{"id":1948608,"date":"2020-12-11T17:34:42","date_gmt":"2020-12-11T22:34:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/?post_type=tribe-knowledgebase&#038;p=1948608"},"modified":"2026-04-22T01:25:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T05:25:15","slug":"membership-plugin-integration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/membership-plugin-integration\/","title":{"rendered":"Integrating Membership Plugins with The Events Calendar"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The ability to hide and show content to certain users is helpful on many kinds of sites, from forums and community sites to news sites and even event calendars. WordPress actually has a lot of options for controlling access to certain pages and posts on a site. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So let&#8217;s look at several of them and how they can be used for online calendars. We&#8217;ll go into great detail for each plugin in additional sections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-plugin-comparison\">Plugin Comparison<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Before jumping in, let&#8217;s consider what it is we&#8217;re looking for. If the goal is to control access to the calendar and certain events, then these are things we want to be able to do:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Limit access to the calendar as a whole to members<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Limit access to certain events and event categories to members<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Display content on a page that is only visible to members<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Limit who can submit events to the calendar based to members<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Create tickets that only members can purchase (availble with some integrations with <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/extensions\/members-only-tickets\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">this handy extension<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>There are probably other requirements we could dream up, but what we have here should account for the bulk of many community and membership sites that use calendars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are more plugins that meet at least some of our requirements that we have time to cover, but some below are some of the top contenders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Each of these plugins are powerful and awesome in their own right. While some cater to specific use cases (e.g. BuddyPress for creating community groups), they all deal with members in some way, shape or form.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><thead><tr><th><\/th><th>BuddyPress<\/th><th>Woo Memberships<\/th><th>Restrict Content<\/th><th>MemberPress<\/th><\/tr><\/thead><tbody><tr><td>Limit access to the calendar<\/td><td>\u274c<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>Limit access to certain events<\/td><td>\u274c<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>Shortcode to display event details to members only<\/td><td>\u274c<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>Limit who can submit events to the calendar<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>Create tickets only members can purchase<\/td><td>\u274c<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705 (Pro)<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>Special ticket pricing and discounts for members<\/td><td>\u274c<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705 (Pro)<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>Custom messaging for no access<\/td><td>\u274c<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><td>\u2705<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-using-restrict-content-pro\">Using Restrict Content Pro<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/restrictcontentpro.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Restrict Content Pro<\/a> is a premium plugin that allows you to limit access to any WordPress page, post, or custom post type. It offers the same capabilities as the free version of the plugin, <a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/restrict-content\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Restrict Content,<\/a> but with additional features, such as the ability to create an unlimited number of membership plans \u2014 including paid ones \u2014 and restrict access to content based on a user&#8217;s membership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Events created with The Events Calendar and tickets created with Event Tickets Plus are custom post types, meaning both of these plugins work well with Restrict Content and Restrict Content Pro, as well as our premium calendar add-ons, like Events Calendar Pro.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let&#8217;s look at some ways that Restrict Content Pro can be used with the calendar and tickets. We&#8217;re focusing on Restrict Content Pro instead of Restrict Content since the features offered in Restrict Content are also available in Restrict Content Pro.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<style>.btn {background: #334AFF;padding:20px;width: 215px;font-weight:bold}.tec-btn{border: none;border-radius: 28px;cursor: pointer;color: #fcfcfc!important;display: inline-block;height: auto;position: relative;text-align: center;text-transform: none;text-decoration:none!important;-webkit-transition: all .15s ease;transition: all .15s ease;width: auto;<\/style><center><a class=\"btn tec-btn\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/restrict-content\/\" rel=\"noopener\">Get Restrict Content Free<\/a><\/center>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons is-layout-flex wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-restrict-access-to-the-calendar-and-events\">Restrict Access to the Calendar and Events<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>It&#8217;s possible to limit access to the calendar based on a user&#8217;s membership status. Restrict Content Pro can prevent non-members from accessing post archives, which is what the calendar is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/rcp-cpt.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948641\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">With Restrict Content enabled, a new &#8220;Restrict Access&#8221; item is added to the Events menu that provides settings for who should have access to events.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>But maybe all we want is to restrict access to a specific event, or even a category of events. We can do both! For example, jump into the editing screen for an event category and select the restriction settings that Restrict Content adds to the category options.