One of our users asked us how they can embed PDFs in their WordPress blog and make it available for others to download as well. In this article, we will show you how you can embed PDFs, Microsoft Word Documents, PowerPoint slides, Excel Spreadsheets, and other elements in your WordPress blog by using a plugin called Google Doc Embedder. Don’t let the name fool you. It does not require you to have a Google Docs account. It simply uses the Google Docs viewer to display all of those files on your blog.
Video Tutorial
If you don’t like the video or need more instructions, then continue reading.
First thing you need to do is install Google Doc Embedder Plugin. (refer to our step by step guide to installing a WordPress plugin).
Once you have this plugin installed, a new settings panel will be added under Settings » GDE Settings.
You can customize the width. Choose whether you want to show the download links to everyone or just logged in users, and control other options. Once you have done that. Lets come back to the media uploader, and upload a new file (your PDF file or Excel file that you want to display). Then copy the Media File url like its shown in the image below:
Now open your post editor, and use the shortcode like this:
[gview file="http://url.to/file.pdf"]
You can override other elements in there such as width= or height= etc. For more Usage Notes refer to the developer’s site.
And you are done. You should now have a PDF attached in your WordPress post with a download link if you have that option selected.
Notice: Many folks confuse the plugin with the name Google Docs. The point of this plugin is to display locally hosted files in the blog not embedding from the Google Docs itself.
Hi,
I have several embedded documents in my website. since I started embedding the power-point slides, Google stopped indexing my site. Could there be a problem?
Hey Joseph,
Embeds are usually not an issue with SEO. However, if the main content area of your website only contains an iframe embed with no other content surrounding it, then it will be harder for search engines to rank those pages. They will be crawled and indexed but will not perform well for the keywords you are trying to target.
way to FAST! cannot get instruction as going SO SO FAST
Did not know you could embed pdf files inside blog posts. Is it possible to keep the view of the embedded pdf on a particular page? Like, page 2 is shown in the embed instead of default 1st page?
Thanks a lot in advance,
Prasad
My PDF file embeds and there’s a download hyperlink for people to use. Is there a way I can count the number of downloads from my site?
Hi,
I tried to follow this video, but when I tried to use the mentioned plugin, Sucuri security gives me an error saying “Access to backdoor or suspected location denied”. How can I embed spreadsheets or PDFs on my site? Please help.
dont use such plugin this will hack your site
Looks like the plugin is outdated. Try ‘Embed Any Document’ instead.
Thanks for the above tutorial. Please i want to embed a PDF in my post and make people download it only when they give my page on facebook a like. I would be happy if you would help me.
I have hyperlinks within my pdf document that I would like to embed in my wordpress post. Is there any way to make these hyperlinks active within the post?
Googlle document embedded is discontinued.. They say if it still works , good., but don’t call if it does not. Problem is now although I can upload a PDFs document with Google Document embedded, the hyperlinks with in the doCumenet do not work. I’ve tried several PDFs embedded and None allow hyperlinks gas to work. Does anyone have a solution for this?
Your site is fantastic! Thank you so much. It is easy to follow and on the right level.
I have installed the plugin and updated a PDF, then deleted the plugin but now there is a PDF icon on all the pages. I can’t seem to locate the file to delete it. It was google page view plugin. How can I locate and delete it?
I was searching for a solution to embed a working Excell document in a WP site and this really helped me! Just one thing: there is a button in the document but the button does not show in the WP site. Do you know how to solve this problem?
Thanks!
Sorry but it is not working anymore and there is no feedback from the creators. Below is the error message you get and this file is only 1.87Mb.
This happened as soon as WordPress updated to the latest version.
You’ve reached the bandwidth limit for viewing or downloading files that aren’t in Google Docs format. Please try again later.
Are these embedded documents searchable?
Hi, I want to embed a Google form (doc) on my WordPress website. How can I do this?
Simply create your Google Form, and then click on the Send button, this will bring up a popup. Click on the embed button in the popup to get the embed code. Copy and paste this code inside your post or pages.
awsm post sir!
Thank you for sharing it is informative but on thing i would like to ask we should upload . documents on our host or should upload it on Google drive. which method is good for seo.
Uploading them on your site would be better if your PDF files do not contain encrypted text then search engines can read and index them as well.
I embedded an Excel spreadsheet and it embeds as a solid image in the Google Docs Viewer. How do I get it to work as a spreadsheet in WordPress?
Okay so I have come a little bit closer to making this work but I havent quite got there yet. The error message i get now is “Sorry, we were unable to find the document at the original source. Verify that the document still exists. You can also try to download the original document by clicking here.” So when I click “Here” the page comes up no problem. Any ideas why this is the case?
I have the same problem and it seems that the plugin only works when the document is accessible for Google. Behind a firewall in an Intranet the plugin is showing this behavior.
I am having the same problem, I uploaded directly from my computer, not google drive. It shows the error above in the viewer, but the download link works. Any help?
Do you know of a workaround for IE? Can’t help but wonder why 49% of my users are using IE…
Which version of IE is this not working in?
Is there a way to add a document on your site that has fill-in areas that later can be printed out?
For example, a contract where someone can fill in their name and the date and either download it with their name or print it?
Editable PDFs have to be done on your computer end not on WordPress end. If you upload a PDF that has editable fields, then the web browser will understand that.
Thanks so much for this tutorial. But I’m wondering — is there a way to make the PDF take up the whole page, rather than showing up as an image within the wordpress site frame? The PDF is of my resume, and I’d like my “resume” tab to open a page that has the resume taking up the full screen…
Hey Emily,
You should consider uploading your PDF by going to Media tab and Add New. Then link directly to that PDF. Send us an email using the contact form if you get stuck
thanx for this plugin. i never knew der was a viewer too….i used to simply link the pdf file to the site its available on!
@smseleem remove the menu item – http://wpbeg.in/irllKU
@wpbeginner Can you help how can I disable Theme Option in WordPress Admin Panel?
@wpbeginner Nice! Thanks for sharing. Cool way to share presentations and the like without going to Slideshare.
Thats great! I have always uploaded the document and created a 301 from the page tab. being able to use shortcode to embed them in the page could be very helpful. Thanks for the tip.
This was something I’ve been looking for. I’m going to get the plugin and find out where you got that shortcode from.
good stuff
Looks like an excellent read, thanks