WordPress plugin | Shutterstock

Documentation

WordPress plugin

The Shutterstock plugin for WordPress allows you to access Shutterstock media directly from WordPress via the API. You can search Shutterstock's library, put preview images on pages and posts, and license, download, and post images and editorial content without leaving the WordPress page editor. By helping streamline your workflow at the point of production and publishing, you can get your message to market more efficiently and effectively than ever before.

Get the WordPress plugin

Prerequisites

By default, WordPress sites have access to a limited library of Shutterstock media. To connect the WordPress plugin to your existing subscription or access our full collection, fill out the form at https://www.shutterstock.com/design/plugins-wordpress.

To install the Shutterstock plugin for WordPress, you need an API application for the Shutterstock API. You can create an application at https://www.shutterstock.com/account/developers/apps.

The plugin works only with API applications that have referrer authentication enabled. In your application, you must specify the host names on which your WordPress site runs.

To add referrer authentication to your app:

Go to https://shutterstock.com/account/developers/apps.
Create or edit an app you want to use with the plugin.
In the Referrer field, specify a comma-separated list of host names that the WordPress server runs on. You can specify "localhost" as a referrer for local testing.
Make sure that each referrer host name is also listed in the Callback URL field.
Save the app and note the consumer key and consumer secret.

To set up the plugin in WordPress, you also need:

WordPress version 5.5 or later
An account on the WordPress server with administrator access
A Shutterstock subscription that is enabled for API use

Installation and authentication

Log in to WordPress as a user with the Administrator role.
In the WordPress admin console, click Plugins > Add New.
In the Add Plugins window, search for the Shutterstock plugin, click Install Now, and then click Activate.

As an alternative, you can download the latest release of the plugin from https://wordpress.org/plugins/shutterstock/ and install it manually by going to the Add Plugins window, clicking Upload Plugin, selecting the plugin file, clicking Install Now, and then clicking Activate Plugin.
In the WordPress admin console, go to Settings > Shutterstock.
Put your API application's consumer key in the API Key field and its consumer secret in the API Secret field.
Click Log in with Shutterstock and log in with the user name and password of the Shutterstock account that you want to use to access the Shutterstock media library. Now the plugin has a token that it can use to access the library.
In the Editorial Country field, enter the three-character country code for editorial content, such as USA or DEU.
In the User Settings table, select which WordPress roles have access to search and license media.
Click Save Changes.

Inserting media into pages

Now that you have the Shutterstock plugin installed and configured, you can use it to add Shutterstock media to your pages:

Open a post or page in the WordPress editor.
Add a Shutterstock block.
In the new block, click Browse.
In the popup window, search Shutterstock's library for media to add. You can click View recommendations to see suggested images based on the text of your blog post or page.

You can also go to the Downloads tab to see images that you have already licensed. The images that are available for redownload depend on the subscription that the plugin is using; to connect the plugin to your subscription, fill out the form at https://www.shutterstock.com/design/plugins-wordpress.
To try a piece of media in your page, click its Insert Preview button. WordPress adds a watermarked preview of the image to your page.
To license the image and put the non-watermarked image on the page, click License this image, select your plan and size, and click License. The Shutterstock plugin downloads the media to the default media upload folder for WordPress. You can see the image in the WordPress Media tab.
In the block settings, update the alt text and dimensions of the image. Other block settings allow you to set HTML attributes including the title, anchor, and class.
Publish the page as usual. The image appears on the page just like any other image that you add to a page.