Show a YouTube player with a playlist, or the latest videos from your channel, on any post or page with one shortcode. Videos are click-to-load: visitors see a lightweight thumbnail, and nothing is requested from YouTube until they press play. That keeps pages fast and makes it easier to respect cookie consent.

• Click-to-load players for faster pages and better privacy, with an optional notice under the player.
• Paste full YouTube URLs or video IDs. Add ?t=90 to a URL to start that video at 90 seconds.
• Three layouts: playlist below the player, beside it, or a grid that opens videos in an accessible lightbox.
• Auto-advance to the next video, several players on the same page, and keyboard-friendly playlists.
• Your YouTube API key stays on the server. Video titles and channel feeds are fetched and cached by WordPress.
• Optional VideoObject structured data for search engines.
• Privacy-enhanced (youtube-nocookie.com) mode.
• A shortcode generator in Settings, so you don’t need to remember any attributes.

Playlist (no API key needed)

Example: [yt_playlist mainid="xcJtL7QggTI" vdid="xcJtL7QggTI, AheYbU8J5Tc, X0zGS4-UKgg, 74SZXCQb44s, 2M0XCH9q3YI"]

Playlist with video titles (YouTube Data API v3)

Example: [yt_playlist_v3 mainid="xcJtL7QggTI" vdid="xcJtL7QggTI, AheYbU8J5Tc, X0zGS4-UKgg" layout="side" autoadvance="1"]

YouTube channel feed with lightbox player

Example: [yt_feed channels="UCpVm7bg6pXKo1Pr6k5kxG9A" results="9" offset="0"]

Optional attributes

• layout="below|side|grid"
• start="90" (main video start time in seconds)
• autoadvance="1"
• schema="1" (VideoObject structured data, needs the API key)
• offset="3" (channel feed only)

Check out the official Playlist Player for YouTube website and a Playlist Player for YouTube demo.

Check out a Property Videos & Virtual Tours demo.

Check out more WordPress plugins here. Need cookie consent for YouTube? Try WP Google Consent Platform (GCP).

From the same author

• Active Contacts – WordPress CRM & Follow-up Plugin
• LazyClone – Copy a WordPress Site Without FTP
• Lighthouse – WordPress Performance & Speed Optimization Plugin
• Active Analytics – Privacy-Friendly WordPress Analytics Plugin
• ImagePress – WordPress Image Gallery & Community Photo Plugin
• eCards – WordPress eCard Plugin with Email Designer
• Repeater for Gravity Forms – Repeater Field Add-on
• Fixtures & Results – WordPress Sports League & GAA Club Plugin
• WP Google Consent Platform (GCP)

1. Upload to your plugins folder, usually wp-content/plugins/
2. Activate the plugin on the plugins screen.
3. Configure the plugin from Settings -> Playlist Player for YouTube.

1. 

   Front-end player #1

2. 

   Front-end player #2

3. 

   Dashboard

4. 

   General Settings

5. 

   YouTube API

6. 

   Help/Usage

4.9.0

• SECURITY: The YouTube API key is no longer printed in the page; playlist titles are fetched and cached server-side
• FEATURE: Click-to-load players (no YouTube requests until a visitor presses play), with an optional notice
• FEATURE: Accept full YouTube URLs (watch, youtu.be, shorts, embed, live) and ?t= start times
• FEATURE: New layout, start, autoadvance and schema attributes, and offset for channel feeds
• FEATURE: Several players on the same page
• FEATURE: Shortcode generator in Settings
• FIX: Channel feeds requested 100 results by default, above the YouTube API limit of 50; the default is now 9
• ACCESSIBILITY: Playlist items are buttons with labels, iframes have titles, the lightbox is a native dialog (Esc closes it, focus is kept inside)
• PERFORMANCE: One small ES module, loaded only on pages with a player
• REMOVED: The “fix for older browsers” option and its script
• UPDATE: Requires WordPress 6.5 (script modules) and PHP 7.4

4.8.3

• UPDATE: Tested up to WordPress 7.1
• DOCS: Add WordPress Plugins directory and donation link

