Practise you like to chat on the net? If the answer is aye, take your fingers off your keyboard, and open your eyes wide.

You've probably noticed that comments on blogs are ever accompanied by a small prototype.

This epitome, which is called an avatar, allows you to better empathise who the author of the comment is (you, me, etc.).

You can imagine that you would run into me differently if my avatar was a totally crazy image or represented someone else.

A Gravatar for WordPress idea as a GIF.
Hey, I let my hair abound… 😉

To display this paradigm, at that place'south a handy service called Gravatar, obviously compatible with WordPress (but not only, you'll see).

If you lot don't know it yet, follow me. In this commodity, I'll explain why you should utilise it, and peculiarly how to create and customize your Gravatar profile for WordPress.

I will finish by revealing some useful tips, but I won't tell you lot more than. Keep reading…

Originally written in October 2014, this article was updated in September 2021.

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What is Gravatar?

Gravatar logo from its website.

Gravatar is a costless service used to manage i's avatars on the spider web and allows Internet users to have "an effortless and verified way to establish their identity online", as stated on its official website.

Websites and other services can use these avatars to "humanize" their platforms a niggling more.

Across WordPress, Slack, Github, Atlassian, Disqus, or even Stack Overflow, utilise gravatars in item.

By extension, the avatar, i.eastward. the image that represents the user of a estimator, has taken the name of the service that manages it. This is why you lot will hear more than about gravatars than avatars.

Here is an example of various comments from readers of the web log. Y'all can see that it helps to get a better idea of who is who (unless there's no photo):

So, how does all this Gravatar for WordPress affair work?

But, by the way, how is your WordPress site able to associate the image linked to the gravatar of the person commenting on your site/blog?

Kickoff, y'all should know that Gravatar is natively integrated on every WordPress site.

Then, as before long as a user with a Gravatar profile wants to comment on a postal service on your site, his gravatar is automatically displayed next to his message if the email address registered with Gravatar is the same every bit the one in his WordPress profile.

If no friction match is found between the 2 services (Gravatar and WordPress), the annotate will be accompanied by the mystery person or a gravatar automatically generated by WordPress.

Default avatars suggested on WordPress.

We can admit that this is less of a representation of who nosotros are (unless we desire to remain anonymous 😛).

In the background, Automattic

Is that clearer to you? So allow's keep with a tiny bit of history, to satisfy the more than curious among you.

Launched in 2005 by the then-called Tom Preston-Werner – who also founded GitHub -, Gravatar is the abbreviation of globally (One thousand) recognized (R) avatar.

This beautiful project was bought in 2007 by Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com, and major contributor to WordPress.org.

For the past 15 years, Automattic has been in charge of the project and has maintained it.

Why use a gravatar for WordPress?

After this presentation of Gravatar, let's identify ourselves on the user'southward side. What are the advantages of using a gravatar?

In that location are several ones:

  • A gravatar allows you to unify your identity on the spider web, since it follows you everywhere. Once you have associated 1 with your email address, information technology will appear every time yous use this address to annotate, provided that the site on which you want to comment supports Gravatar (this is not the case for Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn, for example).
  • It humanizes you considering your comment is associated with your image: nosotros know what yous look like, which is warmer than the unrecognizable avatar of the mystery person, for example.
  • You reinforce your credibility and your brand paradigm. A "real" person volition be more than trusted. Having a gravatar is the insurance of not existence considered equally spam.
  • Your profile is updated on all sites. Y'all want to alter your profile picture? No problem. Do it once on your Gravatar profile, in a few seconds. The change is immediately updated on all the sites on which you have commented. You don't accept to practise it manually on each site, which saves a lot of time.

Moreover, as WordPress explains, the use of a gravatar simplifies the process for " everyone". This means for the user, as you have seen to a higher place, but also for the site administrator.

The latter, for example, does not take to bother managing user accounts, nor their images. The Gravatar service takes care of everything for him.

For all this to work automatically, in the groundwork, you lot must of class have a Gravatar contour, yous got it.

