How To Add a PayPal Donate Button to WordPress : Beginner’s Guide

Thinking about how to add a PayPal donate button to your WordPress website? Congratulations, you landed on the right page :D. In this article I’ll show you how you can add a PayPal button to WordPress.

I think just about everyone knows what PayPal is at this point. It is an easy way to transfer money to almost every nooks and corner of the world within seconds. Payment is an integral part of online monetary transactions, and is especially important to those who own an e-commerce site. Besides, many bloggers and even non-profit organizations add PayPal buttons on their sites.

Coming back to the topic at hand, in this post, I will guide you through two ways of adding a PayPal Donate button in WordPress. The first one is by using a plugin and the second will be a manual method. Unlike WordPress.org, WordPress.com doesn’t allow you to install plugins. (Difference between WordPress.org and WordPress.com) Thus, you will have to go for the latter option in that case. The manual method is also useful when you don’t want to use the plugin. Anyways, it’s not a really bad thing to do something manually sometimes.

So, let’s get started…

Method 1: By using a plugin to add a PayPal Button

Before we start, the very first thing you need to have a PayPal account. If you already have one, log in to your account and you can go to the next step. Those who have not created one, you can create a PayPal account now.

Then, install and activate a PayPal plugin. (You can also check out on our detailed step-by-step guide on how to install WordPress Plugins on your site).  There are lots of WordPress plugins available but for this article, I have installed a free version of PayPal Donation plugin.

Once activated, go to PayPal Donations >> Settings for the configuration of the plugin.

Here, you will see four different sections. The first one is for Usage that is for the user manual. Next, Language & Currency section where you need to enter the language and the currency type you want your payment to be in.

After that, the third section is for PayPal Account. You need to enter your PayPal email that you used to create a PayPal account in the live account field.

The last you will see is for other settings like button style, page redirection when the button is clicked, etc. Moreover, you can create a page to redirect your users to that page after the make the payments or cancel it. For example, you can create a Thank you page and insert the URL of that page on the Return URL field. Lastly, click on the Save Settings button.

After that, go to PayPal Donations >> Buttons. Next, you will be redirected to a page where you can see a “New PayPal Donation Button” on the right side. Click on that button. Next, you will be redirected to a page where you can add the fixed amount, the purpose of your donation and more as shown in the figure below. Click on Save PayPal Donation Button. After the button is created, you can easily add the Paypal donation button to any posts or page of your choice using the shortcode. Alternatively, the plugin also installs a widget automatically. Thus, you also have an option to add a PayPal donation button on the sidebar  To do this, go to Appearance >> Widgets. Then, drag and drop the ” PayPal Donation Button ” widget to any available sidebar you like. Lastly, click on the save button.

Method 2: Manually Adding PayPal Donate button to WordPress

Undoubtedly, the use of this plugin can make your task very easy and it works exceptionally well. However, there are times when we do need to add the button manually. For instance, WordPress.com does not allow us to install any plugins. In that case, this method would be rather fruitful. Furthermore, this method can also be used by WordPress users prefer the manual methods rather than installing plugins.

Alright, you need to first login to your PayPal account. Then, click on the Tools menu item. After that, click on the PayPal Button icon as shown in the image below:

On the next page, you will see a link for creating a new button on the right. Click on it.

Then, you will be redirected to the button creation page. Here, select the options donations under the button type. After that, you can choose the language, currency, amount, etc.  Once you are done with the settings, click on the “Create Button”.

After that, you will see the code on the next page that you will need to display the PayPal donation button. Simply, click on the email tab. Then, copy and paste the given URL into a notepad or any other text editor as per your convenience.

Next, go to the dashboard and then select the page or a post where you want to add the PayPal button. Make sure you are in the Text editor mode. Then, copy and paste the code given below.

 <a href="Your Email URL that you got from PayPal" target="_blank" rel="nofollow" > <img src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/x-click-but21.gif" alt="" /></a> 

Next thing you need to keep in mind that you replace the email URL which you received from PayPal with the link that you copied in your text editor.

And that’s it. This is how we can add a PayPal donate button without using any plugins in a few simple steps.

Summarizing It All

Different people can have the different purpose of adding a PayPal donate button to their WordPress site. Whatever the reasons may be, it helps in generating some revenues. Thus, it aids in generating funds for good causes. All in all, adding the PayPal donate button to your WordPress sites is also very helpful for someone who wants to make some donations. And, of course, accepting donations on your website is made more convenient.

Hopefully, this article helped you all to easily add a PayPal donate button to WordPress. If you liked this article, please feel free to check out on our other articles.

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