How to show a YouTube video using its URL in PHP?

Other Questions YouTube
1

Hey everyone! I’m trying to figure out how to get a YouTube video to play on my website using PHP. I’ve been messing around with iframes, but no luck so far. I’ve looked online and keep seeing stuff about using embed tags, but I’m hoping to avoid that if possible. Does anyone know a way to do this without embed tags? I’m pretty new to this, so any help would be awesome! I’ve been banging my head against the wall for hours now. Thanks in advance for any tips or code examples you can share!

2

I’ve dealt with this issue before, and honestly, using iframes is the most straightforward method. Here’s a slightly different approach that might be useful:

function getYoutubeEmbedCode($url) {
    $pattern = '/(?:youtube\.com\/(?:[^\/]+\/.+\/|(?:v|e(?:mbed)?)\/|.*[?&]v=)|youtu\.be\/)([^\"&?\/ ]{11})/i';
    preg_match($pattern, $url, $matches);
    
    if (isset($matches[1])) {
        return '<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/' . $matches[1] + '" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>';
    }
    
    return 'Invalid YouTube URL';
}

$videoUrl = 'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ';
echo getYoutubeEmbedCode($videoUrl);

This function uses regex to extract the video ID from various YouTube URL formats. It’s more flexible and handles different URL structures. Just pass your YouTube URL to the function, and it’ll return the embed code.

3

As someone who’s worked on quite a few PHP-based websites, I can tell you that using iframes is actually a solid approach for embedding YouTube videos. Here’s a quick snippet I’ve used successfully:

$videoUrl = 'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ';
$videoId = explode('v=', $videoUrl)[1];
$embedCode = '<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/' . $videoId . '" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>';

echo $embedCode;

This code extracts the video ID from the URL and constructs the iframe. It’s clean, efficient, and works well across different browsers. Just make sure to sanitize user input if you’re allowing dynamic video URLs. Hope this helps you get unstuck!

4

yo, iframes are actually pretty solid for this. i’ve used em before. here’s a quick php thing that might help:

$vid = 'https://youtu.be/dQw4w9WgXcQ';
$id = substr($vid, strrpos($vid, '/') + 1);
echo '<iframe src=\"https://www.youtube.com/embed/'.$id.'\" frameborder=\"0\"></iframe>';

just swap out the url and you’re good to go. lemme know if u need anything else!

5

Having worked on numerous PHP projects involving video integration, I can share a reliable method I’ve used consistently. While iframes are indeed a solid choice, there’s another approach worth considering:

Using the oEmbed protocol can provide more flexibility and potentially better performance. Here’s a snippet that leverages oEmbed:

function getYoutubeOEmbed($url) {
    $oembed_url = 'https://www.youtube.com/oembed?url=' . urlencode($url) . '&format=json';
    $data = file_get_contents($oembed_url);
    $json = json_decode($data);
    return $json->html;
}

$video_url = 'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ';
echo getYoutubeOEmbed($video_url);

This approach fetches YouTube’s recommended embed code, which often includes optimizations and respects the video owner’s preferences. It’s also more future-proof, as it adapts to YouTube’s changes automatically. Just be mindful of error handling in production environments.