Install the Memberside plugin

The Memberside plugin is what your app talks to. Without it on your site, the builder cannot connect and no screen has anything to show. Install it before you try to connect an app.

What it adds

• A REST API under the memberside/v1 namespace, plus memberside/v2 for the activity wall.
• A Memberside menu in the WordPress admin sidebar, with four screens: Dashboard, REST API, Services and API Keys.
• Nothing on the front end. The plugin adds no shortcodes, no blocks and no pages, and your site looks exactly as it did before.

Get the plugin

Memberside is distributed privately rather than through the wordpress.org plugin directory, so you will not find it by searching Plugins → Add New on your site. It comes from your account.

1. Sign in at memberside.app and open Downloads in the header.
2. Select Download on the latest version.

That page also lists every previous version with what changed in each, and what each release was tested against. You need it once — after the first install the plugin updates itself, as Keeping it current describes.

Install it

1. In WordPress, go to Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin.
2. Choose the .zip and select Install Now.
3. Select Activate Plugin.

A Memberside entry appears in the admin sidebar. Open it and you should see the Dashboard with your site’s detected plugins listed.

Installing and activating the Memberside plugin

Let the Setup helper walk you through it

Every Memberside screen has a Setup helper button at the top right. It opens a panel on the right-hand side listing what your site needs, in order:

1. Check your site is ready: HTTPS, application passwords, outbound requests.
2. Connect to the app builder.
3. Share your community with the app: the endpoints your app uses and, with Ultimate Member, the forms and member directories ticked Show this to REST API.
4. The optional integrations: Turnstile, push notifications, Google Maps, social sign-in, App Store and Google Play signing, in-app purchases, and Services.

Each step links to the screen where you fill it in. The panel stays open while you move between screens, and it re-checks every time you save a setting.

A step gets a tick only after Memberside has checked that what you saved works. It does not tick a key just because a field has something in it. A step turns amber, with a sentence saying what to fix, when:

• a file you uploaded is not the file that step needs, such as a google-services.json where the Firebase service account belongs;
• a key is saved in both wp-config.php and the database with different values;
• a set of keys is only partly entered, such as an Apple push key with no team ID;
• a signing certificate or provisioning profile has expired, or the two do not belong together.

I’ve done this — check it re-runs the check. If the step still is not finished, it shows a warning instead of a tick, because the usual cause is a field that never saved. Not using this sets an optional step aside so it no longer counts toward what is left. You cannot skip the first three steps.

The badge on the button counts the steps still to do or needing attention. It turns amber when any of them has a warning.

Requirements

WordPress	6.2 or newer
PHP	7.4 or newer
HTTPS	Required. Application passwords are refused over plain HTTP.
Permalinks	Anything other than Plain. The REST API needs pretty permalinks.

Which community plugin

Memberside works with any of these, or none:

Your site runs	What the app gets
Ultimate Member	Its profiles, member directories, forms, account tabs and extensions, plus everything below
BuddyPress or BuddyBoss	Their members, profiles, activity, groups, messages, friends and notifications, plus everything below
Neither	WordPress sign-in, register and forgot password, account deletion, posts and pages, search, and any of WooCommerce, forums, events, jobs and reviews you run

Ultimate Member’s own screens — its directories, forms and account tabs — are switched off on a site without it. They are listed under Memberside → REST API with Needs Ultimate Member beside them, and the builder hides their feature cards.

These are the floors for the current release. The Downloads page states them per version, read from the release itself — check there rather than here if you are installing an older one.

The plugin runs on its own. Ultimate Member is not required for it to activate — the WordPress-core screens (Posts, Page, Default Login, Default Register) work without it — but most of the feature catalogue is built from Ultimate Member or BuddyPress, so in practice you will have one of them.

Version 2.0.0 changed the namespace

The plugin was previously called um-rest-api and served um/v1. Version 2.0.0 renamed it to memberside and moved to memberside/v1 with no alias. If you have an app that was built against the old namespace, it needs rebuilding and resubmitting to the stores. Any older documentation you find describing um/v1 routes is out of date.

Keeping it current

Updates arrive through the ordinary WordPress updater. The plugin checks for a new version twice a day and offers it on Plugins and Dashboard → Updates like anything else, with the release notes under View version details. You do not download a zip again to update.

Go back to Downloads for two things: installing on another site, and putting a specific older version back when a release breaks something for you.

The Dashboard checks your other plugins against a tested-version range and warns when one is older than the minimum Memberside supports, or newer than anything it has been tested with. Neither warning blocks you — they tell you where to look first when a screen behaves oddly. Plugin releases explains where those ranges come from.

When it does not work

Symptom	Cause	Fix
No Memberside menu after activating	Activation failed silently, usually a PHP version below 7.4	Check Tools → Site Health → Info → Server for the PHP version
The builder says Endpoint not found	The plugin is inactive, or you connected a different site than the one you installed it on	Confirm the plugin is active, and check the site URL for a typo or a www mismatch
The builder says this version only serves the app on sites running Ultimate Member	Your Memberside is older than the release that runs without Ultimate Member	Update Memberside from Plugins, or download the latest from your account
Endpoints return 404 even with the plugin active	Permalinks are set to Plain	Go to Settings → Permalinks and choose any other option
No Setup helper button	Your Memberside is older than the release that added it	Update Memberside from Plugins
A step stays amber after you marked it done	The check still finds something missing or unusable	Open the step and read the line with the warning icon; it names the field

Next

Enable the endpoints you need. Nothing is exposed until you do.