Description
EchoThread is a lightweight, privacy-first comment system — a modern Disqus alternative that doesn’t sell your readers’ data or inject ads. This plugin drops EchoThread into any WordPress theme with no code: enter your site key, choose where comments appear, and you’re live.
It’s a thin wrapper around the hosted EchoThread widget (~55 KB gzipped, loaded async from a CDN). All storage, rendering, moderation, and spam filtering happen in the hosted service, so the plugin adds no tracking, no database tables, and no page-weight beyond the widget script.
Why EchoThread
- Privacy-first — no ad tech, no third-party trackers, no data resale. GDPR-friendly.
- AI / ML spam filtering — machine-learning moderation catches AI-generated comment spam that keyword filters miss.
- Real moderation controls — a per-site restricted-word list, ban or trust individual commenters in one click, and auto-close discussions on older posts.
- Threaded replies & reactions — a modern discussion UX, not a flat list.
- Fast — one async script, zero render-blocking, no jQuery.
- Free tier — get started without a credit card.
- Disqus migration — import your existing comments via WXR so no conversations are lost.
- Real counts on your archives — category, tag and home-page teasers show the live EchoThread count instead of the stale WordPress number a migration leaves behind.
How it works
- Create a free account and a site at echothread.io.
- Install and activate this plugin.
- Go to Settings EchoThread Comments, paste your shortname and API key.
- Choose placement — Replace the theme comments (recommended), Append below content, or Manual via the
[echothread]shortcode.
That’s it. Comments render on your posts immediately.
Privacy
This plugin loads https://cdn.echothread.io/widget.js on singular posts/pages where comments are enabled. The widget communicates with the EchoThread API to load and post comments. The plugin itself sets no cookies and collects no personal data. See the EchoThread privacy policy for how the hosted service handles comment data.
Screenshots
Installation
- Upload the
threadbridge-comments-for-echothreadfolder to/wp-content/plugins/, or install via Plugins Add New. - Activate the plugin through the Plugins screen.
- Visit Settings EchoThread Comments and enter your site shortname and API key from your EchoThread dashboard.
- Save. Comments appear on your posts according to the placement you chose.
FAQ
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Do I need an EchoThread account?
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Yes — create one free at echothread.io. The plugin needs your site’s shortname and public API key.
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Is the API key safe to expose?
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Yes. The API key is a public, embeddable credential designed to live in page HTML. It only lets visitors load and post comments on your registered site; it cannot access or change your account.
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Will this slow down my site?
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No. The widget is ~55 KB gzipped, loads asynchronously from a CDN, and never blocks page rendering. The plugin adds no other assets.
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Can I migrate my existing WordPress or Disqus comments?
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Yes. Export your WordPress comments from Tools Export (WXR), then import them in your EchoThread dashboard. Disqus XML exports are also supported.
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Does the plugin track my visitors?
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No. The plugin adds no analytics, no cookies, and no third-party trackers.
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How do I show comments somewhere specific?
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Set placement to Manual and add the
[echothread]shortcode wherever you want the thread to appear. -
Why do my category pages say “0 Comments”?
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Because WordPress stops counting once EchoThread hosts the comments — the number under a teaser comes from WordPress’s own table, which nothing updates any more. A site that migrated from Disqus sees the count it had on the day it switched; a site that never used native comments sees zero.
Turn on Archive comment counts in Settings EchoThread Comments and those numbers come from EchoThread instead. It costs one request per page however many teasers are on it, and whatever your theme already prints stays exactly as it is if the request fails.
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Can I put a comment count somewhere myself?
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Yes —
[echothread-count]inside the loop, or[echothread-count id="123"]for a specific post. Addtext="Join the discussion"to choose what shows until the count arrives.
Reviews
Contributors & Developers
“Comments – EchoThread” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.
Contributors
Translate “Comments – EchoThread” into your language.
Interested in development?
Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.
Changelog
1.3.0
- Added: real comment counts on category, tag, author and home-page listings. WordPress stops updating its own counts once EchoThread takes over, so those teasers showed a number frozen at migration time — or zero. Turn on Archive comment counts in the settings screen. One request fills a whole page, and your theme’s existing markup is left alone if it fails.
- Added: the
[echothread-count]shortcode, for placing a count yourself. - Comment counts now include replies, matching the count shown on the post itself.
1.2.0
- Renamed to “Comments – EchoThread”. Same plugin, same settings, same slug — the old name hid what it actually does. The settings screen now lives under Settings EchoThread Comments.
- The feature list now mentions the moderation tools that shipped alongside it: a per-site restricted-word list, per-commenter ban/trust, and auto-closing discussions on older posts.
1.1.0
- Fixed: “Replace the theme comments” now works on block themes. Block themes render a comments block instead of calling the classic comments template, so on every default theme since Twenty Twenty-Two the recommended placement silently did nothing and the native comments stayed put.
- Fixed: on classic themes the widget no longer breaks out of the content column. The replacement template re-declares the comment area’s wrapper, so themes that constrain comment width keep constraining it.
- Tested up to WordPress 7.1.
1.0.0
- Initial release: settings page (shortname, API key, placement, theme, accent color), replace/append/shortcode placement, async widget loading, WXR migration guidance, multisite-safe uninstall.