Adding audio to a WordPress.com site: what works depending on your plan
WordPress.com and self-hosted WordPress behave very differently when it comes to installing a plugin. On an entry-level WordPress.com plan you cannot install ours, and that is a limit of the platform, not of the tool. What works anyway, and what each route writes (or does not write) to your site.
There are two WordPresses, and the confusion costs half a day to anyone who misses it. Self-hosted WordPress, the one you download from wordpress.org and install with a host, accepts any plugin. WordPress.com, the service hosted by Automattic, only allows third-party plugins from its business tier upward; the entry-level plans do not. So the question "how do I add audio to my WordPress" has no single answer: it depends on the plan you pay for. Here is how to decide in a minute, and what each route actually does.
The test that decides: can you see "Plugins, Add New"?
Log in to your admin area and look, in the left-hand menu, for a "Plugins" entry with an "Add New" submenu. If it is there, you can install ours, and the simplest route is open to you. If it is not, you are on a WordPress.com plan that does not allow third-party plugins: this is not a hidden setting to unlock, it is the scope of your subscription. No need to look further, go to the feed route below.
This distinction is far from trivial. Many blogs start on a free or mid-tier WordPress.com plan, and their authors genuinely believe they will be able to install anything. The day they want a feature that runs through a plugin, they hit a wall, and they often blame the plugin rather than the platform.
If you can install plugins
You are on self-hosted WordPress, or on a business WordPress.com plan. The plugin route is for you, and it is the one our WordPress page describes in detail. The essentials come down to very little, and above all to what the plugin does not do to your site. It installs from the WordPress directory like any other, it adds a single menu entry, it creates no table in your database, and it writes no file outside its own folder. It needs a recent version of PHP (7.4 at least) and the ability to reach our servers: if your host blocks outbound connections, the plugin detects it and shows the address to allow, instead of failing silently.
That restraint is deliberate, and it is what makes uninstalling painless: a plugin that sowed nothing leaves nothing behind. The detail of how the player inserts itself, without modifying your theme, is covered in why the player inserts without touching your theme, and the rest of the install in what the WordPress plugin writes, and what it leaves alone.
If you cannot: the feed route
Every WordPress site, including a WordPress.com plan with no plugins, publishes a feed. That is the door we use when the plugin is not an option. You give us your feed address, we discover your articles there, we generate the audio, and you place the player with a link or a small embed block wherever you like. This route needs no installation on your site, and for good reason: it writes nothing to your site at all, because nothing of ours runs there. It is the mechanism described in discovering articles through the feed, and it works everywhere, on any platform, not only on WordPress.
The trade-off to know before choosing: on this route, the audio is played by our player called from your page, not by a component dropped into WordPress. For a blog on a closed plan, that is exactly the point, since you cannot drop anything in anyway. For a self-hosted site that has the choice, the plugin stays more direct, but the feed gets you going without asking anything of the admin area.
What if I change plan later?
A site that starts on a closed plan and grows can switch to the plugin the day its subscription allows it, losing nothing: the audio already generated stays the same, it is simply presented differently. The reverse is true too, and it is a matter of reversibility we take seriously. The choice of route depends on your setup of the moment, never on your budget: both paths lead to the same audio, and neither is reserved for a paid plan on our side. The plugin and the feed both connect to an account whose free trial opens without a card.
So the right instinct is not to pick the richest route, it is to look first at what your WordPress allows. The "Plugins" menu answers the question before you have even asked it, and the rest follows.
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