For web security purposes, it’s highly recommended that you don’t create WordPress sites using the username “admin”.
This is the default installation user name for WordPress and one of the first areas of potential vulnerabilities hackers will test with a WordPress web site.
In this step-by-step tutorial, you will learn how to change the admin user name in WordPress from ‘admin’ to a more secure user name.
How To Change Your WordPress Username From Admin To Another Username
Typically, in all new WordPress sites, the first user is the admin of the site.
Having the default WordPress user name admin is not recommended, as it poses a security risk to your WordPress site …
Let’s change the WordPress admin user name to a more secure username.
There are a number of ways to view your user name details inside your WordPress backend admin area:
Click on the Users > All Users screen in your main menu …
Click either on the username, or the Edit link when hovering over the username with your mouse …
Or, select Edit My Profile from the “Howdy, User” menu at the top-right hand corner of your Dashboard …
You can also go to your “Profile” section by selecting Users > Your Profile from the main menu.
What you will see when you get into your Profile page, however, is that your user name cannot be changed inside the Dashboard …
So, how can you edit your username?
Change Admin Username By Creating A New Admin User
If your admin login is “admin,” here’s the easiest way to change the user name without accessing your server:
First, create a new user …
Next, create a better user name, and assign this new user account the role of “Administrator”. Save your changes to update your settings …
You have now added a new admin user …
Log out of your WordPress admin area …
Log in with your new admin details …
You should see your new user name details displayed in the “Howdy, User” screen …
Select Users > All Users in your main menu …
You can now delete the old administrator account …
Select the option to assign all content owned by the old user account and reassigned it to the new admin, then confirm the deletion of the old account …
You are now left with only the new Admin account, effectively changing your WordPress admin username …
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 really intended for non-technical WordPress users, let’s go one step further and show you how to change a WordPress 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 A Username Inside The WordPress Database
For our example, we’ll be working with the cPanel management application …
cPanel management application
Log into your server admin account …
cPanel admin area
Scroll down to the “Databases” section and open up phpMyAdmin …
phpMyAdmin
Open up your WordPress database.
Note: If you have a number of databases set up on your domain, make sure that you choose the right one …
phpMyAdmin databases
Don’t worry about the complicated-looking information on your screen screen.
Click on wp_users in the “Table” column on the left-hand side …
The username is located in the “user login” column. To edit the user name just double-click on the 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 go back to your WordPress site. You may find that your session is expired. If so, log in again with your new Admin login credentials …
You will see that the username is now updated. However, it will probably still display the old “nickname” …
To edit the “nickname”, visit your Users section and click on the Edit link below your username …
You can also reach the Profile section if you click on the Edit My Profile link in the “Howdy, User” section …
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 drop down 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 user name on your website.
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"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group