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Default Avatar Options – Identicons

Now you can customize how avatars show up on your blog, including some cool never-before available options.

You can find these options under Settings > Discussion.

Here’s what you can do:

  • Turn avatars on and off, which applies to their display on your blog.
  • Choose a rating, which right now only works for Gravatars but as we integrate WordPress.com and Gravatar avatars better will apply to both.
  • Choose a default other than blank or the mystery man.
  • Laugh manically as you contemplate your new-found power.

I would highly recommend trying out Identicons, which are a cool math-based image idea created by Don Park that’s unique to the commenter, so even if someone doesn’t have an avatar yet they have a consistent (and handsome) image next to their name when they comment.

We’re probably going to make Identicons the default for the dashboard instead of the mystery man, we just need to make a few tweaks to Gravatar infrastructure first. (The generated avatars are CPU-intensive to create, and it’s Sunday, a day of rest for the busy Gravatar servers.)

Also, don’t Identicons sound like something from Transformers?

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by Matt

Posted: Sunday, May 4th, 2008 at 7:53 pm. Filed in Avatars, Features, WordPress.com.
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317 Comments

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Newer Comments »
  1. Nemuriko
    May 4th at 8:37 pm

    “Also, don’t Identicons sound like something from Transformers?”

    You are a great man! :lol:

  2. museditions
    May 4th at 8:49 pm

    The options are very cool. I’ll be interested to see what the generated logos look like. Never liked the mystery man, particularly since 56% of bloggers are women. (No idea if that’s true, I just made it up.) Will generated image users now be eligible for front page/news departments inclusion? Thanks, all.

  3. Matt
    May 4th at 8:50 pm

    Right now people without uploaded avatars will still be excluded from the WP.com front page. That could change, just no plans right now.

  4. Aguair
    May 4th at 8:52 pm

    Holla!

    Nice guys!

  5. unseen
    May 4th at 8:55 pm

    very nice!!!
    thanx WP!!!

  6. Fredi
    May 4th at 8:59 pm

    They sure do.

    Identicons, attack!

  7. Cristian Giménez
    May 4th at 9:13 pm

    Cool!!!

  8. BookGirl
    May 4th at 9:26 pm

    Neat. :)

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  11. DespairsRae
    May 4th at 9:32 pm

    Where do I find the option?

  12. Matt
    May 4th at 9:36 pm

    Under Settings > Discussion.

  13. iaoj
    May 4th at 9:59 pm

    I always feel glad to see developments at WordPress. You guys are nice people from whom every one gets admiration. Thank you for this wonderful Identicon. WordPress deserve to come right on the top. Thank you

  14. Manuel Reis
    May 4th at 10:10 pm

    I saw them yesterday by evening, and I couldn’t be happier.

  15. dontbesadblog
    May 4th at 10:20 pm

    May is already a busy month for WordPress. Astounded at how hard you work for us. Gald I’m not stuck with an other platform.

    Thanks*

  16. Scott Fillmer
    May 4th at 10:26 pm

    I love the new gravatar options, just wish my theme had integrated the code… no big deal, just added a great avatar plugin and works great. You can really see the improvement on the wordpress based blogs (wordpress hosted blogs).

  17. uemai
    May 4th at 10:26 pm

    Always improving with nice features.
    That’s it guys, we portuguese have a saying, which translation is something like: “Stop is to die”
    Keep going.
    Thanks!

  18. cjwriter
    May 4th at 10:37 pm

    Thanks, this is a great feature. I’ve been doing it manually by replacing the email address; it’s certainly a lot less work! Is there any way it could be tweaked to set a different avatar for the comments in Akismet? I almost approved a spam comment because of it.

  19. wweadam
    May 4th at 10:47 pm

    Awesome! Thanks for the update. I love the Wavatars!

  20. iamthelostgirl
    May 4th at 10:56 pm

    Thanks for adding this fun new feature, had a right giggle looking at the monster avatars :D

  21. BriarCat
    May 5th at 12:05 am

    Cute.

  22. pKay
    May 5th at 12:08 am

    Awesome! I was getting sick of all those mystery men faces when surfing in tag surfer. At least a random generated avatars would make the blogger look more colourful!

    Looking forward to seeing that implemented on all those bloggers that dont have a image yet!!

    Keep up the great work! Looking forward to more features!!

  23. Dave
    May 5th at 12:30 am

    Thanks for the option to turn them off without using CSS. Will there be an option to get them off the Dashboard, too?

  24. Craig Hodgkins
    May 5th at 12:33 am

    Thanks again, Matt, for all of the hard work, and for keeping things fun. Most comments coming to my blog are currently “identicon-less” (or from “Mystery Man”), so I’ll see if I notice any difference. Looks like the settings will be good to experiment with, though, just to see what shows up!

  25. wallacegsmith
    May 5th at 12:34 am

    Great idea! After being surprised by a few not-too-family-friendly comment avatars on my blog, I had hoped there would be a solution for filtering them somewhat without deleting the comment, itself. Thanks for the new addition!