If you're not on the web to spill murderous comments while wanting to hide your identity, notice out how to associate a gravatar with your email address, merely below.

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How to create your Gravatar account in ii easy steps?

Step one: Create a WordPress.com account

To get started, simply visit the official Gravatar website. Showtime the registration procedure by clicking on the bluish "Create your Gravatar" push:

Create your Gravatar button on Gravatar's website.

In order to create a Gravatar profile, yous demand a WordPress.com business relationship to authorize the connexion to Gravatar.
To sympathise the differences between WordPress.com and WordPress.org, check out our detailed comparison.

A new window will open, inviting you to create a WordPress.com account. You will be asked to enter:

  • An email accost
  • A username
  • A password

Finish by clicking on the "Create your account" button.

If, like me, you already have a WordPress.com account, click on the "Already have a WordPress.com business relationship?" link.

Then log in. For the purposes of this tutorial, we'll assume yous don't take one.

Sign up for Gravatar with a WordPress.com account.

Step 2: Confirm Your Email Address

If all went well, y'all'll be taken to this page (with the email you lot entered, of course):

Confirmation email sent to start using Gravatar for WordPress.

And so go to your inbox, and click on the activation electronic mail sent past the WordPress.com team.

Click on the "Activate Business relationship" button:

Button to activate WordPress.com and Gravatar account.

You lot will be immediately redirected to the WordPress.com interface, which will confirm your registration to Gravatar.

A button volition take you dorsum to your Gravatar business relationship, where y'all should exist automatically logged in! And that'southward it for y'all.

Name and details of a Gravatar profile.

How to customize your Gravatar profile?

How to assign a gravatar image to your e-mail address?

Now that you have an account, yous can assign an avatar (well, a gravatar) to your email address.

From the main page of the official Gravatar website, hover over the drop-downwards bill of fare on the acme right, then click on "Add an Paradigm":

Add an image on Gravatar for WordPress.

You will get in on the following page:

Different options to upload an image on Gravatar.

For this pace, you have 4 choices:

  1. Upload a moving-picture show from your computer (Upload new).
  2. Requite the link of an paradigm present on the internet (From URL). For instance, the link of one of your profile pictures on social media.
  3. Add a previously uploaded image (Past uploads). This does not apply here, since nosotros just created an business relationship.
  4. Take a pic from your webcam (From webcam).

For the purpose of this tutorial, we will start with the most common case, in my opinion, which is to upload a photo from your computer.

Click on "Upload new" to arrive on this page:

Upload new image on Gravatar.

Before going any further, let'south have a quick look at the image yous will cull. Don't forget that it will represent you lot publicly. The platonic is to put a photograph that shows you at your best, or the logo of your company / site / blog.

Here, information technology's pretty standard. Simply upload your epitome by clicking on "Choose file", then click on the "Side by side" button.

Once you lot've sent your image to Gravatar, you'll have the option to resize it. Use the corners to choose the area to ingather (if any):

Crop your photo on Gravatar.

When y'all are satisfied, click on "Ingather Image".

The last pace is to cull a rating for your image.

Much like movies are not allowed nether 12, sixteen and 18, the same is true for WordPress sites (this is ready in Settings > Discussion).

Finally, there is a good adventure that your site is mainstream and then click on "rated Chiliad":

Choose a rating for your Gravatar.

If you choose another type of rating (e.g. R or X), chances are your gravatar will non be displayed on the sites you comment on.

And that's it, your email accost is now associated with a gravatar. Y'all can at present display it everywhere you leave comments on the Internet.

The Gravatar homepage displays the prototype associated with the email address:

Manage Gravatars.

Now you can add other email addresses and images to display different gravatars. Y'all can also play around with audience ratings ("rated Chiliad", "rated PG", etc.).

What other information tin can you add together to your Gravatar profile on WordPress?

