Why and How to Use Disqus with Wordpress

by Matt Langford on June 23, 2009 · Comments

Disqus for Wordpress

If you haven’t heard, Disqus is an excellent comment replacement system for Wordpress and other blogging platforms. In addition to all basic functionality, it is also well integrated with Facebook Connect and Twitter.

I am going to detail for you the reasons I chose to switch to Disqus and how I did it. While pretty much everything I say will apply to all blogs and themes, a few things will be specific to Wordpress.


Benefits & Advantages of Using Disqus

socialSocial Network Integration. All commenters can leave remarks in the traditional way by filling out their name, email, website (optionally), and comment. But they can also login using their Facebook or Twitter credentials. This will not only show links to their profiles, but also include their respective profile photo.

If you register with Disqus as a commenter, you can also have links to your blog AND social networks show up on your comment. Of course, disqus also works flawlessly with gravatar, wavatar, etc.

Fewer Plugins on Wordpress. While plugins can add terrific functionality to your blog, too many of them can slow it down and even confuse your readers.

By installing and using the features of Disqus, I was able to delete previously required plugins (such as CommentLuv, Recent Comments, Subscribe to Comments, and Akismet).

profileIndividual Comment Features. With Disqus, users can ‘like’ a quality comment, find the social networks of a commenter, report an inappropriate comment, and reblog a comment with ease.

Additionally, you can also see other comments left (and subscribe to them) by a particular person across ALL blogs with Disqus enabled.

Responsive Support Team. The Disqus team is very involved with their users and they respond in a timely manner. I’ve asked questions via Twitter (@disqus) and via email. In both cases, I received my answer in a very acceptable time frame.

How to Use/Setup Disqus

To be honest, I was expecting to have to deal with countless problems when shifting to Disqus. Removing the current commenting system, transferring all previous comments to disqus, installing disqus, styling it, testing it, and loving it should take a lot of time… Right? Well, simply put — NO, it doesn’t.

Basically, all you have to do is register for an account with Disqus (free) and install the Disqus Comment System plugin. With the plugin, you can easily choose your display options and rules, make simple styling modifications, and import your other comments. When ready, it will remove your current commenting system and replace it with Disqus. Literally 5 minutes of work!

For more complex styling, you can add some simple CSS to your style sheet. (If you’re using the Thesis Theme, just place it in custom.css.)

  • How long did it take for old comments to show up?
  • About an hour. It depends on how many sites are trying to do that at the same time. Trackbacks came first, then comments appeared. You can go to import.disqus.net to see the status of the transfer.

    (Edited: Fixed Link)
  • It shouldn't cause any problems with the import (although I'm not 100% certain), but your domain name registered with Disqus has a typo: You forgot the S at the end of reflectionS. =)
  • You rock, thanks for catching that. When ever I hit "import" under my settings panel I just get a white screen, I was about to email them and ask if that is normal.
  • It did the same for me. If I waited a second though, it would eventually return to the settings page. The link above will show your comment file as being uploaded or processed if it is working correctly.
  • i am using it on my blog since last month and it rocks
  • Looking good!
  • Thanx mate.
  • Mike_hts
    Disqus seems very slick and I've used it to comment on a number of sites. I would love to have a single tool to manage all the various commenting features and functionality on my blog (one Ring to rule them all).

    However I'm concerned about asking people who want to leave a comment on my blog to sign up for yet another service. Have you gotten any pushback from potential commenters not wanting to sign up for Disqus just to leave a comment?

    How easy is it to leave the Disqus service if I want to discontinue it at some point? Will I lose all my comments stored with Disqus if I stop using it on my blog? This might not be an issue and may just be my lack of understanding on how Disqus works.
  • Its not necessary to signup to comment through disqus. Its on many of blogs including me which doesnt require any signups.

    Regarding leaving disqus sometime, you wont lose any comments because Disqus uses copy of your blog comments and your comment still remain on your wordpress blog even if you deactivate Disqus.
  • Everything avinashtech said is correct, but I'd also like to point out: You can comment as a register Disqus user, as a Twitter user, or as a Facebook user... Or simply as a guest in the classic Wordpress way!

    Leaving disqus wouldn't be a problem at all.
  • Mike_hts
    Matt & avinashtech, thanks for clearing those items up. Disqus in now on my Things To Do list to install on my blog.
  • darekjones
    I really like the new features that come along with DISQUS. Specially, the idea of Video commenting is simply amazing.