  26. Pingback: Default avatar options are in trunk cour … « WordPress Development Updates
  27. AKHMAD SUDRAJAT
    May 5th at 1:42 am

    very nice!
    thx Matt

  28. Queni
    May 5th at 2:01 am

    cool
    I did a brief explanation on my blog (Spanish)

  29. Muslimah
    May 5th at 2:21 am

    Hi Matt!

    Thanks load for this new feature as I’ve been waiting for, and finally my dream just came true.

    Keep going!

    Terima kasih! (the Indonesian for thanks)

  30. Arun Shanbhag
    May 5th at 2:57 am

    Thanks Matt!
    love that Rating feature too!
    (sorry, don’t know if that was always there – just noticed it!)

    Is it possible (now or in the future, to have multiple custom avatars, which I could switch from time to time?

    Arun

    PS, am switching an EE blog to WP sometime this summer – can’t wait! :-)

  31. katm
    May 5th at 3:14 am

    Awesome. Now I don’t have to put in my own gravatar to get rid of the ugly shadow man.

    Thanks team!

  32. ThePearLady
    May 5th at 3:19 am

    Y’all all [@WP] are just freakin’ cool, Matt. :D

  33. Moon
    May 5th at 4:36 am

    I’ve already noticed…
    Fine.

  34. ChenZhen
    May 5th at 5:26 am

    I was kind of hoping that I could upload my own default avatar, but oh well.

    For now, I am reserving the right to assign deserving commenters their avatar using my super cool Chamber emblems. lol

  35. ChenZhen
    May 5th at 5:28 am

    Also, could we customize the avatar that appears for pingbacks?

  36. Viper007Bond
    May 5th at 5:31 am

    Heh, glad to see my code being put to use (I wrote the defaults patch). :D

  37. legoless
    May 5th at 9:58 am

    My readers were actually discussing the default avatar yesterday… Awesome ideas guys!

  38. furoshiki
    May 5th at 11:04 am

    Really a very cool option. I was, too, very much unpleased with the MysteryTar Invasion. Thanks WP!

  39. coolsmurf
    May 5th at 11:40 am

    this identicons is the best add-on for eons years. thanks!

  40. Dimas
    May 5th at 12:42 pm

    Guy’s you are so creative! Brilliant person! Well Done!

  41. Bruninho
    May 5th at 12:48 pm

    very good!

  42. FXSmom
    May 5th at 1:09 pm

    I saw this earlier and totally dug it. It makes my comment widget look so much prettier since 90% of those who comment are from elsewhere. :)

    Mucho Gracias

  43. m@q
    May 5th at 1:36 pm

    I don’t like the MYSTERY MAN avatar…
    So… welcome Identicons!

  44. persikoglass
    May 5th at 2:19 pm

    Very good WP team. I’m impressed. Keep it up!

  45. Red
    May 5th at 4:23 pm

    Neat.

  46. Chittaranjan
    May 5th at 4:38 pm

    We’re fast running out of ‘words-of-praise’ for WP! Nice, Cool, Awesome, Good all sound so passé now…..what with WP doling out one after another goodie!!!

    Wouldn’t it have been nice if the humans in Transformers were called ‘Identicons’? Mebbe WP/Gravatar/Automattic could have “sponsored” the Identicons :P

    I’m kinda sitting idle now….so…..

    Lexicons – Bot-followers of Lex Luthor
    Beacons – Light-emitting Bots
    Silicons – sandy Bots
    Pros n’ Cons – :|

  47. fightingwindmills
    May 5th at 4:54 pm

    The Identicons are very beautiful. Thanks for making that an option!

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  49. F4154LMAN
    May 5th at 5:58 pm

    i’ve tried that wavatar and monsterID avatar identification,
    haha.. those monsters are so funny :D
    love it

  50. loveparadox
    May 5th at 6:03 pm

    cool thanks!

  51. Brian
    May 5th at 8:01 pm

    I love how this gives all the spam comments nifty avatars too. They were so lonely before. :roll:

  52. *~{š†ΣLLªr}~*
    May 5th at 8:13 pm

    I did notice that. That IS a good Idea, I’ll have to check that one out for myself.

  53. Guineapig119
    May 5th at 8:54 pm

    I think it is a cool idea
    Next thing ya know, you guys will allow people without avatars to create there own! :mrgreen:
    Great Job!

  54. The Bagel of Everything
    May 5th at 9:28 pm

    I love this! Especially the ability to set a maximum rating. I had previously cropped off more of my avatar than I’d have liked, for the sake of any family blogs I may visit.

    How are the ratings set? Does each user set the rating of his/her own avatar? I looked in my profile settings, but didn’t see an option.

  55. ismailimail
    May 5th at 9:53 pm

    Hi, is there any trick to it? I enabled it to show identicons but they aren’t showing up on the blog.

  56. ismailimail
    May 5th at 10:54 pm

    I guess the icons are showing up on the individual blog posts, but they aren’t showing up on the front page next to individual’s names. It would be helpful if the icons could also show up on the front page of the blog so they may be enticing for people to click and read.

