Shortcodes
What a shortcode is
Hugo loves Markdown because of its simple content format, but there are times when Markdown falls short. Often, content authors are forced to add raw HTML (e.g., video <iframe>
’s) to Markdown content. We think this contradicts the beautiful simplicity of Markdown’s syntax.
Hugo created shortcodes to circumvent these limitations.
A shortcode is a simple snippet inside a content file that Hugo will render using a predefined template. Note that shortcodes will not work in template files. If you need the type of drop-in functionality that shortcodes provide but in a template, you most likely want a partial template instead.
In addition to cleaner Markdown, shortcodes can be updated any time to reflect new classes, techniques, or standards. At the point of site generation, Hugo shortcodes will easily merge in your changes. You avoid a possibly complicated search and replace operation.
Use shortcodes
In your content files, a shortcode can be called by calling {{% shortcodename parameters %}}
. Shortcode parameters are space delimited, and parameters with internal spaces can be quoted.
The first word in the shortcode declaration is always the name of the shortcode. Parameters follow the name. Depending upon how the shortcode is defined, the parameters may be named, positional, or both, although you can’t mix parameter types in a single call. The format for named parameters models that of HTML with the format name="value"
.
Some shortcodes use or require closing shortcodes. Again like HTML, the opening and closing shortcodes match (name only) with the closing declaration, which is prepended with a slash.
Here are two examples of paired shortcodes:
{{% mdshortcode %}}Stuff to `process` in the *center*.{{% /mdshortcode %}}
{{< highlight go >}} A bunch of code here {{< /highlight >}}
The examples above use two different delimiters, the difference being the %
character in the first and the <>
characters in the second.
Shortcodes with raw string parameters
You can pass multiple lines as parameters to a shortcode by using raw string literals:
{{< myshortcode `This is some <b>HTML</b>,
and a new line with a "quoted string".` >}}
Shortcodes with markdown
Shortcodes using the %
as the outer-most delimiter will be fully rendered when sent to the content renderer. This means that the rendered output from a shortcode can be part of the page’s table of contents, footnotes, etc.
Shortcodes without markdown
The <
character indicates that the shortcode’s inner content does not need further rendering. Often shortcodes without Markdown include internal HTML:
{{< myshortcode >}}<p>Hello <strong>World!</strong></p>{{< /myshortcode >}}
Nested shortcodes
You can call shortcodes within other shortcodes by creating your own templates that leverage the .Parent
variable. .Parent
allows you to check the context in which the shortcode is being called. See Shortcode templates.
Use Hugo’s built-in shortcodes
Hugo ships with a set of predefined shortcodes that represent very common usage. These shortcodes are provided for author convenience and to keep your Markdown content clean.
figure
figure
is an extension of the image syntax in Markdown, which does not provide a shorthand for the more semantic HTML5 <figure>
element.
The figure
shortcode can use the following named parameters:
- src
- URL of the image to be displayed.
- link
- If the image needs to be hyperlinked, URL of the destination.
- target
- Optional
target
attribute for the URL iflink
parameter is set. - rel
- Optional
rel
attribute for the URL iflink
parameter is set. - alt
- Alternate text for the image if the image cannot be displayed.
- title
- Image title.
- caption
- Image caption. Markdown within the value of
caption
will be rendered. - class
class
attribute of the HTMLfigure
tag.- height
height
attribute of the image.- width
width
attribute of the image.- loading
loading
attribute of the image.- attr
- Image attribution text. Markdown within the value of
attr
will be rendered. - attrlink
- If the attribution text needs to be hyperlinked, URL of the destination.
Example figure
input
{{< figure src="elephant.jpg" title="An elephant at sunset" >}}
Example figure
output
<figure>
<img src="elephant.jpg">
<figcaption>An elephant at sunset</figcaption>
</figure>
gist
To display a GitHub gist with this URL:
https://gist.github.com/user/50a7482715eac222e230d1e64dd9a89b
Include this in your markdown:
{{< gist user 50a7482715eac222e230d1e64dd9a89b >}}
This will display all files in the gist alphabetically by file name.
