Consent management for WordPress
A cookie banner your other plugins actually listen to. Consent Studio declares WordPress opt-in and then sets the WP Consent API from every answer, so anything built against it holds back until your visitor decides.
- Official plugin
- Speaks the WP Consent API
- Hardened against ad blockers
From €10 a month. No credit card, no per-visitor billing.
A cookie banner that works with WordPress
WordPress has a consent standard of its own, and plugins that respect it are waiting to be told. This is what tells them.
Opt-in is declared before anything runs
The first thing set is that this site is opt-in. That single declaration is what the WP Consent API hands to every plugin reading it, so a plugin deciding whether to fire has the right rule before it has an answer, rather than assuming the permissive one.
- WP Consent API
- Opt-in declared first
Five categories, from your three
Analytics and marketing map straight across. Functional carries three of WordPress’s own: functional itself, preferences, and anonymous analytics, which is the category for measurement that identifies nobody. Every one of the five starts denied until your visitor answers.
- Five WordPress categories
- Denied until answered
Google Consent Mode v2, from the same answer
The plugin ships Consent Mode v2 defaults as well, so Google’s tags get the denied state before they run and the update the moment your visitor chooses. One answer, two audiences: the plugins on your site and the tags in your tag manager.
- Consent Mode v2 included
- One answer, both
Serving California as well as the EU?
The GDPR and the CCPA ask for opposite defaults, and a banner built for one of them quietly gets the other wrong.
Opposite defaults, one banner
The GDPR wants marketing denied until a visitor agrees. The CCPA runs the other way, as an opt-out. Region rules give each visitor the right starting state, so one banner answers both without a second install for the US.
Global Privacy Control is respected
California treats a browser opt-out signal as a request you have to honour. Consent Studio reads GPC and can apply it before the banner is ever shown, on every plan.
One record, both regimes
Whichever default a region gets, the decision goes into the same consent log. There is nothing separate to keep in step when an auditor asks for one history.
One answer controls every tool on your site
A banner that only governs the platform leaves everything you added on top of it running. Consent Studio speaks to the tools around it as well, and by default holds anything it does not recognise until the visitor says otherwise.
Discover All Integrations
Choose how to install the cookie banner
Every route ends with the same banner and the same consent record. Pick the one that fits how your site is built.
Official plugin
Recommended RouteUpload the official plugin from your WordPress admin and activate it. It loads the banner ahead of everything else on the page, keeps itself updated, and is the route hardened against ad blockers.
- Installed from your admin
- Updates with the platform
Direct code
Add the snippet to your theme’s head instead, through your theme or a code snippets plugin. Full control over placement, and yours to update when the installed script changes.
- Full control
- No dependencies
Google Tag Manager
Already running Google Tag Manager? Add our official tag from the Community Template Gallery on the Consent Initialization trigger. Nothing goes into WordPress at all.
- Official tag template
- No site deploy
How to set up cookie consent for WordPress
Four steps and about ten minutes. You need access to your WordPress admin, and nothing else.
Add your site in Consent Studio
Create the site and the banner is generated for your domain, with your categories, your text and your styling. All of that lives in Consent Studio rather than in WordPress, so changing it later never means touching the site again.
Upload and activate the plugin
Download the official plugin from our help center, then upload it under Plugins in your WordPress admin and activate it. It is an upload rather than a search in the WordPress plugin directory, which is worth knowing before you go looking for it there. Once active, it loads the banner ahead of the rest of the page.
Switch the WordPress integration on
Open Web CMP and go to Integrations, then enable the WordPress Consent API. This is the half that makes your other plugins listen. The plugin puts the banner on the site; the integration is what declares the site opt-in and sets the five consent categories from every answer.
Check what your plugins actually do
A plugin only respects consent if it was built to read the WP Consent API, and plenty were not. Consent Studio’s weekly crawl lists what your pages actually load, which is where a plugin phoning home shows up. Anything that ignores the standard can still be held by marking its embed in your template.
A cookie banner alone is not enough
Most sites are leaking before anyone notices. Not through malice, but through a tag somebody added in a hurry, a vendor that changed its script, a plugin that phones home.
- Unconsented tracking
- Unwanted overseas transfers
- Consent records you cannot produce
- Scripts you never approved
The Full Consent Stack.
Three products, one consent record. What a visitor agreed to in the banner is what every downstream tag sees.
Which plan WordPress needs, and why
Essential covers this page. The plugin and the WP Consent API are on every plan, so one WordPress site needs nothing more.
Essential is enough
€10/month
- The official plugin and the WP Consent API
- Google Consent Mode v2, shipped with it
- Unlimited pages, 200,000 consent actions a month
What Professional adds
€36/month
Worth it once the plugin list keeps growing, or the site belongs to a client.
- More depth: HTTP consent cookies, accessibility, re-prompting
- On-demand scans, after activating a plugin
- Sitemap scanning, for archive and tag pages
- Unlimited collaborators, Essential includes two
Every plan includes
Trusted by organisations that care about privacy
Frequently asked questions about WordPress
What is the WP Consent API?
It is WordPress’s own standard for passing a visitor’s consent between plugins. A consent platform sets the categories, and any plugin built to read them checks before it stores or sends anything. It defines the categories and the plumbing; it does not ask the visitor, which is what a cookie banner is for.
Does a WordPress cookie banner plugin make a site GDPR compliant?
Only if the banner actually governs what runs. A notice that appears while your analytics and marketing plugins keep firing changes nothing, and that is the common failure. What matters is whether consent is obtained before storage, whether the answer reaches your other plugins, and whether the decision is recorded.
Do I need a plugin to add Consent Studio to WordPress?
No, but it is the route we recommend. The plugin loads the banner ahead of the rest of the page, updates itself, and is hardened against ad blockers. Adding the snippet to your theme’s head or deploying through Google Tag Manager both work, and both leave the updating to you.
Is the Consent Studio plugin in the WordPress plugin directory?
It is an upload rather than a directory install. Download it from our help center, then add it under Plugins in your WordPress admin and activate it, which needs access to /wp-admin and nothing else. It updates itself from there.
Will Consent Studio work with plugins that ignore the WP Consent API?
Yes, by a different route. Plugins built against the standard are handled automatically. Anything that ignores it is held the way any third-party embed is: mark it in your template with the consent category it needs, and Consent Studio releases it once that category is granted.
Can I use Consent Studio in combination with WPML?
Yes. WPML translates your pages; the banner is served by Consent Studio, which carries its own set of languages, configured in Web CMP rather than through WPML. It follows the language of the page it loads on, so the Dutch version of your site shows the Dutch banner and the German version the German one. Set the languages once in your dashboard and every translated page is covered.
Get Started with the Full Consent Stack
Everything you need in one bundle. Consent Studio provides you with a consent banner, scanner and client-side tag manager that guarantees no data ever gets transferred overseas.
Read the documentation
Our help center walks through every integration, plugin and template step by step, with screenshots. It is written and kept current by the people who build Consent Studio.