For increased security, you should never create WordPress sites with 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 or blog.
In this step-by-step tutorial, we’ll show you how to change the WordPress admin user name to a more secure username.
How To Change Your WordPress Username From Admin To A More Secure User Name
Normally, on a new WordPress site, the first registered user is usually the site administrator.
The default WordPress user name admin is not recommended, as it puts your WordPress site at risk of being attacked by hackers or bots …
Let’s change the admin username in WordPress from ‘admin’ to a more secure user name.
There are several ways to access your “Profile” section inside WordPress:
Click on the Users > All Users page in your main menu …
Click either on your user name, or click on the Edit link when hovering over the user name with your mouse …
Or, select Edit My Profile from the “Howdy, User” dropdown menu near the top-right hand corner of your admin area …
You can also visit your “Profile” area by selecting Users > Your Profile from your admin sidebar menu.
What you will see in the Profile area, however, is that you can’t change your username from your administration section …
So, how do you edit a 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 this without going into your server:
Click Add New to create a new user …
Next, create a new username, and assign this new user the role of “Administrator”. Remember to save your changes to update your settings …
You have now created a new user with the role of admin …
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” screen …
Select Users > All Users in the main menu …
You can now delete your old administrator account …
Select 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 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 mostly designed for non-technical WordPress users, let’s go one step further and show you how to change a username inside the WordPress database.
All you need is 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:
Changing A Username Inside The WordPress Database
In our example, the server uses the cPanel management application …
cPanel
Log into your server control panel …
cPanel administration area
Scroll down to the “Databases” section and click on phpMyAdmin …
phpMyAdmin
Open up your WordPress database.
Note: If you have multiple databases set up on your domain, make sure that you select the right one …
phpMyAdmin databases
Don’t panic when you see the complicated screen.
Click on wp_users in the “Table” column on the left-hand side …
The user name is located in the “user login” column. To edit the field 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 if you’re finished and reopen the browser to your WordPress site. You may find that your session is expired. If so, log in again with your new Admin credentials …
You will see that the user name is now updated. However, your admin details will probably still be displaying the old “nickname” …
To edit the “nickname”, open your Users screen and click the Edit link below the user name …
You can also access your Profile section by clicking 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 drop-down menu …
Click Update Profile to save your new settings …
You admin area is now updated with a new username and nickname …
Congratulations! Now you know how to change the WordPress admin username on your website or blog.
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