4.8.2

• UPDATE: Tested up to WordPress 7.1
• DOCS: Add WordPress Plugins directory link

4.8.1

• FIX: Prevent caching of empty API responses to avoid persistent blank channel feeds
• FIX: Send Referer header with YouTube API requests for compatibility with referrer-restricted API keys

4.8.0

• PERFORMANCE: Cache YouTube API responses using transients to avoid API calls on every page load
• PERFORMANCE: Replace file_get_contents() with wp_remote_get() for remote API requests
• PERFORMANCE: Remove admin stylesheet and use native WordPress styles
• PERFORMANCE: Load admin assets only on the plugin settings page
• SECURITY: Escape YouTube API output in channel feed shortcode
• FIX: Add allow="autoplay" attribute to iframes for modern browser autoplay support
• FIX: Add autoplay to lightbox player in channel feed
• UPDATE: Add error handling for failed YouTube API requests

4.7.4

• FIX: Add referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" to YouTube iframes to ensure HTTP Referer is sent per YouTube embedded player requirements
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility

4.7.3

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility

4.7.2

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• SECURITY: Increase plugin security by sanitizing and unslashing options

4.7.1

• FIX: Fix a missing JavaScript dependency

4.7.0

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Update the channels shortcode to use Grid instead of Flexbox CSS
• UPDATE: Reduce the number of tags to 5

4.6.9

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility

4.6.8

• FIX: Fix Cross Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability (props yuyudhn via Patchstack)

4.6.7

• FIX: Fix missing scripts and styles for the new channel feed feature

4.6.6

• FEATURE: Add YouTube channel feeds
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility

4.6.5

• FIX: Fix Cross Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability (props Skalucy via Patchstack)
• UPDATE: Update PHP coding standards
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility

4.6.4

• FIX: Fix Cross Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability (props Yudha P. via Patchstack)
• UPDATE: Update copyright year
• UPDATE: Remove unused patterns from PHPCS ruleset

4.6.3

• UPDATE: Update author banner
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility for pre-5.0 versions
• UPDATE: Update WPCS ruleset
• UPDATE: Replace back-end PNG image with inline SVG

4.6.2

• FIX: Fix wrong class in plugin documentation
• FIX: Clarify usage in plugin documentation and readme.txt
• UPDATE: Add cleanup routine after plugin uninstallation (delete 6 options)
• UPDATE: Update readme.txt with shortcodes and features

4.6.1

• FIX: Fix a content filtering issue with “Rate my post” plugin (props @sabelya)
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility

4.6.0

• FIX: Remove a redundant variable
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Update codebase to conform to latest WordPress Coding Standards (WPCS) ruleset

4.5.9

• FIX: Fix documentation link
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility

4.5.8

• UPDATE: Update PHP 8 compatibility
• UPDATE: Add lazy loading for iframes
• UPDATE: Implement strict use for JavaScript

4.5.7

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Remove old, unused code

4.5.6

• FIX: Fix aspect-ratio for Firefox and Safari (props @sabelya)
• UPDATE: Update PHP coding standards (function naming)
• UPDATE: Update plugin assets

4.5.5

• FIX: Sanitize URL parameter in back-end
• UPDATE: Combine and minify JavaScript
• UPDATE: Minify CSS
• UPDATE: Optimize DOM loaded functions
• PERFORMANCE: Remove setInterval() for detecting YouTube iframe
• PERFORMANCE: Add version number to CSS to break caching
• PERFORMANCE: Remove heavy JavaScript for detecting video aspect ratio
• PERFORMANCE: Implement modern CSS aspect-ratio for Core Web Vitals compatibility

4.5.4

• FIX: Fix YouTube API V3 demo
• FIX: Fix YouTube API V3 click event (switch to event delegation)
• UPDATE: Update classic playlist JavaScript to ES6
• UPDATE: Update readme.txt links
• UPDATE: Add donation link

4.5.3

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility

4.5.2

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Update JavaScript to ES6
• FIX: Fix version number for enqueued scripts

