How do I get the Vimeo links that will make my developer love me?

First of all: Plus or pro

Unfortunately, this feature only exists for people with a Vimeo Plus or Vimeo Pro account. Are you a client of ours with just a handful of videos? Then just drop us a message and we’ll sort everything out for you.

Update: as of June 2023, Vimeo has renamed its plans. Plus is now called ‘starter’ and Pro is now called ‘standard’

Got a few more videos, and would it be handy to manage and upload them yourself? Then I’d recommend getting your own Plus or Pro account.

The hunt for the right links.

If we manage a website for you and you have an option somewhere to add a video, the input “Vimeo URL” probably looks familiar. Maybe your instinct was to drop the Vimeo share URL in there. Good thinking! But unfortunately that won’t work.

On Plus and Pro accounts, Vimeo generates a set of “Distribution links” for every video you upload. These links host the videos as ‘raw’ files on Vimeo’s (fast) servers. With these URLs, your developer can build your videos seamlessly into a web design that scales responsively. And as a nice bonus, the video loads without all sorts of annoying scripts from a video embed.

Sadly, these distribution links are a bit hidden. So let me walk you through it, screenshot by screenshot.

Step 1: Upload your video

In your dashboard, upload your video by clicking “New Video” or dragging and dropping the video file into your browser.

Step 2: Find the settings

You might have to wait a moment until your video has uploaded, but once it has, you can ‘manage’ the video. Click ‘Settings’ on the right.

Step 3: Find the advanced settings

A menu now slides out on the right. Click “Advanced settings” at the bottom.

Step 4: Open the Distribution tab

Now you’re in the real settings. Click “Distribution” in the left-hand navigation.

Step 5: Video File links

Another menu folds out on the left. Click “Video file links”.

Step 6: Found it!

The expanded menu now scrolls down to the following list:

Step 7: Make a choice

Here are the formats once more:

• HLS (m3u8)
• DASH (mpd)
• HD 1080p (mp4, 1920x1080)
• HD 720p (mp4, 1280x720)
• SD 540p (mp4, 960x540)
• SD 360p (mp4, 640x360)
• SD 240p (mp4, 426x240)

For fullscreen homepage landing sections I’d go for 1080p. For everything else, 720p is enough. And don’t forget: the lighter the video, the faster your page loads. Important for your SEO score too.

If the video ends up in a small spot that would only fill a quarter of a desktop screen, I’d even recommend SD 540p.

Step 8: Profit

Once you’ve made your choice, click “Copy link”, paste it into the “Vimeo URL” input in our custom back-end aaaand… Voila! The video is on your website.

Tip for the pros

Need to load more than 20 videos while filling your website? Here’s how I do it:

1. I collect the Vimeo IDs of all the videos I need in a list. Something like 459386023.
2. In your browser, open the management page of the first video on your list, with the Vimeo ID in the URL, followed by /distribution#video-file-links.
3. You now land straight on the advanced settings page, with the distribution links expanded and already scrolled to the video file links.
4. Copy the link you need and paste it wherever it has to go.
5. In the URL from step 2, replace the Vimeo ID with the next one on your list.
6. You land straight on the advanced settings page again, with the distribution links expanded and already scrolled to the video file links.

This way you don’t have to click 6 times per video before you reach the list of URLs. Super handy.

Thanks for reading, ciao.