    Darek from Free Classifieds posting service
  • Yeah, I've considered adding the video functionality too, but I don't yet see a high demand for it. In the future though, it's an absolute possibility!
  • jeremybunner
    Matt, how do I get DISQUS to show the options to connect via twitter & facebook?
  • Jeremy, you can do it in the disqus settings inside wordpress or by logging in via disqus.com.
  • Agreed. What's cool about Disqus is that it is very user friendly and makes it painlessly easy to comment.
  • luwinski
    I am very interested. I have everything ready, and would very much appreciate it.Thanks a lot for sharing........
  • Wow thanks for sharing a review on DISQUS, I've made up my mind to install Disqus on my own blog.
  • Hi Matt. Is there any way to disable the comment feature on Disqus for a given page in Wordpress/Thesis? I would rather it not appear on my Contact and About pages. Thanks in advance!
  • Andrew, yes you can do that, but not in Disqus... It's a Wordpress/Thesis setting. Just go to Thesis Options, then under Display, expand the Comments section. From there, you can disable comments on all pages!
  • Great. Thanks. Does it have to be all or none? Is it possible to remove comments on specific pages while allowing comments on others? I tried disabling comments within the specific page edit, but that did not work with Disqus.
  • You can do that in Wordpress as well -- For whatever page you want to remove comments, click the edit button, then scroll down until you find the options for "Discussion" (underneath the text box and stuff) and deselect "Allow Comments!"
  • I'm finding, that this feature does not work for me. It seems to be that I can have commenting on all pages or none.

    Also, I sent you an email via your contact page regarding custom image headings for sidebar content. Did you happen to see that?

    I hope all is well. Thanks.
  • On your first point, that's really odd... I just tested it out on a couple of sites and it worked without a glitch. If it is something with Thesis, I suggest asking @pearsonified on Twitter.

    For the custom image headings for sidebar widgets, you can use this tutorial by the official DIYthemes Answers site: Style Widgets. Just login with the same info as you use on diythemes.com!
  • I had the same problem, Andrew. Try adding this line of code around line 100 of disqus.php:

    if ( 'closed' == $post->comment_status ) { return false; }

    If you uncheck the "Allow Comments" box in any page or post, the Disqus bar shouldn't show up anymore.
  • Thanks for helping us out! Did this work for you, Andrew?
  • Hi Matt,

    Sorrry for the delayed response.

    tedw4rd's Disqus fix worked like a charm!

    "Try adding this line of code around line 100 of disqus.php:

    if ( 'closed' == $post->comment_status ) { return false; }"

    I'd love to let him know via this thread, but I was unable to respond to his comment as well as your final comment asking me if his tip worked.

    It almost seems like the thread got too narrow and lopped off the reply link. Strange.

    Can you look into this? I'd love to know if it's something I'll need to look out for should my comment threads become as popular as yours!

    Thanks for all your help!
  • In the settings of Disqus, you can set how 'deep' a particular thread can go. I have it set to 5 levels, which is why you couldn't create a 6th.
  • rotaadmiral88
    Thanks to all of you for having this discussion about how to disable comments on specific pages. It's been driving me nuts for two days! :-)
  • Also, this could just be me, but FYI, I've been finding over the last several weeks that in Firefox (Mac) your site loads and then instantly goes blank, leaving a white screen in browser. The only way I have been able to keep this from happening is by activating Firebug as soon as the page begins loading. It appears that somehow this halts a bit of code from loading.

    A few times, just before the page went white, I saw that stylized widget you have for popular/recent posts display "brokenly" for lack of a better term. It seems like a break in the javascript. Just a hunch. The same issue is happening on Alex's site, Blogussion.com. I'll be letting him now as well. Perhaps take a look over there to compare.
  • Thanks for the heads up, but I can't seem to duplicate the problem. I've tried it on Safari and Firefox for mac... As well as Safari, Firefox, IE, Chrome for PC without seeing that. Do you have any plugins installed that may be interfering with something?

    I'd really like to figure this out! A little troubling!
  • The only plugin I have is Firebug. I have made a video of the problem using Snapz Pro. What address should I mail it to? It's 9.5 MB.
  • Jgrubb
    Thanks! This has been driving me nuts for days.
  • I don't really see the point over the default commenting.
  • I know this post is a little older, but I have a question about Disqus. What did you do with your tabbed widget for the recent comments?