To display a specific file within the gist:
{{< gist user 50a7482715eac222e230d1e64dd9a89b 1-template.html >}}
Rendered:
highlight
To display a highlighted code sample:
{{< highlight go-html-template >}}
{{ range .Pages }}
<h2><a href="{{ .RelPermalink }}">{{ .LinkTitle }}</a></h2>
{{ end }}
{{< /highlight >}}
Rendered:
{{ range .Pages }}
<h2><a href="{{ .RelPermalink }}">{{ .LinkTitle }}</a></h2>
{{ end }}
To specify one or more highlighting options, include a quotation-encapsulated, comma-separated list:
{{< highlight go-html-template "lineNos=inline, lineNoStart=42" >}}
{{ range .Pages }}
<h2><a href="{{ .RelPermalink }}">{{ .LinkTitle }}</a></h2>
{{ end }}
{{< /highlight >}}
Rendered:
42{{ range .Pages }}
43 <h2><a href="{{ .RelPermalink }}">{{ .LinkTitle }}</a></h2>
44{{ end }}
instagram
The instagram
shortcode uses Facebook’s oEmbed Read feature. The Facebook developer documentation states:
- This permission or feature requires successful completion of the App Review process before your app can access live data. Learn More
- This permission or feature is only available with business verification. You may also need to sign additional contracts before your app can access data. Learn More Here
You must obtain an Access Token to use the instagram
shortcode.
If your site configuration is private:
services:
instagram:
accessToken: xxx
[services]
[services.instagram]
accessToken = 'xxx'
{
"services": {
"instagram": {
"accessToken": "xxx"
}
}
}
If your site configuration is not private, set the Access Token with an environment variable:
HUGO_SERVICES_INSTAGRAM_ACCESSTOKEN=xxx hugo --gc --minify
To display an Instagram post with this URL:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BWNjjyYFxVx/
Include this in your markdown:
{{< instagram BWNjjyYFxVx >}}
param
Gets a value from the current Page's
parameters set in front matter, with a fallback to the site parameter value. It will log an ERROR
if the parameter with the given key could not be found in either.
{{< param testparam >}}
Since testparam
is a parameter defined in front matter of this page with the value Hugo Rocks!
, the above will print:
To access deeply nested parameters, use “dot syntax”, e.g:
{{< param "my.nested.param" >}}
ref
and relref
These shortcodes will look up the pages by their relative path (e.g., blog/post.md
) or their logical name (post.md
) and return the permalink (ref
) or relative permalink (relref
) for the found page.
ref
and relref
also make it possible to make fragmentary links that work for the header links generated by Hugo.
ref
and relref
take exactly one required parameter of reference, quoted and in position 0
.
Example ref
and relref
input
[Neat]({{< ref "blog/neat.md" >}})
[Who]({{< relref "about.md#who" >}})
Example ref
and relref
output
Assuming that standard Hugo pretty URLs are turned on.
<a href="https://example.com/blog/neat">Neat</a>
<a href="/about/#who">Who</a>
tweet
To display a Twitter post with this URL:
https://twitter.com/SanDiegoZoo/status/1453110110599868418
Include this in your markdown:
{{< tweet user="SanDiegoZoo" id="1453110110599868418" >}}
Rendered:
Owl bet you'll lose this staring contest 🦉 pic.twitter.com/eJh4f2zncC
— San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance (@sandiegozoo) October 26, 2021
vimeo
To display a Vimeo video with this URL:
https://vimeo.com/channels/staffpicks/55073825
Include this in your markdown:
{{< vimeo 55073825 >}}
Rendered:
youtube
The youtube
shortcode embeds a responsive video player for YouTube videos. Only the ID of the video is required, e.g.:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7Ft2ymGmfc
Example youtube
input
Copy the YouTube video ID that follows v=
in the video’s URL and pass it to the youtube
shortcode:
{{< youtube w7Ft2ymGmfc >}}
Furthermore, you can automatically start playback of the embedded video by setting the autoplay
parameter to true
. Remember that you can’t mix named and unnamed parameters, so you’ll need to assign the yet unnamed video ID to the parameter id
:
{{< youtube id="w7Ft2ymGmfc" autoplay="true" >}}
For accessibility reasons, it’s best to provide a title for your YouTube video. You can do this using the shortcode by providing a title
parameter. If no title is provided, a default of “YouTube Video” will be used.
{{< youtube id="w7Ft2ymGmfc" title="A New Hugo Site in Under Two Minutes" >}}
Example youtube
output
Using the preceding youtube
example, the following HTML will be added to your rendered website’s markup:
<div style="position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden;">
<iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/w7Ft2ymGmfc?autoplay=1" style="position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; border:0;" allowfullscreen title="YouTube Video"></iframe>
</div>
Example youtube
display
Using the preceding youtube
example (without autoplay="true"
), the following simulates the displayed experience for visitors to your website. Naturally, the final display will be contingent on your style sheets and surrounding markup. The video is also include in the Quick Start of the Hugo documentation.
Privacy configuration
To learn how to configure your Hugo site to meet the new EU privacy regulation, see Hugo and the GDPR.
Create custom shortcodes
To learn more about creating custom shortcodes, see the shortcode template documentation.