Facebook and Instagram embeds to be deprecated October 24th

9/24/2020: Updated the post to reflect that the oembed_cache post type is only used for caching oEmbeds used within widgetWidget A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page. WordPress widgets were originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user. content. Also added a reference to the CoreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. TracTrac An open source project by Edgewall Software that serves as a bug tracker and project management tool for WordPress. ticketticket Created for both bug reports and feature development on the bug tracker. focused on removing the oEmbed support. @desrosj

Facebook recently announced that all oEmbed requests for Facebook and Instagram content will be deprecated on October 24th, 2020. These APIAPI An API or Application Programming Interface is a software intermediary that allows programs to interact with each other and share data in limited, clearly defined ways. requests are at the backbone of both GutenbergGutenberg The Gutenberg project is the new Editor Interface for WordPress. The editor improves the process and experience of creating new content, making writing rich content much simpler. It uses ‘blocks’ to add richness rather than shortcodes, custom HTML etc. https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/ and the Classic Editor to embed videos, pictures, updates, and more from the popular social platforms.

Changes to tokenless access for User Picture and FB/IG OEmbed endpoints: By October 24, 2020, developers must leverage a user, app, or client token when querying Graph API for user profile pictures via UID, FB OEmbeds and IG OEmbeds. Developers should provide a user or app token when querying for profile pictures via a UID or ASID, though client tokens are supported as well. Please visit our changelog for User PictureFacebook OEmbed and Instagram OEmbed for details on how to start calling these Graph API endpoints today.

Facebook for Developers

In response to this change, WordPress will be removing Facebook and Instagram’s oEmbed endpoints from WordPress Core code. This change will likely be released in WordPress 5.6. But, if a 5.x minor releaseMinor Release A set of releases or versions having the same minor version number may be collectively referred to as .x , for example version 5.2.x to refer to versions 5.2, 5.2.1, 5.2.3, and all other versions in the 5.2 (five dot two) branch of that software. Minor Releases often make improvements to existing features and functionality. occurs after October 24th and before 5.6 (currently scheduled to be released on December 8, 2020), it could be included in that release. Gutenberg 9.0 recently removed support.

If you are a WordPress user or developer that is using Facebook or Instagram embeds, there are some community plugins that aim to bring support. For continued support, sites or applications will need to register developer accounts with Facebook, and add the relevant API keys to all requests.

Because oEmbed responses are cached in the database using either post metaMeta Meta is a term that refers to the inside workings of a group. For us, this is the team that works on internal WordPress sites like WordCamp Central and Make WordPress. or the hidden oembed_cache post type (currently used only in widgets), any embed added prior to the October 24th deadline will be preserved past the deprecation date. These posts are not purged by default in WordPress Core, so the contents of the embed will persist unless manually deleted.

Any new embeds added after the October 24th deadline will return the URLURL A specific web address of a website or web page on the Internet, such as a website’s URL www.wordpress.org as a link if the Graph API request is not performed using a token.

To follow along with the changes to address this in WordPress Core, check out the ticket on Trac (#50861).

Props @francina, @desrosj, @clorith for proofread and review.