    Oh, can you still use commentluv with Disqus? I kinda like it.
  • Mark, Disqus supplies you with code to display your most recent comments (as well as a few other things) that you can very easily insert into your widget as I did.

    As for CommentLuv, I don't believe you can use it with Disqus, but I could be wrong.
  • Matt, I'm curious. How long does it take for a new comment to show up in your widget? (I might have my answer after this post.)

    Also, it seems that commentluv is working with Disqus. I like the way you've customized the comments css. Nice and easy to read. Looks like my next project. :)
  • Mark, It normally does take a few minutes, but nothing crazy. I'm glad you like my css, Thanks!
  • Hey Matt ... dang you always convince me with all this tech stuff. Was just wondering if it'll work with my Thesis comment customization? I flipped the avatar placement, colors, etc. Just scared that I can't make it look pretty, seen some who use Disqus and it looks a little messy.

    Thanks Matt!
    Renee
  • Renee, You can style it pretty easily (most people seem to be taking my css, then making small adjustments where needed). It won't be exactly the same, but you can still make it look nice!

    I see that you're in the process of playing with it now on your blog. Looks like you're waiting on the comments to import. Let me know what you think!
  • beautyfoolrenee
    hey matt, you're quick! Yeah I was testing it out and liked it, though I have no idea how to style it so it looked so messy. It was already 5am here and I was half asleep so I unplugged it for now, though want to re-activate it! I just have a few questions though, hope it ok!

    - where do I see your css? *muahah* I like the cleaner look you're doing so if it's possible to steal your code and make my own adjustments? :)
    - you wouldn't happen to know how to change the avatar to the left side, would you? It started off as that but then I made the avatars bigger in its settings and it changed to the right side by itself.

    Alright, that's all. Thanks Matt :)
    Renee
  • Renee, you know it's no problem! Anytime!

    -To see my css, just click here and scroll down. It's under "disqus comments."
    -To move the avatar, just find the "dsq-header-avatar" property in the above css and float it left. This SHOULD work. =)
  • beautyfoolrenee
    Thank you Matt!

    I am sooooon there. I am trying to figure out how to style the link colors; there is so much pink it looks like overkill!

    I think I'm also going to ask my readers what they think; I'm not sure about the '2 steps' it involves to comment, I suppose most people like to comment and click submit and that's about it. Your readers are all tech-savvy so they know what they are doing, my readers may not understand all its features at first glance. Regardless I really like Disqus but I'm a little scared about that! :(
  • The 2 steps thing is only an option for commenters... They can still leave comments in the traditional way. You don't have to login via Facebook/Twitter/OpenID/Disqus to leave a comment.
  • Hey Matt Disqus seems to be cool.
    Thanks to you blog I came across it.
    I will too try it.
  • I was doing a bit of research about how and why to use Diqus and your informative post came up near the top of Google results. I already knew I wanted to use it on my blog -- I've set up an account. But I wanted to hear some experiences of others before I pointed to it as a "good" idea. Thanks for your insights and tutorial. (And thanks to others who have shared questions and answers.) Your post has a most lively discussion and I will be sure to point others here who are trying to make up their minds. Cheers!
  • Hey matt
    Must say the way you are helping everyone here is amazing. I'm big fan of default wordpress style comment and more over Thesis comment box rocks..
    Though looking at all comments making me to try disqus for a while.. I have seen all the pros here I will rather search for cons , so that I can figure out is it worth dealing with Disqus or not..
  • It's really different for everyone, but I encourage you to install the Disqus plugin and play with it for a bit. If you don't like, simply remove the plugin and everything will return to normal assuming you didn't get hundreds of disqus comments in that timeframe!
  • Matt I receive almost 20-30 comments in a day and I don't mind taking the risk..though if juice is worth to squeeze..
    You have been using it for long, and you have mentioned all the benefits of using it, is there anything which you missed in comment form from default wordpress comment box after moving to Disqus.....??
    Meanwhile thanks a lot for the link to Matt articles..
  • kye
    I stumbled on this article by accident, but boy is it ever timely! Learning how to install disqus on my wordpress blog was one of the jobs on my list today :) --thanks!
  • Thanks for this post. I recently installed Disqus. I've noticed that the load time is slower. Can you say how long it took all of your comments to be transferred? I've got about a weeks worth and than it stops for some reason.

    www.cwmemory.com
    Thanks
  • It took a couple hours for me, but once I had them imported, everything ran smoothly!
  • I just loaded it again and will give it another shot. So if I understand you correctly, it takes a few hours for all the comments to transfer and then it should load more quickly?

