For security reasons, never set up sites using the username “admin”.
This is the default installation user name for WordPress and one of the first things that hackers will test with a WordPress website.
In this tutorial, you will learn how to change your admin username in WordPress from ‘admin’ to a more secure username.
Changing Your WP Admin User Name
Generally, in all new WordPress site installations, the first user is the admin of the website.
Having the default WordPress user name admin is not recommended, as it can out your WordPress site at risk of being hacked …
Let’s change your WordPress admin user name to a more secure user name.
There are several ways to access your “Profile” section after logging into your WP administration area:
Select the Users > All Users page in your main menu …
Click either on the user name, or the Edit link when hovering over the username with your mouse …
Or, select Edit My Profile from the “Howdy, User” drop-down menu at the top-right hand corner of your screen …
You can also access your “Profile” screen by selecting Users > Your Profile from the main menu.
What you will see when you get into the Profile page, however, is that you can’t change usernames from the Dashboard …
So, how do you change a WordPress admin user name?
Change Admin Username By Creating A New Admin User
If your user name is “admin,” here’s the easiest way to change your user name without accessing your server and altering your WordPress database:
Click Add New to add a new user …
Next, create a better username, and assign your new user account the role of “Administrator”. Remember to save your changes to update your settings …
A new admin user should now be displaying …
Log out of your WordPress admin area …
Log in with your new admin details …
You should see your new username details in the “Howdy, User” panel …
Click on Users > All Users in the main menu …
Delete your old administrator account …
Choose the option to attribute all content owned by the old user account and reassigned it to your new user, then confirm the deletion of the old user account …
You are now left with only the new Admin account, effectively changing your WordPress admin user name …
Change Admin Username Using A WordPress Plugin
Another easy way to change the username is to use a plugin like the one shown below.
Username Changer
(Username changer)
Username Changer is a free WordPress plugin that lets you easily change your admin username (and allow other users to change their usernames too!)
Installing The Plugin
To install the plugin from your WordPress dashboard, go to Plugins > Add Plugins and type in “username” into the Keyword search field (if you need help see our tutorial on installing WordPress plugins).
There are several plugins you can use to perform a similar function. Locate the Username Changer plugin and click on ‘Install Now’ …
(Install the plugin)
After installing the plugin, click the ‘Activate’ button …
(Activate the plugin)
Configuring The Plugin
After installing and activating the plugin, go to Settings > Username Changer …
(Settings – Username Changer menu)
This brings you to the ‘Settings’ screen.
Here, you can allow other user roles to change their usernames too (be careful about doing this!) …
(Username Changer Settings – Allowed Roles)
You can also configure email notifications (if you choose to allow users to change their usernames) …
(Username Changer Settings – Email notifications)
Using The Plugin
To change your username, go to Users > Your Profile …
(Users – Your Profile menu)
Scroll down to the ‘Name’ section and you will see a ‘Change Username’ link next to the grayed out username field. Click on this link to change your username …
(Click on ‘Change Username’ link)
The ‘Username’ field will become editable. Change your username and click the ‘Save Username’ button …
(Save your new username)
Changing your username will log you out of your WordPress admin area. You will need to log back into your WordPress site.
Click on the link to log back in …
(Click on the link to log back in)
Log back into your site with your new username (note: your password should remain the same) …
(Log back in with your new username)
Note: If you don’t click on the link to log back in you will find yourself logged out of your site …
(Changing your username will expire your session)
After logging back into your site, go to your User Profile section and you will see that your username has been changed.
(Username changed)
To learn more about this plugin, go here: Username Changer
Although this tutorial is mostly aimed for non-technical WordPress users, let’s go one step further and show you how to change your user name inside the WordPress database.
All you need is admin access to your server.
To learn how to search and replace content in your WordPress database without touching code or editing WordPress database tables, see the tutorial below:
How To Change Your User Name Inside The WordPress Database
For the example below, the server is using cPanel …
cPanel management tool
Log into your server control panel …
cPanel administration area
Navigate to the “Databases” section and open phpMyAdmin …
phpMyAdmin
Click on your WordPress database.
Note: If you have a number of databases set up on your domain, make sure that you select the correct one …
phpMyAdmin databases
Don’t worry about the complicated screen.
Click on wp_users …
The username is located in the “user login” column. To edit the field simply double-click on this text you want to change …
Type in the new username and click outside the edit box to update the field with your new username …
Log out of your server when you’re finished and reopen the browser to your WordPress site. You will probably find that your session has expired. If so, log in again with your new administration details …
You should see that your username is now updated. However, it will probably still be displaying the previous “nickname” …
To change the “nickname”, go to your Users section and click on the Edit link below the user name …
You can also get to your Profile section if you click on the Edit My Profile link in the “Howdy, User” screen …
Choose a new name to display publicly from the drop-down menu …
Note: You can also create a new Nickname in the Nickname field and it will then be available for selection in the Display name publicly as dropdown menu …
Click Update Profile to save your new settings …
You admin area is now updated with a new user name and nickname …
Congratulations! Now you know how to change the WordPress admin username on your website.
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum