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Summary
READ ITIs there a better alternative to Vimeo to embed videos on webpages?
With the growing demand for video content on websites, finding the right platform to host and embed videos has become crucial. If you feel the same, then we're aligned! Just keep reading.
While Vimeo has been a popular choice for many years, it may not be the best fit for everyone – especially since their announcement about their prices, last year. Fortunately, there are several alternatives available that offer unique features and benefits.
The best alternative to Vimeo will depend on your specific needs and goals. Consider factors like video length, customization options, analytics, elements you can add on top of videos, and pricing. With the right platform, you can enhance your website's user experience and engage your audience.
If you want to take a look at the comparison table between all 7 of these alternatives, feel free scroll to the bottom of the article!
7 Best WordPress Video Plugins to Play Videos
1. Vidjet, ideal for video-shopping
Key features of Vidjet:
When coming across Vidjet I noticed that it is by far one of the more simple and user-friendly interfaces in the market.
It gives us, users, great features, but my favorite one is the possibility to tag products on videos. It helps if we want to send my customers straight from videos to product pages, and boost add-to-cart rate.
Another cool trait that I only see Vidjet doing is that they let you customize options on the player. Some examples are: hide control bar, autoplay videos, etc.
One of the most essential things is a detailed dashboard that will lead me to make data-driven decisions, based on my visitors exposed to videos.
For someone not very tech-savvy, Vidjet is the best alternative since it proposes no-code video publishing (i.e. you don't have to manually embed videos on your pages!).
Another nice touch Vidjet has added: its optimized video streaming, leading to almost no impact on loading times. This is made possible thanks to asynchronous video loading.
After having first-hand experience of how quickly you can publish videos at scale, it will benefit e-commerce stores if they need to pump out numerous videos a week. Because we all know, uploading videos with embed codes takes a long time and is a pain for marketing teams.
Targeted customer profile
Vidjet serves SMB e-commerce companies. Most companies are in different industries, ranging from fashion, cosmetics and apparel, all the way to electronics, fitness, and supplements.
From the examples I got, Vidjet usually serves D2C online-stores. This just shows that Vidjet is offering an advanced solution to video shopping.
Pricing
Now, as for Vidjet's Pricing strategy, they offer very competitive pricing. After the free trial ends, there are three options for users to choose from. All these options include hosting and bandwidth.
- Growth, for $99/month - you get 50 videos with 10,000 videos views per month.
- Pro, for $299/month - you get unlimited videos with 50,000 videos views per month.
- For “Enterprise” you will need to reach out to get a quote. Quotes range from $349 to $999 per month.
2. Presto Player, ideal for e-learning, podcasting and blogging
Key features of Presto Player
One more Vimeo substitute is Presto. The most captivating characteristic that I found was that it has many customization features. For example, autoplaying videos that are muted by default a good way to increase viewer's engagement without ruining their first experience.
It also proposes a trait known as focus mode. Focus mode is basically keeping viewer's complete attention. If you are not actively watching, it has a solution for that where it will basically pause the video until you start to actively watch the video again. Very well suited for important information, such as online classes.
Moreover, another key attribute is the action bar. This is where you can add an action anywhere during the video, whether it being the start, middle, or end. For example, like putting a link on the video that will take you to the site of a page or a product.
On Presto, we can upload videos that are even longer than 20 minutes with customization features. Another one I liked: the private feature that restricts viewers. Once again, perfect for LMS (Learning Management System) proposing premium courses.
Targeted customer profile
Presto has 3 main target groups. The first one targets sales and marketing teams. Presto offers specialized features for marketers, such as analytical reports that help them to back their decision with accurate data.
Another one of its target audiences is course creators using an LMS. This is because it can make course creators content more interesting by using videos with appealing options. This will help course creators as it allows us to learn multiple chapters in just one video. Moreover, Presto allows viewers to see where new chapters start at the bottom of the video.
Their last target audience is podcasters and audio content creators. This is because Presto offers high performance audio player. Presto knows how to adapt to its own customer targets, as they have their own key elements for each customer target.
Pricing
Taking a look at Presto pricing strategy, I found it pretty competitive for such a quality player. The big difference regards the hosting and bandwidth of videos. Indeed, Presto player doesn't allow self-hosting of video files. Instead, it gives you multiple hosting locations, using third-party tools. Obviously, this includes an extra recurring charge to you. So, keeping that in mind, you would pay these price options below.
- $69/year for the Starter, allowing up to 1 website
- $99/year for the Pro, allowing up to 25 websites
3. Easy Video Player, ideal for tech-savvy webmasters
Key features of Easy Video Player
Easy Video Player being another alternative to Vimeo has one of simpler user interfaces in the market. You can insert videos that you have self-hosted in your servers, or externally-hosted videos via direct links. A nice little possibility making it versatile to its users.
Another key feature that we can find from this is that this platform can help embed MP4 files into your website, allowing high-quality streaming. Yet, I have not found the information whether you could use other types of videos files, such as MOV, with this tool.
Furthermore, it offers a loop as a feature. This is helpful because it allows us to reuse the code. This makes it pretty good, as you will no longer have to rewrite codes over and over again.
Least but of least, it also allows almost all browsers to read your videos. So this makes it super convenient for us as it is so accessible. This way, you don't have to worry about viewers using Internet Explorer or old versions of Safari!
Targeted customer profile
After surfing on the internet, I understood that tech-savvy people working as webmasters or web agencies would be using this platform.