    Thanks so much for taking the time to respond.
  • You got it! I went straight to @disqus for this explanation: When you add disqus, you're entered into a queue of other new users. They are processed in order of first come, first serve. The more comments you have, the longer it takes.

    I had about a thousand comments and did the the transfer at a high traffic time -- yet it only took a little less than 2 hours to process them completely.
  • Thanks again. I've got a little more than 8,000 comments so I will do my best to wait it out. :)
  • Hi Matt,

    I was completely sold on Disqus as a commenting system. I loved it so much that I installed it on several sites I manage. Well, it really bit me in the behind.

    I found out today that Disqus has been emailing subscribers the comments submitted on my sites BEFORE THEY ARE APPROVED! Including posts the moderator chose not to approve!

    Many comments that never appeared on the website were emailed to anyone who had commented on that page prior! I couldn't believe it. I was so embarrassed! I had to go to the site owners with my hat in hand.

    Maybe I overlooked something, but I have found no way to stop this from happening. I turned off all notifications for the user's sites on their Disqus profile, but unapproved dummy posts I submitted were again sent to subscribers.

    WTF! Is it me or did Disqus overlook something REALLY REALLY Important???

    I contacted support this morning, and have yet to hear back.

    If anyone knows how to fix this, your help would be greatly appreciated. I would love to reactivate the Disqus plugin for its many useful features.
  • Andrew, that is obviously a big deal, whether or not they choose to acknowledge it. I encourage you to keep us updated via this comment thread of what their response and/or fix to this issue is. I'm pushing a link to your comment out on Twitter right now.
  • Hey. I'm from Disqus.

    This shouldn't be the case, though sometimes edge cases creep up. We'll verify everything is working properly. You can reach me at daniel@disqus.com if you have anymore direct questions (or comment here).
  • Daniel, thanks for stopping by! Hopefully this was just an extreme case, an exception to the rule.
  • Hi Matt. Thanks for your support on this matter. I have replied to Daniel and I will certainly keep you and your readers posted.
  • Would love to know if there was resolution on the issue of emailing comments to subscribers before admin approval. Was this solved? I'm considering using Disqus now. Thanks!
  • I haven't seen the problem arise again for me, so I'm assuming it was fixed globally as well.
  • Hi Brian,

    After going back and forth for about a week, Disqus stopped responding to my requests. They dodged making an effort to resolve the issue and instead chose to hide behind a technicality. The technicality being that at the request of my client, I was unable to send Disqus the original comment that appeared on her website and was the source of our concern.

    I did however reproduce the issue on her site several more times through testing. When I presented this to Disqus, they said that I was wrong and that it was functioning properly.

    Frankly, I found the employee I was dealing with to be rude and unwilling to help. I spoke with Daniel afterward, we never had a disagreement, but he also stopped responding after one or two emails. Disappointing at best.

    I use Disqus on one of my sites now, since privacy is not a concern on that site, but I have removed it from all other sites I manage. If you or you're clients are concerned about privacy and moderation control when handling comments, I would suggest you do the same.
  • I'm glad I scrolled all the way down here... I was ready to use disqus - but I am now holding off to see what this crazy episode was all about!

    Thanks
  • Hi Ellie,

    I'm still working with Disqus to resolve this issue. I will be sure to post the results here.
  • Hi Andrew... So whatever happened with this disqus issue you had on your site?
    I see you are using on your site - so what was that episode you had?
  • Hi Ellie,

    After going back and forth for a couple of days, Disqus stopped responding to my requests. They dodged making an effort to resolve the issue and instead chose to hide behind a technicality. The technicality being that at the request of my client, I was unable to send Disqus the original comment that appeared on her website and was the source of our concern.

    I did however reproduce the issue on her site several more times through testing. When I presented this to Disqus, they said that I was wrong and that it was functioning properly.

    Frankly, I found the employee I was dealing with to be rude and unwilling to help. I spoke with Daniel afterward, we never had a disagreement, but he also stopped responding after one or two emails. Disappointing at best.

    I use Disqus on one of my sites now, since privacy is not a concern on that site, but I have removed it from all other sites I manage. If you or you're clients are concerned about privacy and moderation control when handling comments, I would suggest you do the same.
  • Hi Andrew....
    Thanks so much for responding... I don't want any privacy concerns... so while disqus is interesting - I'm leaving things just as they are for now. ;)
  • Thanks Matt for the tip, and the very useful comments. I've been looking for how to solve some of Disqus' quirks.
  • Thanks Matt. I'm trying this out on my site, and it all looks good so far!