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/rcp-event-categories.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948643\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Restrict access by access level or by membership level.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The same thing goes for events. Open an event in the WordPress editor, and select who is able to access that event in the &#8220;Restrict this content&#8221; settings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/rcp-event-options.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948644\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The settings are located at the bottom of the post editor.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Restrict Content gives us even more fine-grain control by allowing us to restrict certain content on a page to members, including events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/restrict-content-shortcode.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948657\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-restrict-ticket-purchases\">Restrict Ticket Purchases<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Another thing we can do is allow specific memberships access to certain tickets, whether we&#8217;re using Event Tickets by itself or with The Events Calendar. For example, we can use the <code>[restrict]<\/code> shortcode that comes with Restrict Content to display the tickets for an event just to members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/rcp-shortcode-ticket.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948649\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Placing a Ticket block between two Shortcode blocks with the <code>[restrict]<\/code> shortcode limits access to the ticket to a specific user role, access level or membership level.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>This is great if you&#8217;re using Event Tickets to create and sell tickets, but what if we&#8217;re using Event Tickets Plus to make tickets with an e-commerce plugin, like WooCommerce? A ticket is a product and products are a custom post type, which means Restrict Content Pro is able to restrict access to those tickets as well. We can even set those restrictions on the product editing screen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/rcp-woo-product-settings-1024x581.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948665\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">We can set not only who can <em>view<\/em> a ticket, but who can <em>purchase<\/em> it as well.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>And to make members-only ticket creation even easier with Restrict Content Pro, check out our <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/extensions\/members-only-tickets\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">handy extension<\/a>!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-restrict-access-to-event-submissions\">Restrict Access to Event Submissions<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Community Events is a paid add-on for The Events Calendar. It creates a page with a form on it that allows users to submit events to be published to the calendar without giving them access to the WordPress admin. While Community Events provides a way to limit access to users who are registered to your site and logged into their account, we can use Restrict Content Pro to add further restrictions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Just like any other page or post, Restrict Content Pro provides additional settings to the page editor \u2014 including the event submissions page. And that&#8217;s because you add the submission form to any page on your site using the <code><a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/k\/community-events-shortcodes\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">[tribe_community_events]<\/a><\/code> shortcode.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/rcp-restrict-page.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948651\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">We could use the <code>[restrict]<\/code> shortcode here as well, but setting it at the page level ensures non-members never even see the page.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>We can do the same thing with any other Community Events shortcode, including the one that displays a list of events a user has submitted to the calendar (<code>[tribe_community_events_event_list]<\/code>). We might even consider bumping up the restriction level on this page to higher membership level, allowing us to charge more for a membership that allows members both to submit events, and manage the events they have submitted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-pros-and-cons\">Pros and Cons<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>There&#8217;s a lot to like about Restrict Content and Restrict Content Pro! But like all things, there are upsides and downsides to it, in this case, when it comes to events and tickets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group plugin-benefits-wrapper has-background\" style=\"background-color:#f9f7f4\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-9d6595d7 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-pros\">Pros<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group plugin-benefits has-light-green-cyan-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Easily restrict access to any page, post, event, etc. based on user role.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Use a shortcode to restrict access to content within a page or post, including events.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Create membership levels with tiered levels of access to content.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Integrates with WooCommerce to set access to tickets.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Display custom messaging for non-members.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Create tickets that only members can purchase, by upgrading to the premium plugin.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-cons\">Cons<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group plugin-benefits has-pale-pink-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Requires a paid upgrade to Restrict Content Pro to set ticket restrictions, though that can be offset by charging a membership fee.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Product restrictions are limited to WooCommerce, which may not be ideal for some organizations.