While a Gravatar profile is logically associated with a photo, it's not the just thing y'all tin can display when you mail service a annotate. Yous can make your profile fifty-fifty more complete by including:

  • Information about your identity, such as the name to be displayed publicly, your location, or a few lines to draw yourself.
  • Links to your website/blog, "or whatsoever sites that help draw who you are" every bit mentioned by Gravatar.
  • A background image or color.
  • Contact information, such as your email address, a cell phone number, a Google Hangouts or Skype account, etc.
  • And even your crypto-currency wallet addresses "to brand available for friends and services".

All this data can be added through the "My Profile" menu:

Submenus on your Gravatar profile.

Please note that information technology is possible to create several gravatars on your profile, without the need to create a new account by email.
You can add more e-mail addresses to your Gravatar business relationship by going to the "My Gravatars" menu and clicking on the "Add email address" link.

Using multiple gravatars can be useful if y'all want to split your personal and professional activities (and thus distinguish your comments accordingly).

How to prepare a default Gravatar on your WordPress site?

By reading the lines above, you lot take associated a gravatar to your email address.

Even so, not all readers of your site accept done so. Every bit a result, they volition have a default gravatar.

As a site administrator, you tin can set a default gravatar, for people who do non have a Gravatar profile, but who want to exit a comment.

At that place are two ways to do this.

Method 1: Use the default settings of WordPress

To do this, go to Settings > Word. If yous whorl down a bit, you lot will find a section dedicated to avatars:

Avatas on the WordPress interface.

It is cleaved down into 3 parts:

  • "Avatar Display". If you uncheck this box, the avatars will not be displayed anymore. 😉
  • "Maximum Rating". This allows y'all to define the maximum rating you want for the gravatars of the people who volition leave comments.
  • "Default Avatar". You accept vii display options for people who practice not take a Gravatar profile, ranging from the famous "Mystery Person" to a more "retro" epitome.

Method 2: Use a plugin

If the avatars offered natively past WordPress do not suit you lot, you can ascertain a default 1 by activating a plugin similar One User Avatar.

This plugin gives you lot the possibility to define an avatar for users who don't accept i, by going through the "Settings" menu of the plugin and selecting an paradigm of your selection.

Before terminal, I would as well similar to give you lot a tip that should interest you and improve the user feel of your visitors.

How to cache gravatars (and preserve your site's loading speed)?

As you discovered at the offset of this article, having a Gravatar profile has many advantages.

But there is at least ane disadvantage with Gravatar: it can negatively impact the loading speed of your pages.

Before revealing a solution, here are some explanations to empathise what we are talking nearly.

I don't teach y'all annihilation if I echo that gravatars are displayed on your site past the Gravatar service. Then far, it'south pretty unproblematic.

When an article containing comments is posted on your site, HTTP requests are made by your browser to Gravatar's servers, in gild to call back the images associated with each Gravatar profile of the "commenters", if nosotros tin can call them that.

Are you all the same following me? On small articles, this is not really a problem.

Merely on articles with dozens or even hundreds of comments, the loading speed can take a few seconds. And that's a bit more annoying.

The more than comments there are, the more HTTP requests need to exist made, and the slower your article/page loads.

To prepare this, I recommend activating the FV Gravatar Cache plugin which will, as the proper noun suggests, cache your commenters' gravatars straight on your site.

The FV Gravatar Cache plugin to download on WordPress.

Some settings are bachelor in Settings > FV Gravatar Enshroud, but those proposed past default are more than enough.

And at that place you lot become, i more than trouble solved 😉

Gravatar for WordPress: epitomize

Throughout this article, y'all've discovered how to apply Gravatar for your WordPress site. In particular, we've covered the following:

  • What is Gravatar and why use it?
  • How to create a Gravatar account?
  • How to customize your Gravatar profile, including how to assign a gravatar to an email address (a gravatar linked to Gmail, for instance)?
  • 2 methods to set a default gravatar on your WordPress site.
  • How to cache gravatars?

All these tips will help you meliorate correspond yourself (or your organization, site, etc.) on the Cyberspace, while professionalizing your brand image by making it more "human being".

Don't forget that all your interactions are public and contribute to building your reputation. Information technology'south up to you lot to run into what is appropriate or not to say.

In the concurrently, exercise you use a gravatar? Share your feedback by posting a comment.

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