  57. winenegress
    May 6th at 12:06 am

    Thanks. I think I already have an avatar.

  58. thomasarie
    May 6th at 12:15 am

    Hohohohoh! Nice! Very nice!

  59. Tubbo & Dubba Tubba
    May 6th at 12:28 am

    Great post!

    Please come to our site.

    -The Tubbo Twins

  60. Gerald Ford
    May 6th at 12:32 am

    I was wondering what those colorful squarish-patterns were by guest commenters. Very cute feature. I love it.

  61. saiful
    May 6th at 12:34 am

    Cool….man..

  62. legalize
    May 6th at 12:37 am

    Probably the best avatar! Thanks
    May be will be interesting a linkable avatar page in WP.
    Give us a present Matt

  63. Eru
    May 6th at 12:59 am

    Another surprises (there’s a lot of cool announcements today)

    Great Job!

  64. b oe d
    May 6th at 1:09 am

    cool :)

  65. JavierTC
    May 6th at 1:20 am

    Cool!

  66. QuillDancer
    May 6th at 1:34 am

    Too cool. And the avatar generator, as well.

  67. ФHi
    May 6th at 1:40 am

    thx, it’s great !! coz i dont like the MysteryMan ;)

  68. Freya/Buildabearvilleblog
    May 6th at 1:46 am

    Awesome!! How do I get rid of the picture in my current avatar to try it out on myself?

  69. politiconews
    May 6th at 1:52 am

    Excellent. Been wanting an avatar myself. will get one now.

  70. politiconews
    May 6th at 1:56 am

    Thanks for the auto generated identicon .
    Can I use this in future with slight changes in colour?

  71. nurussadad
    May 6th at 2:17 am

    Good job

  72. Fay
    May 6th at 2:47 am

    Cool!

  73. vibesandstuff
    May 6th at 2:52 am

    im gonna go try it now :)

  74. daeng limpo
    May 6th at 3:17 am

    thanks MATT

  75. dkpresents
    May 6th at 3:29 am

    Always thinking on our behalf. Brilliant…

  76. thegrip
    May 6th at 3:48 am

    Can you make an avatar that looks like some dude who just smoked a bunch of sherm dust?

  77. parentingislami
    May 6th at 4:10 am

    That’s nice Matt. Thanx

  78. grokcode
    May 6th at 4:32 am

    Any chance of having ravatars included in the admin panel? I think its a nice addition since it allows greater customization of icons by the blog owner while still showing unique avatars for all the commenters (but then again I wrote the plugin so I’m biased.)

    I had been debating about the best way to handle the admin screens when upgrading the plugin for 2.5 until I saw this post. It seems pretty obvious that having it included alongside the other options would make the most sense. Anyway if anyone out there is interested, let me know and I can help out with the integration.

  79. udom
    May 6th at 5:47 am

    VERY COOL :-D I like it.

  80. propaganda press
    May 6th at 5:47 am

    this is a good thing cause am tired of that grey black square

  81. deftoned
    May 6th at 6:04 am

    The Gravatars icon has sorely been needed! As awesome as it is, a lot of people still don’t know about it! Thank you for this!

  82. BKB
    May 6th at 6:27 am

    I really want to use my own default image though.

  83. Nanang Suryana
    May 6th at 6:45 am

    very nice!!!

  84. penyobenny
    May 6th at 6:50 am

    thanks!

    he he,
    didnt know how many CP people there were!

    http://play.clubpenguin.com/ !!!

    you must be under 16!!!

  85. penyobenny
    May 6th at 6:51 am

    HAPPY CINCO DE MAYO!

  86. Ale
    May 6th at 6:59 am

    Cool!

  87. sunshineforlife
    May 6th at 8:04 am

    cool!

  88. Hameedullah Khan
    May 6th at 8:29 am

    Very nice feature. Thanks once again!

  89. campsimplicity
    May 6th at 9:06 am

    Thank you, that’s a great idea. ;)

    By the way, I’d like to have an animated avatar. Would that be possible?

  90. famoon
    May 6th at 9:57 am

    Awesome!

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  92. wuryan
    May 6th at 10:32 am

    Good job and very nice

  93. harbicoil
    May 6th at 10:32 am

    Awesome upadate guys!

  94. Alessio in Asia
    May 6th at 10:48 am

    cool

  95. ><>narniapengi<><
    May 6th at 11:28 am

    Great idea, love it!

  96. MondoFree
    May 6th at 12:06 pm

    Thanks a lot for this option.

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  98. Ratssafwevbn
    May 6th at 12:39 pm

    cool ;) thanks wordpress :P

  99. Ratssafwevbn
    May 6th at 12:40 pm

    i hope you dont screw it up :lol: jk jk jk cuz sometimes when u try to go to a blog it says system error it’s probaly matt’s fault :lol:

  100. Ray
    May 6th at 12:52 pm

    Awesome!
    Keep it up ..and hey, it’s Tuesday already! ;)

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