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-using-buddypress\">Using BuddyPress<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>BuddyPress adds social networking features to WordPress. When users register to the site, they have the ability to join and create groups where they can send messages, post status updates, and get notifications for other user activities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Pretty cool, right? But what does that have to do with calendars?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While BuddyPress allows users to register as members of a site, it&#8217;s really more about curating member groups and creating connections between users than it is managing access to content like a membership plugin. Regardless, BuddyPress is a community-driven plugin that provides a way to give users access to certain groups and to make those groups public or private \u2014 all great stuff when it comes to an online calendar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For example, a group can be private but still displayed in the Group Directory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/buddypress-groups-directory.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948616\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>So let&#8217;s look at various ways that BuddyPress and our products can work together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-add-the-calendar-to-a-group-page\">Add the Calendar to a Group Page<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>So, yes, BuddyPress does indeed restrict access to certain pages, or groups in this case. While that doesn&#8217;t do much in the way of restricting access to the full calendar, group pages support shortcodes. That means, with the help of <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/k\/which-plugins-should-i-use-on-my-membership-site?\">shortcodes in Events Calendar Pro<\/a>, we can drop <code>[tribe_events]<\/code> in the group description and only the members of that group can see the calendar. That is, assuming the calendar isn&#8217;t linked up somewhere else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But we can do better. The <code>[tribe_events]<\/code> shortcode <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/k\/embedding-calendar-views-with-the-tribe_events-shortcode\/\">can be used to show certain categories of events<\/a> which is a nice way to give group members access to specific events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/buddypress-calendar.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948619\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Using the <code>tribe_events<\/code> shortcode is a nice workaround to give group members their own calendar view in the group description.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-allow-members-to-submit-events\">Allow Members to Submit Events<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Another thing you might want to consider is allowing members to submit and publish events to the calendar. That&#8217;s exactly what our Community Events add-on for The Events Calendar does: it adds a page on your site that contains a form that allows users to submit events to the calendar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But that form is on a single page, and that page can&#8217;t really be added to a group or restricted so that certain members can access it. That&#8217;s where the <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/k\/community-events-shortcodes\/\">shortcodes included in Community Events<\/a> help. For example, we can drop <code>[tribe_community_events view=\"submission_form\"]<\/code> on the page and that gives members a way to add events to the calendar. That way, certain groups can have access to post events, and you still have the ability to moderate those submissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-limit-access-to-calendar-content\">Limit Access to Calendar Content<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>We can sort of restrict access to the calendar, but it&#8217;s a little hacky and limited only to group descriptions. There&#8217;s also no way to restrict access to other content based on a user&#8217;s role or which groups they are in. There are BuddyPress extensions \u2014 like <a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/bp-restrict\/\">Restrictions for BuddyPress <\/a>\u2014 available that can make that happen, but BuddyPress is unable to do it on its own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Another option is <a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/buddypress-members-only\/\">The BuddyPress Members Only<\/a> plugin. It will actually restrict certain WordPress pages and posts so that only registered members can access and manage them. This includes events, tickets, venues and organizers, all of which are custom post types.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/members-only-buddypress-restrictions-1024x684.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948624\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">BuddyPress Members Only can restrict access to pages, posts and custom post types \u2014 including The Events Calendar and Event Tickets \u2014 in the plugin settings.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-create-member-only-tickets\">Create Member-only Tickets<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Let&#8217;s say you want to create tickets that only BuddyPress members can purchase \u2014 or even see. There are a couple ways to go do that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>First, as we saw in the last section, we can use a BuddyPress extension to restrict access to tickets. That way, only members will be able to view and purchase them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Second, we can <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/k\/embedding-tickets-and-rsvps\/\">embed tickets<\/a> on a group page or a member profile using a shortcode. Event Tickets Plus includes <code>[tribe_tickets]<\/code> and <code>[tribe_rsvp]<\/code> that displays tickets on any WordPress page or post \u2014 including BuddyPress pages \u2014 and can even embed specific tickets from specific events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/ext-ticket-shortcode-default.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1948631\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The <code>[tribe_tickets]<\/code> shortcode can embed tickets on any WordPress page or post.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-pros-and-cons-0\">Pros and Cons<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns plugin-benefits-wrapper has-background is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-9d6595d7 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\" style=\"background-color:#f9f7f4\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-pros-0\">Pros<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group plugin-benefits has-light-green-cyan-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Calendar and event shortcodes work on personal profile and group pages.