Getting Started

Adding external images to posts or custom post types

Published · Last updated

External Images work everywhere that allows featured images and/or galleries. Note that not all post types have ‘gallery support’ enabled, so in those cases the gallery box will not appear.

Did you know?

The image URL you paste is stored in the external_image_url custom meta field and served straight from its original host. WordPress never downloads the file or generates the usual set of resized copies, so there is nothing sitting in your uploads folder to back up or move.

If you are setting up your first image, the External Images Quick Start Guide walks through the whole flow end to end.

Adding an external featured image

To add a featured image, paste the URL into the top box in the Image URL box under the ‘External Images’ heading.

Deleting your external image

To delete the external featured image, click ‘Remove Image’ under the ‘External Images’ section:

Adding a gallery to a post/custom post

In compatible post types that support galleries, you’ll find an additional box. You can enter the image URLs into this box, hit ‘Preview Image’ and that extra image will be added to your gallery.

Deleting images from the gallery

When you hover over the images in the External Images Gallery section, a red cross will appear allowing you to delete images from the gallery.

Gallery box missing?

If the gallery box does not appear on a custom post type, that post type has not declared gallery support. Featured images still work regardless. Adding gallery support is a one-line theme or plugin change against add_post_type_support().

Further reading

set external gallery and per-variation images on products
how the `external_image_url` field maps into your posts
the fastest route from install to first image

Comments

▲
▼
1/1