10 Best Advanced WordPress Backgrounds Alternatives in 2026
Updated September 7, 2026 · Ranked by how closely each plugin matches, from WordPress.org data · How this works
Advanced WordPress Backgrounds has 30,000+ active installs on WordPress.org. These 10 plugins share its category or its tags on WordPress.org, are actively maintained, and each has at least 100 active installs. They are ordered by how closely they match, not by our opinion.
The 10 closest alternatives to Advanced WordPress Backgrounds
- 1
Embeds for YouTube
Closest match4.2 (24) 9,000+ active installs🎥 An incredibly fast, simple, yet powerful, method of embedding YouTube videos into your WordPress site.
Shares the video, youtube tags on WordPress.org. About a third of the installs, no update since April 18, 2025.
- 2
4.8 (206) 20,000+ active installsHigh performance YouTube video, playlist and audio-only embeds which don't slow down your blog and offer optimal accessibility.
Shares the video, youtube tags on WordPress.org. About half the installs, last updated 18 days ago.
- 3
4.4 (39) 5,000+ active installsShow video thumbnails or playable video block of recent YouTube Playlist, Channel (User Uploads) videos.
Shares the video, youtube tags on WordPress.org. 5,000+ installs against 30,000+, no update since February 8, 2025.
- 4
4.6 (36) 7,000+ active installsIf a YouTube or Vimeo video embed exists near the start of a post, we'll automatically set the post's featured image to a thumbnail of the video.
Shares the video, youtube tags on WordPress.org. About a quarter of the installs, last updated July 14, 2026.
- 5
4.8 (339) 100,000+ active installsA modern video and audio player for courses, landing pages, marketing, and testimonials — with captions, branding, and page-builder support.
Shares the video, youtube tags on WordPress.org. About 3.3 times the installs, last updated 5 days ago.
- 6
4.4 (45) 10,000+ active installsThis plugin provides a simple way to set an automatically scaled full screen background image.
Shares the background tag on WordPress.org. About a third of the installs, no update since March 29, 2023.
- 7
4.1 (28) 1,000+ active installsPlay any Youtube video as background of your page or as custom player inside an element of the page.
Shares the video, youtube tags on WordPress.org. 1,000+ installs against 30,000+, no update since September 14, 2023.
- 8
Featured Video for WordPress – VideographyWP
4.5 (31) 1,000+ active installsWordPress featured video plugin that allows you to create video posts from YouTube videos.
Shares the video, youtube tags on WordPress.org. 1,000+ installs against 30,000+, last updated December 5, 2025.
- 9
4.6 (572) 100,000+ active installsA multi-featured plugin to embed YouTube in WordPress. Embed a video, YouTube channel gallery, playlist, or YouTube livestream. Defer JavaScript too!
Shares the youtube tag on WordPress.org. About 3.3 times the installs, last updated today.
- 10
Feeds for YouTube (YouTube video, channel, and gallery plugin)
4.9 (200) 100,000+ active installsThe Feeds for YouTube plugin allows you to display customizable YouTube feeds from any YouTube channel.
Shares the youtube tag on WordPress.org. About 3.3 times the installs, last updated 11 days ago.
Switching from Advanced WordPress Backgrounds: common questions
What is the best alternative to Advanced WordPress Backgrounds?
Embeds for YouTube is the closest match: it shares the same WordPress.org tags and has 9,000+ active installs with a 4.2 out of 5 rating.
Which Advanced WordPress Backgrounds alternative has the most users?
Presto Player, with 100,000+ active installs reported by WordPress.org.
Which Advanced WordPress Backgrounds alternative is rated highest?
Feeds for YouTube, rated 4.9 out of 5 by 200 reviewers. Only plugins with at least 50 reviews are counted.
Are these Advanced WordPress Backgrounds alternatives free?
Every plugin listed here is free to install from WordPress.org. Where WordPress.org marks a plugin as commercial, the developer also sells a paid version or add-ons, and that is shown on each plugin.
How are alternatives chosen?
Automatically, from WordPress.org data: plugins that share a category top 10 with Advanced WordPress Backgrounds score highest, then plugins that appear in the same WordPress.org rankings, then plugins with the same tags, weighted so rare tags count more than common ones. Plugins by the same author and plugins rated under 4.0 are left out.
How we choose these alternatives
Nothing on this page is picked by hand. Every day we walk the whole WordPress.org directory, then score every plugin against Advanced WordPress Backgrounds on three signals: sharing a category top 10 counts most, then appearing in the same WordPress.org rankings, then carrying the same tags, with rare tags counting for more than common ones like "wordpress". Plugins by the same author are excluded, so an author's own add-ons cannot fill the list, and so is anything rated below 4.0 or with fewer than 100 active installs. The ten highest scores are what you see, in that order. Full methodology.
The bottom line
Embeds for YouTube is the closest match to Advanced WordPress Backgrounds by the data we track, and Presto Player has the widest reach with 100,000+ active installs. Embed Plus for YouTube Gallery, Livestream and Lazy Loading with Facades shipped the most recent release, on September 6, 2026. The list is rebuilt every day from WordPress.org, so a plugin that stops being maintained drops out on its own.
Weekly · free
What moved this week
One email a week, built from the same daily snapshots these rankings come from: the plugins that climbed, what launched, and one ranking worth a look.