Connecting your account

TubePress is free and fully self-hosted — it runs end to end on your own server with no account required. Linking a free tubepress.io account is entirely optional: it simply unlocks the paid cloud add-ons (the content catalogue, AI features, the marketplace, product announcements and the support desk) when you want them.

Connecting is a one-time step that issues an API key and secret, stored in your CMS. This page explains what connecting unlocks, how the link works, and — just as importantly — what never leaves your server.

Why connect an account

A linked account is the single switch that turns on every optional cloud service. One connection, one shared credit balance, powering:

• The content catalogue — 400,000+ ready-to-publish videos you import on demand.
• AI features — generate and translate titles and descriptions through the AI proxy.
• The marketplace — premium, signed plugins and themes licensed to your domain.
• Product announcements & support — the admin notice bar and the in-admin ticket desk.

Create a free account

Sign up at tubepress.io. Creating an account is free, and new accounts start with 150 free credits so you can try the catalogue and AI features before spending anything. Credits are the prepaid unit shared by every paid service — see credits & AI for how they work and how to top up.

Link your CMS

Connect from the catalogue settings (open /admin/import → Catalogue) or straight from the Support widget — both share the same flow.

1. Start the connect popup. Click Connect TubePress account. A small window opens at tubepress.io/connect, carrying your site's origin so it knows who is asking.
2. Approve. Sign in and authorise the link. The popup hands an API key and API secret back to your admin securely.
3. Keys are saved. TubePress stores them server-side as catalogue_api_key, catalogue_api_secret and the API URL (https://tubepress.io/v1), then verifies the link by fetching your credit balance.

Prefer to do it by hand? Use Enter API keys manually and paste the key (it starts tp_) and secret from your dashboard. Either way the credentials live only in your CMS settings — every cloud call is signed server-side, so the secret is never exposed to the browser.

The URL binding limit

To curb abuse, tubepress.io limits how many accounts may bind to the same CMS URL: at most two accounts per site URL within any rolling 30-day window. This is enforced on the cloud side when you connect, not by anything in your install.

In normal use you will never hit it — one site, one account. It only matters if you repeatedly re-link a URL to different accounts in a short span. If a bind is refused, wait out the window or connect from the correct account.

Disconnecting & rebinding

To disconnect, clear the API key and secret in the catalogue settings. The connection check then reports the install as not configured, and the paid features fall back to their preview or disabled state — your local content is untouched.

To rebind, run the connect flow again or paste a different account's keys; the new credentials overwrite the old. Remember the URL binding limit applies when a new account binds. If you run paid marketplace items, they re-validate against your domain on the new account — keep the same registrable domain and they keep working.

What stays on your server

Your data never moves to the cloud. Videos, users, comments, taxonomy, pages, settings and all media live in your own MySQL database and storage. The connection is deliberately narrow — tubepress.io only ever sees:

• Your credit balance and the debits/refunds you make.
• The specific catalogue videos you choose to download (then copied to your storage).
• Licence checks for paid items — only your registrable domain (e.g. example.com), never your content.
• Support tickets you open, and the public announcement feed your admin fetches.

Even catalogue thumbnails and previews are proxied through your own server, so the underlying CDN address never appears in the browser. Disconnect at any time and everything you have already imported stays exactly where it is.

Next steps