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Groups can be private or hidden, allowing for certain events to be displayed to group members with a filtered <code>[tribe_events]<\/code> shortcode.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Supports integrations with other plugins that are capable of restricting content to users based on their BuddyPress user role or group membership.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-cons-0\">Cons<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group plugin-benefits has-pale-pink-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Calendar shortcodes are not the same as restricting access.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Restricting access to content is limited to group pages.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Restricting access to the calendar, events, and event submissions requires an additional plugin.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>There is no clear way to limit ticket purchases to certain members out of the box.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-using-memberpress\">Using MemberPress<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>MemberPress is a comprehensive and robust membership plugin for WordPress. It accounts for everything, from the membership plans and commerce, to content restrictions and member management.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>MemberPress also happens to work extremely well with The Events Calendar. Let&#8217;s briefly look at how MemberPress works, then move into some examples of how it can be used with The Events Calendar and our other plugins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-color has-background\" style=\"color:#141827;background-color:var(--global-palette8)\">\ud83d\udc4b <strong>Heads up!<\/strong> MemberPress is a premium WordPress plugin that is purchased and downloaded through the <a href=\"https:\/\/memberpress.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">MemberPress website<\/a>. It is not freely available in the WordPress Plugin Directory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-creating-memberships\">Creating Memberships<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>MemberPress is designed, first and foremost, to create and manage memberships plans that users can sign up for. The plugin makes it incredibly simple to do. Once it&#8217;s activated on the site, navigate to MemberPress \u2192 Memberships in the WordPress admin and click the &#8220;Add New&#8221; option.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/admin-memberpress-add-membership.png\" alt=\"Add new membership with MemberPress\" class=\"wp-image-1948707\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The membership editor is used to name the membership plan and configure everything from its pricing to how members register for it.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The exact settings for a membership depend on what it needs to do. How long does a membership last? What&#8217;s the price? Can someone renew their membership? Who&#8217;s allowed to sign up for it? These are the sorts of things you get to decide here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"members-only-calendar-and-events\">Members-only Calendar and Events<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>MemberPress makes an assumption when a new membership is created. It assumes that anyone who registers for it gets a benefit for being a member, and one of those benefits is access to certain content on the site. It does that in the &#8220;Rules&#8221; section of the plugin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/memberpress-admin-rules-settings.png\" alt=\"MemberPress rules\" class=\"wp-image-1948713\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Content restrictions and permissions are managed in the &#8220;Rules&#8221; section. A rule is what sets whether certain memberships have exclusive access to content.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>MemberPress provides no shortage of options for what type of content can be restricted to memberships. It can even be used to limit access for everything, from specific pages, posts, categories, tags, products, taxonomies, child pages, URLs, and lots more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/membpress-rules-settings-events.png\" alt=\"Add New Rule with MemberPress\" class=\"wp-image-1948714\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Selecting &#8220;All Events&#8221; restricts access to the calendar so that it can only be accessed by members of the VIP membership plan.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>It&#8217;s this sort of flexibility that might make MemberPress a must for a community calendar with memberships. Need to restrict access to the entire calendar? Check. How about just to a certain category of events? Yep. Specific events? Of course. Sell tickets? That&#8217;s covered too. No WooCommerce? No problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We can also define micro-level settings in the page and post editor, including whether non-members can view the post excerpt, what message non-members see when trying to access restricted content, and whether to display a login form for members to access their account.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/admin-memberpress-event-single-1024x842.png\" alt=\"Single Event page with added membership\" class=\"wp-image-1948710\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"members-only-tickets\">Members-only Tickets<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Our free <a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/event-tickets\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Event Tickets<\/a> plugin provides the ability to create tickets for events, pages, posts, and any custom post type. It supports PayPal right out of the box, but if you&#8217;re already using an e-commerce provider, including WooCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads, our <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/products\/wordpress-event-tickets\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Event Tickets Plus<\/a> add-on can be added to integrate Event Tickets with it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>MemberPress is unable to limit access to tickets created with Event Tickets as far as its Rules settings go. However, MemberPress provides shortcodes that enforce rules when they are wrapped around content on a WordPress page or post.