4.5.1

• FIX: Fix issue with playlist not appearing
• FIX: Fix issue with playlist styling
• UPDATE: Refactor JS for less overhead
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Update demo link

4.5.0

• UPDATE: Update PHP requirements
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility

4.4.1

• FIX: Fix a strict check
• FIX: Add spaces removal for V3 shortcode (main video)
• FIX: Add spaces removal for V3 shortcode (playlist)

4.4.0

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Remove jQuery dependency
• UPDATE: Force cache clearing for JavaScript actions

4.3.5

• UPDATE: Code quality fixes
• UPDATE: Update JavaScript DOM loading detection

4.3.4

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Mobile UI tweaks

4.3.3

• FIX: Fix localized issue not saving options

4.3.2

• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Add new screenshots
• UPDATE: UI tweaks

4.3.1

• FIX: Remove old code
• UPDATE: Refactor and move player functions
• UPDATE: Add YouTube related options
• UPDATE: Remove unused option
• UPDATE: Add more documentation (+ YouTube API how-to)
• UPDATE: Add more/better YouTube branding

4.3

• FIX: Load JS/CSS assets only when shortcode is present
• FEATURE: Add YouTube API V3
• FEATURE: Add new settings screen
• FEATURE: Add new shortcode
• UPDATE: Add a bit of documentation
• UPDATE: Add more/better YouTube branding

4.2.4

• FIX: YouTube Branding fixes
• FIX: Author box layout fixes

4.2.3

• FIX: Regression fix for previous version (add interval checking)

4.2.2

• FIX: Fix player detection before being loaded

4.2.1

• FIX: Fix JS code being executed on all pages
• UPDATE: Update readme.txt

4.2

• FIX: Add PHP compatibility
• FIX: Fix/update old screenshots
• FIX: Remove jQuery dependency
• FIX: Fix JS codeflow
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Update readme.txt and general information

4.1.6

• FIX: Fix script being included before jQuery
• FIX: Fix duplicated variable assignment
• FIX: Fix strict variable assignment
• FIX: Remove unused colour picker script
• UPDATE: Update plugin usage details
• UPDATE: Small admin UI tweaks
• UPDATE: Remove novd argument and switch to internal count

4.1.5

• PERFORMANCE: Stop options from autoloading
• UPDATE: Update WordPress compatibility
• UPDATE: Better i18n options
• UPDATE: Remove unused colour option

4.1.4

• FIX: Remove version constant
• FIX: Better security tweaks
• UPDATE: Update admin menu name to reflect the plugin

4.1.3

• FIX: License update
• FIX: Official link update

4.1.2

• FIX: Fix color picker enqueue dependency
• UPDATE: Move all JS code to a separate file
• UPDATE: Change the main video playlist function (JS) to accept parameters

4.1.1

• FIX: Remove hardcoded background colour
• FIX: Remove hardcoded padding and increase margin
• FIX: Correctly enqueue style.css
• UPDATE: Update default height and add option autoloading
• UPDATE: Completely refactor YouTube Javascript
• UPDATE: Remove all Flash (SWFObject) dependencies

4.1.0

• FIX: Add index.php file to plugin root
• UPDATE: Update plugin URLs
• UPDATE: Update CSS styles for better compatibility

4.0.1

• UPDATE: Add getButterfly ad box

4.0.0

• FIX: Change all HTTP links to HTTPS
• FIX: Update YouTube API and remove all deprecated functions and parameters
• FIX: Remove parameters with same values as the default ones
• FIX: Clean up the code (slight performance increase)
• FIX: Fix rare cases of line ending issues
• UI: Remove background color for better theme integration

3.2.0

• FIX: Fix IFRAME name target
• FEATURE: Add responsiveness

3.1.0

• FIX: Fix a PHP warning
• FIX: Remove deprecated options nonce
• FEATURE: Add usage details on the plugin page
• PROMOTION: Add link to premium version on CodeCanyon

3.0.2

• Add license link
• Add donate link
• Add default options
• Fix wrong internal version

3.0.1

• Add CSS vendor prefixes

3.0.0

• Initial release