SmartVP Video Player

SmartVP Video Player gives every video on your site the same clean, accessible player, whether the file lives in your Media Library, on a CDN, on YouTube or on Vimeo. Each player is created once under SmartVP Video Player → Add New Player and placed anywhere with a shortcode.

Features

• Sources: self-hosted or direct-link MP4, YouTube and Vimeo.
• Original size: the player takes the video’s own aspect ratio, so there are no black bars. Fixed ratios (16:9, 4:3, 21:9, 1:1, 9:16 or custom) are available too.
• Play on scroll: start playing (muted) when the player scrolls into view and pause when it leaves.
• Drag-and-drop control bar: choose which Plyr controls appear and in what order, with keyboard support.
• Live preview: see the player, its size, corner radius and control bar while you edit, without saving.
• Playback options: autoplay, muted start, loop, preload, start time, seek step, disable pause and playback speeds.
• Subtitles and quality menu for direct MP4 sources (WebVTT tracks and multiple quality files).
• Size and shape: max width, max height and corner radius per player, with site-wide defaults.
• Lightweight YouTube embeds: YouTube shows a poster and loads the YouTube player only when the visitor presses play (or when autoplay or play-on-scroll starts it).
• Pause others: starting one player pauses the rest on the page.
• VideoObject structured data for players that have a poster.
• Editor checks: warns about malformed links, a link that does not match the selected source, and a start time past the end of the video.
• Translation ready.

Usage

1. Go to SmartVP Video Player → Add New Player.
2. Pick a source, then upload a file or paste a YouTube or Vimeo link.
3. Adjust the look and behaviour while watching the preview, then publish.
4. Copy the shortcode, for example [smart_video id="123"], into any post, page or widget.

For developers

The player exposes PHP filters and a small JavaScript API (window.SmartVP) for adding sources, render modes and features from another plugin or theme. The full list is documented at the top of includes/extend.php.

External services

This plugin connects to the services below only when a player uses them. It does not send any data to the plugin author.

YouTube (Google)

Used when a player’s source is YouTube.

• In the visitor’s browser, the YouTube embed (https://www.youtube.com/embed/…) and the YouTube IFrame Player API (https://www.youtube.com/iframe_api) load when the visitor presses play, or when autoplay or play-on-scroll starts the video. The default poster image is loaded from https://i.ytimg.com/. YouTube receives the video ID, your site’s address and the usual browser data (IP address, user agent).
• From your server, the player asks YouTube’s oEmbed endpoint (https://www.youtube.com/oembed) for the video’s width and height so it can be sized correctly. Only the video URL is sent. The answer is cached for a day.

YouTube Terms of Service and Google Privacy Policy.

Vimeo

Used when a player’s source is Vimeo.

• In the visitor’s browser, the Vimeo player (https://player.vimeo.com/video/…, loaded with Vimeo’s “do not track” option) and the Vimeo Player API script (https://player.vimeo.com/api/player.js) are loaded with the page that shows the player. Vimeo receives the video ID, your site’s address and the usual browser data.
• From your server, the player asks Vimeo’s oEmbed endpoint (https://vimeo.com/api/oembed.json) for the video’s thumbnail, width and height. Only the video URL is sent. The answer is cached for a day.

Vimeo Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.

Link check in the editor

While an editor types a video URL in the player settings, the plugin can check from your server that the link answers (a single small request to that URL, only for YouTube and Vimeo addresses, your own site, or links ending in a video file extension). Nothing else is sent. This runs only in wp-admin, for users who can upload files.

Third-party libraries

All bundled locally; nothing is loaded from a CDN.

• Plyr 3.8.4 — MIT License. vendor/plyr/plyr.js is the unminified build of the plyr.min.js the plugin loads.
• Codestar Framework 2.3.1 — GPLv2 or later. Used for the player settings and metabox screens; trimmed to the fields this plugin uses. Unminified sources are included next to the minified files.
• Font Awesome 4.7.0 — fonts SIL OFL 1.1, CSS MIT. Section icons in the settings screens.