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-syntaxhighlighter-code \"><pre class=\"brush: plain; title: ; notranslate\" title=\"\">\n&#x5B;mepr-show rules=&quot;5723&quot; unauth=&quot;message&quot;]Only VIP members can see this.&#x5B;\/mepr-show]\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n<p>That means we can hide tickets from non-members directly on the page using Shortcode blocks. We need three blocks altogether:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Shortcode block that contains the opening part of the MemberPress shortcode<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Ticket block that we want to show only to members<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Shortcode block that closes the MemberPress shortcode<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/event-single-admin-memberpress-shortcode-ticket.png\" alt=\"Add a shortcode to add a membership to the event page with MemberPress\" class=\"wp-image-1948720\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Now that the ticket is placed between the two shortcodes, only members will see it when visiting the event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/membpress-admin-shortcodes-front-end.png\" alt=\"Frontend and backend views of the event page\" class=\"wp-image-1948723\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Hiding tickets from non-members becomes a little easier if you&#8217;re using Event Tickets Plus with WooCommerce or Easy Digital Downloads. Tickets created with Event Tickets Plus are registered as products and those products are custom post types, and MemberPress can create rules for custom post types.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/memberpress-rules-ticket.png\" alt=\"Edit rule page\" class=\"wp-image-1948725\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>To make creating membership-only tickets even easier, you can use our <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/extensions\/members-only-tickets\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">handy extension<\/a> that integrates perfectly with MemberPress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"members-only-event-submissions\">Members-only Event Submissions<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Hey, here&#8217;s an idea: let members post events to the calendar! With our <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/products\/community-events\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Community Events add-on<\/a> to The Events Calendar, an event submission form can be added to the front end of the website. And, since MemberPress can give members exclusive access to any WordPress page or post, we can give exclusive access to the submission form as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Add <code><a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/k\/community-events-shortcodes\/#ce-submit\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">[tribe_community_events]<\/a><\/code> to a Shortcode block in the WordPress page editor, save the page, and we get the event submission form.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/community-events-shortcode-back-front-end.png\" alt=\"Adding a membership rule to the community event page\" class=\"wp-image-1948696\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, this becomes a page like any other, which means MemberPress can limit access to it based on a user&#8217;s membership plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/memberpress-rules-page-community-events.png\" alt=\"Create protected content on the single evnet page\" class=\"wp-image-1948727\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">We can create a single page rule in MemberPress that limits access to the page containing the shortcode for the event submission form.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Here&#8217;s another idea: create one membership plan that allows members to submit events, and <strong>create an additional plan that allows members access to view and edit their events<\/strong>. We can do that the exact same way we just did for the event submission form, only adding a parameter to the shortcode we used before, like this: <code>[tribe_community_events view=\u201dmy_events\u201d]<\/code>. That embeds a list of the events a user has submitted if they are logged in, and we can use a MemberPress rule to limit access to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-pros-and-cons-1\">Pros and Cons<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>MemberPress is a pretty darn neat plugin, but that doesn&#8217;t mean it&#8217;s perfect for everyone. Here are a few things to consider before using it with your calendar and events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group plugin-benefits-wrapper has-background\" style=\"background-color:#f9f7f4\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-9d6595d7 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Pros<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group plugin-benefits has-light-green-cyan-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Easily restrict access to any page, post, event, event category, venue, or organizer based on a user&#8217;s role.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Integrates with WooCommerce, but can accept payments on its own.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Create tickets that can only be purchased by members.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Create multiple membership tiers to offer different levels of access to events and tickets.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Set the amount of time members can access content (e.g. one-year membership plan) and allow renewals.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Display a call to action just for non-members to purchase a membership plan.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Display content on a page or post that only members can see using shortcodes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Cons<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group plugin-benefits has-pale-pink-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>There is no free option.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>It might be be overkill for basic needs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Conclusion<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Again, we think MemberPress is pretty fantastic. It&#8217;s going to have everything you need to create and manage memberships, as well as slew of things, like courses and subscriptions. And, of course, it works extremely well with The Events Calendar for lots of use cases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At the same time, MemberPress might be too much for your site, especially if you&#8217;re already using WooCommerce or Easy Digital Downloads as an e-commerce provider. There&#8217;s no need to manage two e-commerce systems. It&#8217;s probably more practical to look at either <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/integrating-woocommerce-memberships-with-the-events-calendar\/\">WooCommerce Memberships<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/integrating-restrict-content-pro-with-the-events-calendar\/\">Restrict Content Pro<\/a> with Event Ticket Plus in that scenario.