WooCommerce Subscriptions Setup

WooCommerce Subscriptions is a premium WooCommerce extension that adds recurring billing — monthly or annual subscriptions — to your WooCommerce shop. It’s the right choice if you’re already using WooCommerce for physical or digital products and want your podcast subscriptions to live in the same shop.

WooCommerce Subscriptions is the supported WooCommerce bridge for Benecaster. It connects recurring subscription products directly to Benecaster’s feed gating — subscribers with an active subscription get private feed access, and their access is revoked when the subscription lapses.

Before You Start

• WooCommerce must be installed and active
• WooCommerce Subscriptions must be installed, activated, and licensed
• At least one subscription product should exist in WooCommerce before mapping tiers
• You should have a Benecaster paid license activated

Step 1: Connect the Bridge

Go to Benecaster → Settings → Subscription.

WooCommerce Subscriptions appears in the plugin list if WooCommerce and WooCommerce Subscriptions are both active. Select it and click Connect.

Benecaster scans for products of type subscription and variable-subscription and confirms the connection. Each subscription product appears as one entry — variable subscription products appear as a single entry for the parent product, not as separate entries per variation.

If WooCommerce Subscriptions doesn’t appear, confirm both WooCommerce core and the Subscriptions extension are active. See Subscription Plugin Not Connecting.

Step 2: Map Your Tiers

Go to Benecaster → Settings → Subscription → Tier Mapping.

Benecaster lists your WooCommerce subscription products. Variable subscription products appear as a single entry — the parent product — regardless of how many variations they have.

All variations of a variable subscription product map to the same Benecaster tier. This is the correct setup for the most common use case: offering monthly and annual billing options for the same access level. A subscriber who buys the monthly variation and one who buys the annual variation both get the same tier.

If you need different price points to unlock different tiers — for example a Basic product and a Pro product — create separate WooCommerce subscription products rather than variations of one product.

For each product, select the corresponding Benecaster tier. Leave unmapped any products that don’t relate to podcast access — those are simply ignored.

See Mapping Your Membership Tiers for guidance on common tier configurations.

Step 3: Test the Connection

Create a test subscription in WooCommerce — place a manual order in WooCommerce → Subscriptions → Add Subscription and assign it to a test user. Set the subscription status to Active.

Within a few seconds, Benecaster should generate a token for that user. Verify at Benecaster → Subscribers.

How WooCommerce Subscriptions Events Map to Benecaster

WooCommerce Subscriptions status	Benecaster action
Active	Generate token; feed active. Covers three activation paths: new subscription, resubscription after cancellation, and payment-failure recovery (subscription returning to Active from On hold).
Cancelled	Mark token inactive
Expired	Mark token inactive
On hold	Feed continues during hold period. This is the status WooCommerce Subscriptions sets when a payment fails — Benecaster receives the on-hold event but takes no action until the subscription resolves to Active (recovered) or Cancelled/Expired.
Pending / Failed	No token generated; no feed access

WooCommerce Subscriptions-Specific Notes

Subscription switching: WooCommerce Subscriptions handles product switches (upgrades and downgrades) by cancelling the old subscription and creating a new one. Benecaster doesn’t handle the switch as a single event — it receives the cancellation and the new activation as separate lifecycle events and responds to each normally. The net result is correct: the old tier is revoked and a token for the new tier is generated. The subscriber’s feed URL changes because a new token is issued.

Trial periods: Free trial subscriptions activate immediately, generating a token and sending the welcome email. If a subscriber doesn’t convert after the trial, the subscription moves to cancelled and the feed stops.

Failed payments and retry: When a payment fails, WooCommerce Subscriptions sets the subscription to On Hold and begins its retry schedule (configurable number of attempts over configurable days). Benecaster continues serving the feed during the hold period. If a retry succeeds, the subscription returns to Active and Benecaster registers the recovery as a fresh activation — no manual intervention needed. If all retries are exhausted, WooCommerce cancels the subscription and Benecaster marks the token inactive.

Multiple subscriptions per user: If a subscriber has multiple active subscription products, Benecaster maps each one independently. If two subscriptions map to the same tier, the subscriber holds one token at that tier. If they map to different tiers, the subscriber gets access at the higher tier’s level (Benecaster uses the highest active tier).

WooCommerce variable subscriptions: Benecaster maps tiers using the parent product ID, not the variation ID. This means all variations of a variable subscription product always map to the same Benecaster tier — the billing interval, price, or region of the variation makes no difference.

Common setups that work correctly with this behaviour:

• Monthly and annual billing for the same tier — create one variable subscription with monthly and annual variations. Map the parent product to your tier once. Both billing options unlock the same feed access.
• Regional or currency pricing — create variations for different currencies or regions (e.g. USD, GBP, EUR). All variations map to the same tier automatically.

Setup that requires separate products instead of variations:

• Different access levels at different price points — if you want a Basic plan and a Pro plan as two WooCommerce products, create them as two separate subscription products (not as variations of one). Map each product to its corresponding Benecaster tier individually. Variations of the same parent product cannot map to different tiers.