Changing a WordPress User Profile Picture – Avatar

This will help you understand the concept of Avatar and how WordPress uses the Gravatar service to display WordPress user profile pictures.

If you would like to know how to change WordPress user profile pictures, you will need to read this article to know how to change user avatar and change WordPress default profile picture to your custom image.

To see what we are talking about look at the image on the left with the default WordPress user avatar. Scroll to the bottom in my user description and you will see I replaced the default WordPress avatar with my own picture.

Go get started on changing your WordPress user profile picture, we will need to start by knowing what avatar means before we can jump into much deeper details of how to go about changing your WordPress user profile picture.

So what is the meaning of Avatar?

Forget the movie, we are talking WordPress here ?

Avatar is a user profile picture for WordPress Users. They allow WordPress users to set unique pictures that identify them on their user page.

When set, user Avatars enable you to use any photo uploaded to your gravatar account as your profile picture. This picture is then used on your WordPress profile page, besides every comment you make and bellow any posts, you author.

Where the avatar is not set in your gravatar account, or where you have no account at all, the default “mystery man” default image will be displayed.

WordPress, by default, uses Gravatar to pull user avatar with the help of the email IDs of users to display the avatar in the comments and posts.

Setting or Changing Your WordPress Avatar.

There are broadly two ways to change your WordPress user profile picture or avatar. You can change the avatar using the gravatar services or by use of an avatar WordPress plugin.

Method One: Changing a WordPress User picture using gravatar.

You can have your WordPress user profile picture changed using the gravatar service. To do so, you will go through the following steps.

1. Visit the Gravatar website and login your WordPress.com account.  You must make sure that you are loving into the WordPress.com account that uses the same email as that of your WordPress account if you have more than one wordpress.com account.
2. Since you are loving in with a third-party service, you will need to approve or wordpress.com to be used to login to your gravatar. Once login is clicked, an approval request will appear.  Please click to approve so you are directed to your Gravatar account home page.
3. Once Logged into your Gravatar account, locate and click on “My Gravatars”. In this section, you can choose which email address is associated with the account you want to use. This is especially important where you have several emails associated with your account.
4. Pick an image from previously uploaded images to set as your avatar. If you do not have uploaded images or wish to add a new picture, use the “Add New Image” option on the same page to navigate and upload an image of your choice.
5. Set the image of choice as your Gravatar profile picture and it will also become your WordPress user profile pic.

Method Two: Changing a WordPress User picture using Plugins.

There are several WordPress plugins that can easily be used to upload custom pictures and set them as your WordPress user profile picture.

For purposes of this tutorial, I will be using the WordPress plugin called WP User Avatar.

YOU CAL ALSO READ: Best Free Avatar WordPress Plugins

While I have chosen to use WP User Avatar in this lesson, there are several other WordPress that come with the functionality of changing the user’s profile picture. The article on the link above reviews many other options available at your disposal.

Ok so now that we have decided on a WordPress plugin to use to change user profile pictures, let’s get started!

1. Install the Plugin. You can log in to your WordPress website admin area. Locate the plugin menu located on the left of your admin dashboard.

   

2. Click Add New. We now need to search and add WP User Avatar plugin.  Once you locate the Plugin, Click Install Now and thereafter Activate.

   

3. Change your User Profile Picture. Locate the Users menu “Users” in the main admin dashboard menu and select All Users. Locate your user name and click Edit. Scroll to User avatar and upload the picture you want to use and save.

   

Whatever method you choose, it should be pretty easy yo set your custom user profile image. If however, you need help, we would be more than glad to help you any way we can.