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Regardless of the situation, MemberPress is most certainly capable of everything you&#8217;d need from a membership-based calendar, from providing exclusive access to the calendar, and certain categories of events, specific events, to tickets and event submissions. There are so many<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-using-ultimate-member\">Using Ultimate Member<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>With the <a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/ultimate-member\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ultimate Member<\/a> plugin, it&#8217;s possible to restrict event content for specific user roles. You can use a shortcode provided by the Ultimate Member plugin to make this happen. Ultimate Member supplies shortcodes that you can use to restrict event content for specific user roles. This way, only certain roles will have access to your calendar and tickets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-show-content-to-specific-roles\">Show Content to Specific Roles<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Use the following shortcode to display your event content to specific roles:<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-syntaxhighlighter-code \"><pre class=\"brush: xml; title: ; notranslate\" title=\"\">\n   &#x5B;um_show_content roles=&#039;member&#039;] &lt;!-- insert content here --&gt; &#x5B;\/um_show_content]\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n<p><strong>Note:<\/strong> You can add multiple target roles, use &#8216;,&#8217; e.g. <code>&nbsp;[um_show_content roles='member,candidates,pets']<\/code><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-hide-content-from-specific-roles\">Hide Content from Specific Roles<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Use the following shortcode to hide your event content from specific roles:<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-syntaxhighlighter-code \"><pre class=\"brush: xml; title: ; notranslate\" title=\"\">\n     &#x5B;um_show_content not=&#039;member&#039;] &lt;!-- insert content here --&gt; &#x5B;\/um_show_content]\n\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n<p><strong>Note:<\/strong> You can add multiple target roles, use &#8216;,&#8217; e.g. <code>&nbsp;[um_show_content roles='member,candidates,pets']<\/code><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-limit-access-to-calendar-content-0\">Limit Access to Calendar Content<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>To limit access to calendar content, like events, you&#8217;ll first want to check that option in the settings under <strong>Ultimate Member &gt; Settings<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.theeventscalendar.com\/kb\/uploads\/2022\/02\/Screen-Shot-2022-02-07-at-2.06.40-PM.png\" alt=\"Ultimate Member settings\" class=\"wp-image-1951895\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Now head over to one of your single event pages on the backend. You&#8217;ll see this nifty new option at the bottom of the page to restrict content to your event page. Check the box and select who you&#8217;d like to see the event content.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.theeventscalendar.com\/kb\/uploads\/2022\/02\/Screen-Shot-2022-02-07-at-2.08.54-PM.png\" alt=\"Ultimate Member: Content Restriction\" class=\"wp-image-1951896\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-members-only-tickets\">Members-only Tickets<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>You can restrict access to tickets as well with Ultimate Member. To do this, you&#8217;ll need to wrap a Ticket Block in the Ultimate Member shortcode provided above. So it&#8217;ll look something like this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.theeventscalendar.com\/kb\/uploads\/2022\/02\/Screen-Shot-2022-02-07-at-2.21.50-PM.png\" alt=\"Hide ticket content with Ultimate Member\" class=\"wp-image-1951898\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The ability to hide and show content to certain users is helpful on many kinds of sites, from forums and community sites to news sites and even event calendars. WordPress actually has a lot of options for controlling access to certain pages and posts on a site. So let&#8217;s look at several of them and&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1955565,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_swpsp_post_exclude":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[],"stellar-product-taxonomy":[161],"class_list":["post-1948608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-integrations","stellar-product-taxonomy-the-events-calendar"],"acf":[],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":46,"label":"Integrations"}],"stellar-product-taxonomy":[{"value":161,"label":"The Events Calendar"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/images.theeventscalendar.com\/kb\/uploads\/2023\/02\/social-share-1024x538.png",1024,538,true],"author_info":{"display_name":"Jaime Marchwinski","author_link":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/author\/jaimetri-be\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":46,"name":"Integrations","slug":"integrations","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":46,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":54,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0","cat_ID":46,"category_count":54,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Integrations","category_nicename":"integrations","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1948608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1948608"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1948608\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1970133,"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1948608\/revisions\/1970133"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1955565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1948608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1948608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1948608"},{"taxonomy":"stellar-product-taxonomy","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theeventscalendar.com\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/stellar-product-taxonomy?post=1948608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}