouTube video in a post, I simply copy the embedded code, and bingo, there’s the video.
- http://remarkablogger.com Michael Martine
  
  It doesn’t always work that easily for a variety of reasons, as you can see by some of the comments on this post. But, also, it’s just no longer necessary, which is why I wanted to update the post. It gets tons of search traffic.
http://www.facebook.com/pbarot Parth Barot

I’m getting so frustrated with writing embed code in to my wordpress blog, it’s annoying me so much lol So I went on to html mode instead of visual, clicked on ‘add media’, went to ‘embed video from url’, which I did and pasted the embed code in the url box and when I preview it, the actual video frame appears but no content.. Help please?!