Better Disqus Comments puts Disqus comments on your WordPress site without slowing your pages down. Disqus is heavy — its embed pulls in several hundred kilobytes of scripts, fonts and iframes on every page view. This plugin holds all of that back until a visitor actually gets to the comments, or clicks a button to open them.
It works on its own. You don't need the official Disqus Comment System plugin: enter your Disqus shortname and comments show up. Everything else is optional:
Lazy loading — Disqus loads when the comments come into view, when the visitor clicks a button, or straight away. Mobile visitors can get a different method.
Comment counts — "12 Comments" links on your archives show the Disqus count.
Comment sync — Disqus comments are copied into your WordPress database as they are posted, and older ones can be pulled in or sent the other way.
SEO mode — search engines get your comments as plain WordPress comments they can index, while people get Disqus.
Addons — Disqus on WooCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads pages, comment widgets, button styles and more.
Formerly Disqus Conditional Load
The plugin was called Disqus Conditional Load until version 13. The slug (disqus-conditional-load), settings and hooks are unchanged, so existing sites and custom code keep working. Coming from the official Disqus plugin or DCL Pro? See Upgrading.
Or download the ZIP from WordPress.org and upload it under Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin.
If the official Disqus Comment System plugin is active, see Upgrading from the official Disqus plugin before you deactivate it — your settings are copied over automatically, but only while its data is still there.
Everything lives on one page under Disqus in the admin menu, with three tabs:
Tab
What it has
Settings
Five panels — Disqus, Comment loading, Display, Comment sync and Advanced — plus panels added by addons. One Save Changes button at the bottom saves them all.
Addons
The addon catalogue and the Premium Bundle: buy, download and activate licenses.
Help
Links to these docs, the support forum and priority support.
The page needs the manage_options capability by default (administrators). Developers can change that with the DCL_ACCESS constant.
Disqus replaces your theme's comments area — the classic comments template or the Comments block in block themes — on posts where all of these are true:
It is a single post, page or custom post type view (not an archive).
Comments are open on that post.
The post is published (not a draft, scheduled, pending or trashed).
Its post type isn't in Exclude post types on the Display panel.
The visitor isn't a search engine bot — bots get SEO mode instead.
WooCommerce products are left alone so product reviews keep working. The Comments for WooCommerce addon puts Disqus on product pages.
To place the thread somewhere else in your content, use the [dcl-comments]shortcode.
Getting Started
Better Disqus Comments puts Disqus comments on your WordPress site without slowing your pages down. Disqus is heavy — its embed pulls in several hundred kilobytes of scripts, fonts and iframes on every page view. This plugin holds all of that back until a visitor actually gets to the comments, or clicks a button to open them.
It works on its own. You don't need the official Disqus Comment System plugin: enter your Disqus shortname and comments show up. Everything else is optional:
Formerly Disqus Conditional Load
The plugin was called Disqus Conditional Load until version 13. The slug (
disqus-conditional-load), settings and hooks are unchanged, so existing sites and custom code keep working. Coming from the official Disqus plugin or DCL Pro? See Upgrading.Requirements
Install
Or download the ZIP from WordPress.org and upload it under Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin.
If the official Disqus Comment System plugin is active, see Upgrading from the official Disqus plugin before you deactivate it — your settings are copied over automatically, but only while its data is still there.
Connect your Disqus site
Until a shortname is saved, nothing is shown to visitors and every admin screen shows a reminder:
example.disqus.com. Pasting the full address works too.That's it — open any post with comments enabled and scroll down. See Disqus Account for finding your shortname and what the other keys are for.
The settings page
Everything lives on one page under Disqus in the admin menu, with three tabs:
The page needs the
manage_optionscapability by default (administrators). Developers can change that with theDCL_ACCESSconstant.Where Disqus shows
Disqus replaces your theme's comments area — the classic comments template or the Comments block in block themes — on posts where all of these are true:
WooCommerce products are left alone so product reviews keep working. The Comments for WooCommerce addon puts Disqus on product pages.
To place the thread somewhere else in your content, use the
[dcl-comments]shortcode.The toolbar menu
Users who can moderate comments get a Disqus menu in the WordPress toolbar, on the front end and in the admin:
The first three appear once a shortname is saved and open in a new tab. The core Comments menu is left in place.
What's next