Are you planning to sell goods online to an international audience? If so, then it’s a good idea to consider providing users with currency conversion.
Currency conversion software lets your prospects translate international currency transactions to their local currency when checking out products on e-commerce sites. It also lets visitors view the exact amount their card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their home currency.
One great advantage of adding currency conversion to your site is that it lets your customers view and understand prices in foreign countries in their own local currency, and makes it easier for purchasers to calculate their costs and expenses.
If your site is powered by WordPress, it’s easy and simple to add currency conversion via a plugin to your WP web site, allowing your visitors to quickly understand the cost of your products.
Currencyr – Free Currency Converter For WP Sites
Currencyr is an intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a unique converter tooltip. It’s also free!
Plugin features include the following:
- Inline conversion tool
- Supports various exchange rates providers, like Google, Open Exchange Rates & European Central Bank
- WP-Cron task scheduler enabled
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Supports integration with a number of online store plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Can detect local currency automatically
- Supports full translations
Note: This plugin needs your server to be running PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you currently have an older version of PHP installed. Ask your webhosting provider to check and upgrade your PHP.
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You can install the Currencyr plugin from your WordPress dashboard by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking the “Install Now” button …
When you have installed and activated the plugin, you can configure the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your WordPress admin menu …
This takes you to the plugin settings page …
For example, you can choose your base currency from a drop-down menu if you want a different currency than the default option ’United States Dollar’ …
You can also choose which data provider you want to use from the drop-down menu in the Provider section. The default provider is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can also select another provider, such as FoxRate or Google Finance …
Note: If you select Open Exchange Rates as your provider, an API (Application Programming Interface) is required …
You can specify how often you would like the currency exchange rates to be updated by choosing an option from the Update Rates dropdown menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which is an open-source library of Javascript code that lets web developers add things like animation effects to web applications (e.g. WordPress plugins).
Unless you have a reason to change the jQuery settings, just ignore this section …
Configure the rest of the plugin settings to suit your own preferences and don’t forget to click ‘Save Changes’ when done …
After your plugin settings have been configured, you can easily add currency conversion to any WP page or post using shortcodes.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, AUD, CAD, etc …) in this plugin.
Plugin Shortcodes
You can easily insert currency conversion into WordPress pages, posts and widgets without editing code using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to your WordPress pages and posts:
Let’s say that you are selling your product online for a set amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to show this amount converted into British pounds (GBP) on your product information page.
All you need to do is insert the following shortcode to your page content …
Note: You can also display amounts in dollars and cents (e.g. 16.95, 22.00, 149.00, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode should look after you have inserted it into a page …
Once your content has been published, your currency conversion will display like this …
Using the same example, let’s now display the same amount into multiple currency formats.
To do this, use the shortcode shown below (add as many currency symbols as you like separated by vertical pipes) …
The example below now shows how the shortcode looks when inserted into a post …
After publishing your information, the currency conversion will then appear like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to change the currency separator symbol with this plugin.
Now, let’s say that you would like to specify a different base currency than the one set as your default.
For example, say you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your site targeted to non-European visitors (e.g. Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below shows how the above shortcode looks when you add it to a page …
After publishing your page or post, the converted currency amounts will then display like this …
Plugin Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your website or blog’s sidebar using the plugin’s widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar, choose Appearance > Widgets in your WordPress dashboard menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets area find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and drag it to the Active Widgets area …
Configure the widget settings as shown below (add currency codes separated by a comma), and click Save to save your settings …
Your currency conversion tool will now show on your sidebar menu with the options you have specified when configuring the widget …
Additional Plugin Notes
This section contains additional information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin allows you to specify the symbol to display as the currency separator when using several currencies.
You can change the symbol in the ‘Multiple Separator’ settings section.
So, for example, using the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Separates all your currency amounts with a forward slash as shown below …
If you change this symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your site visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Integration
As mentioned earlier, the plugin can be integrated with a number of WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: Currencyr plugin site)
Congratulations! Now you know how to easily add a currency converter to your WordPress website.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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