    Keep on posting - I'm learning a lot from you :-)
  • It almost seems like the thread got too narrow and lopped off the reply link. Strange.
  • In the settings, you can choose how many replies are possible. I currently have mine set as 5 deep -- meaning after the 5th deep response, the reply link will disappear. You can set that as high or low as you'd like.
  • still using askimet :(
  • It takes around a week doesnt it, i am not 100% sure. Disqus definitely works real well with wordpress...
  • Hey Matt! How can I use wavatar on DISQUS? I want non-gravatar users to have a unique avatar and I don't know how to do it.

    Thanks in advance! DISQUS rocks. :D
  • Anyone that uses gravatar.com or logs in to comment via twitter/facebook or registers with Disqus will have their avatar displayed.
  • One question again. :D How can I show my latest tweets when I 'expand' my profile? When I hover on your avatar and click the 'Expand' I can see your latest tweet. How can I do that? Please help. Thank you so much!
  • Basically, you just have to register your account with Disqus (free) and list your twitter account when doing so. That's it!
  • So I can just install this and go? It's really that straightforward? I'm worried about breaking things :P
  • Yep, it's that simple! And if you don't like, the uninstall process is just as easy!
  • That was so easy! I am awaiting the import to complete now (not like I have many comments yet anyway :( but still!) Thanks man, you gave me that boost of confidence I needed to go for it. I'm a nerd, I like to think I am anyway, and this was way easier than most functionality-extending plugins.
  • Glad to help. Let me know if you like it... or have any other questions!
  • I am using it since ages, and it's lovable. I was wondering why doesn't anyone write about it. And now I found you! I love DISQUS.
  • Disqus is great but you will never have an all round superstar product that fits everyone's needs. I say it offers a lot of things and sure interlinks major blogging platforms great which is (imho) great.
  • I guess Disqus already has too many features :D

    And this article has too many comments! bwahahah =))
  • i am using it on my blog since last week, Thank you!
  • Very welcome! Glad you like it!
  • Thanks Matt! I found DISQUS on Mashable, like it and was looking for more info of what it was about and if I could use it on WordPress. I found your this blog post very useful! I am putting my blog together now and will definitely integrate this, Its awesome and easy to use once you understand it.
  • Dude! Wow! That was a Snap! Thax again, Matt :)
  • 1st of all thanx Matt, this whole discussion cleared alot of my querries except 1.i used disqus for 1week and now back to my default thesis comment box. if am correct then all my comments go into disquz database which i can extract through xml. i can use the option to import comments from wordpress to new disqus system, but if after say a few weeks or months, am having issues with disqus and i want to revert back to my old thesis comment box, then how can i import all comments from disqus to my wordpress db.??
  • Just installed Disqus! Hopefully everything will work correctly... time will tell.
  • Thanks for this well written article, after reading it, I installed the Disqus plugin. Relatively simple installation, and import of the massive amounts of comments that I had already on my blog. I am wondering about twitter integration, but I guess that will be answered in time...
  • What do you mean by twitter integration? You can login using twitter, links from twitter are posted below the comments, and you can tweet your comment out.
  • Ahhh... I did not exactly understand how disqus and twitter worked together, it makes more sense to me now...
  • I was thinking of using Discus with wordpress. You have really solved my problem . Thanks for this.
  • Thanks a lot for introducing me to Disqus!

    However, I can't seem to get it to import comments. This message keeps appearing: There was an error exporting your comments. If your API key has changed, you may need to reinstall DISQUS (deactivate the plugin and then reactivate it). If you are still having issues, refer to the WordPress help page.

    Also, Disqus gets mixed in with my after post boxes. I use the Thesis theme.

    Any ideas to whats wrong?

    Thanks!
  • Jake - Disqus is awesome. I've been using it on my personal blog for some time now.

    however, like yourself, on my new blog I am encountering the very same error that you are. I have not had it resolved as yet. Have you?

    I have found the following blog article (http://blog.justinkorn.com/2009/01/welcome-disq...) which proposes a fix but it didn't work for me.

    I'm still waiting on Disqus support to figure out what's wrong. When they do - and if you've still got the same issue - I'll let you know!
  • Guest
    In the process of setting it up now.
  • install the plugin
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