How do I manage users in WordPress?

Introduction

Depending on the complexity of your website, you may need to create multiple WordPress users and assign them specific permissions and roles. Fortunately, WordPress has a powerful built-in user management system that gives you full control over your users. This system supports multiple user roles that define users' permissions and thus what they can and cannot do on your website. The default roles in WordPress are

Administrator
Editor
Author
Employees
Subscriber

In the following lines of this tutorial you will learn how to create, configure and further manage your WordPress users.

Call up the user administration

The first thing you need to do is log into your WordPress admin dashboard. You can do this by going to your domain and typing "/wp-admin", e.g. "mydomain.ch/wp-admin", where "mydomain.ch" stands for your actual domain name.

Once you are logged in, please navigate via the menu bar on the left to Users > All users.

You will then be redirected to the "Users" page, where you will see a list of all users on your website.

Overview of the user page

As you can see, the user table consists of a few columns that contain important data, such as the username, the name, the email address associated with the account, the role and the number of posts the user has created.

At the top of the page you will find some links (e.g. "All", "Administrator", etc.) that allow you to list users by their role. Each link shows how many users are assigned to that role.

Below the links you will find the multiple actions that apply to all users displayed on the current page. These include deleting selected users and changing their current roles.

You will also notice the search function, which is very useful if you have a large number of users.

After you get familiar with the user interface, you can perform the most common actions such as creating, editing and deleting users.

Create new user

There may be times when you need to create a new user for some reason. Fortunately, this is a simple and straightforward task in WordPress. First, click on the "Add new user" button.

After that, you will be automatically redirected to the "Add new user" page, where you will have to enter the required user information. As you will notice, these refer to general user information and are quite self-explanatory. Nevertheless, we will go through them one by one below.

Username: In this field you need to enter the username that the user needs to log in to the WordPress dashboard. Please note that the username cannot be changed in the future.

Email: This field must contain a valid E-mail address be specified for the user. This email address will be used for all internal communications, updates, etc.

First name/Surname: These fields are intended for the actual name of the user. They are optional, so you can leave them empty.

Website: This is also optional. You can enter the user's website or leave it blank.

Password: The password for the user account is generated automatically. If you want to enter your own password, please click the "Show password" button and enter it in the corresponding field.

Send user notification: This checkbox controls whether an email message is sent to the user to inform him about the creation of his account and provide him with the account details.

Role: The role is a set of permissions that control the level of access to the user. You can choose between the following options:

Subscriber: Users assigned this role can only log in and make basic changes to their profile, such as changing their profile information and, of course, their password. They cannot use any other core WordPress features available in the WordPress admin panel.

Employees: Users who have the role of a collaborator can perform only three tasks - read all posts, edit their own posts and delete.

Authors: Authors can create, edit, delete and publish their own contributions and upload media files. They are responsible for the content of the website. In addition, authors can tag their own posts and, of course, review comments on their posts.

Editor: You have full control over the content of your WordPress-based website. Editors can add, edit, publish and delete any posts, including those written by others. The Editor user role can also moderate, edit and delete comments.

Administrator: This role allows full control over the website. The Administrator user role allows you to add, edit, and delete posts for all users of the website. You can install, edit, and delete plugins and themes, add new users to the site, change information about existing users, and delete them.

After you have entered the required information, please click the "Add new user" button to complete the creation.

Now your new user is successfully created and you can find him in the list of users.

Related tutorial: How do I create a database user in cPanel?

Editing users

It may happen that you need to change an existing user account. This process is no different from creating a user account. To change the general information, find the user in the list, move the mouse cursor over the user and click the "Edit" link.

You will be redirected to a page similar to the user creation page. The difference is that here there are some additional options that you can edit for the user profile.

In the first section "Personal Options" you can control the appearance of your user account. You can disable the visual editor, change the color scheme, enable keyboard shortcuts and disable the website toolbar.

The following two sections, "Name" and "Contact Information", contain the general user information that you configured when you created the user account.

In the last two sections "About the user" and "Account management" you can change the user's resume and profile picture and change the user login password.

Once you have made the desired changes, please click the "Update User" button to apply them.

If you want to change the role of a particular user, you can do so in the user list. To do so, check the corresponding checkboxes and select the new role from the "Change role to" drop-down menu. Then you need to click the "Change" button to make the desired change.

This will update the role of all selected users.

Delete a user

If a user is no longer needed, you can delete it by finding it in the user list, hovering over it with the mouse and clicking the "Delete" link.

A warning message will appear and you will need to click the "Confirm Delete" button to continue.

In some cases it may be necessary to delete several users at the same time. You can do this by checking the box in front of "User name" in the table header. This will select all users currently displayed on the page. To prevent unwanted users from being deleted, you just need to uncheck the corresponding checkboxes.

When you are done, please click the "Multiple Actions" drop-down menu above the table and select the "Delete" option.

After that, please click the "Apply" button located right next to the drop-down menu.

That pretty much covers the basics of user management. You should now be able to manage your WordPress users properly. We hope the information in this tutorial was helpful and our explanations understandable.

If you have any questions regarding user administration, please contact our Support Team. We will be happy to help you.