Pricing
In my opinion, it's a decent price point at $19.99, as it is a one time payment. Yet, it lacks features, and doesn't include self-hosting like Vidjet, Vimeo or YouTube. You're just paying for the player and its components.
4. FV Flowplayer, ideal for tech-savvy people
Key features of FV Flowplayer
The FV WordPress Flowplayer is a popular plugin for WordPress websites, with 30.000+ active installations. This allows people to publish videos and audio content, using embed codes. The plugin is user-friendly, and can be customized. It has multiple options such as autoplay, full-screen mode, and subtitles.
One of the advantages I found was that the FV WordPress Flowplayer is compatible with a wide range of video and audio formats. This can handle everything from MP4 and FLV files to HLS and MPEG-DASH streams, making it an adaptable choice for website owners who want to host a variety of media content. If you've struggles with video formats and codecs in the past, this will make your life easier!
To sum this all up for you, FV WordPress Flowplayer is a very strong and versatile plugin that offers several features for publishing video and audio content on WordPress websites, using short codes. Its compatibility with many formats and devices, along with its customization features, makes it a strong option in the market.
Targeted customer profile
I could not find conclusive data on FV Flowplayers targeting a specific customer profile. So, I came to the conclusion that, just like Easy Video Player, I noticed that they were not catering to any specific target customer, and in fact had a more general target market approach.
Pricing
FV Flowplayer is a complete tool that you can use for free. This sometimes makes people skeptical, cause they believe it's a demo and as soon as the demo trial is completed they will need to pay. Don't worry, this is not the case! You will just have to pay for hosting and badnwith of your videos, on external servers such as Amazon S3, DreamObjects, or Wasabi.
5. Html5 Video Player, ideal for tech-savvy webmasters
Key features of Html5 Video Player
Built with the very-famous HTML5 video architecture, this SEO-optimized player offers a shortcode generator that makes it easy to add videos to your posts and pages. Html5 Video Player is compatible with most devices and operating systems. This way, you won't have to worry your videos work on IOS mobile devices. Moreover, this plugin will for sure work on other browsers, such as Google Chrome, Safari, Firefox and more.
I found out they recently release a new version, allowing users to add videos from external sources, such as Amazon S3.
There is also a quality switcher that has been added to the pro version. A good thing for viewers experience!
Targeted customer profile
After reading a few reports, this playerhave vastly different clientele – unlike Vidjet or Presto Player with specific customers. Since it does not host videos on its servers, its users must host videos on their own servers, or server providers. Therefore, I'd say it targets tech agencies, and tech freelances.
Pricing
Html5 Video Player is a bit more expensive than the two previous players I mentioned. Yet, I could argue that the value for the money is there. After the free plan is finished, we have 3 options to choose from that if we want to continue with this plugin. The set of prices is as follows:
- $30 for a single site
- $75 for 3 sites
- $299 as a developer
6. Product Video Gallery, ideal for e-merchants looking to add videos to product pages
Key features
This plugin adresses a big problem: allowing e-commerce stores to add videos, inside the PDP (Product Page Description) image galleries. It's only working on WooCommerce stores, the e-commerce version of WordPress. For non-ecommerce WordPress websites, this plugin won't come useful.
Adding videos to product pages helps showcase products in a more engaging way, for potential customers. Ultimately, it boosts time spent on your webpages. It's also likely to increase conversions and engagement.
Unfortunately, if you're also looking for a all-in-one video hosting solution, you'll be disappointed. Indeed, it doesn't offer a hosting and steaming option, so you would have to host your videos on an external server, like most tools mentioned in this article.
Another trait that I really like is that it can support any type of YouTube Video URLs. This is a good hosting solution, and it's free (and it's a perfect transition with the last paragraph!).
Targeted customer profile
Small e-commerce companies wanting to add videos on their product pages, to explain better how their products work.
Pricing
After the free plan, if you choose to upgrade, what are our options going to be?
- $25/year for 1 site
- $59/year for 3 sites
- $99/year for 10 sites
7. YouTube, ideal for anyone wanting to publish videos on webpages
Key features of YouTube
The first characteristic of YouTube is that it proposed free video hosting, and gives you iframe codes to insert in your pages. As mentioned, YouTube lets you take their videos and embed it on to your website. However, that may bring a few drawbacks, as the ads and recommended videos will most likely increase the bounce rate of your visitors. Remember: the goal of YouTube is to drive traffic back to their platform, and expose it to ads. After all, it's how its business model works.
YouTube's analytics is key, as it gives you information of the behavior of your subscribers. A few examples are: retention rate, or amount of views per subscriber. So, from an analytical point of view, YouTube, if utilized correctly, can be your biggest blessing.
Yet, if you're looking for the customization options, such as modifying the play button, the control bar, etc., YouTube will not be apropriated. Indeed, it doesn't offer these options and comes with a standardized UI (User Interface).
One other drawback is the privacy of videos. Despite YouTube having the backing of the tech giant Google, Vimeo still offers more privacy. And if privacy is key for you, you'll find over alternatives in the market, like Wistia.
Targeted customer profile
I am certain we've all come across a few companies on YouTube talking about their products. These types of companies having an active YouTube account are the perfect audience. This way, they can reuse their YouTube videos on their website's pages, and increase number of views on their existing YouTube videos.
Pricing
As mentioned, YouTube charges its customers $0 to use, which gives it an edge over some of its competitors. As nowadays, Vimeo is charging a lot more, so it ends up adding to a hefty amount.
Comparison table
While this article presents a non-exchaustive list, we hope it'll help you choosing the best tool for your need!
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