How to show an author’s avatar within WordPress

If you’d like to show the author’s avatar within a WordPress post, we’ll show you how in this article. While the functionality is not built into WordPress (version 3.2.1 as of this writing), you can surprisingly accomplish this task with just one line of code.

In this article, we’ll update the top part of the post that says “Posted on” so that it shows the author’s avatar. Refer to the screenshots below to see the results.

In this article, you will learn how to show an author’s avatar within WordPress.

Showing an Author’s Avatar in WordPress

1. Log into your WordPress Dashboard
2. In the left menu, under “Appearance”, click “Editor”
3. On the “Editor” page, find and click “content.php” in the list of files on the right of the page
4. Find this section of code:
   <?php twentyeleven_posted_on(); ?>

   … and replace it with this:

   <? echo get_avatar( get_the_author_meta('user_email'), $size = '50'); ?> <?php twentyeleven_posted_on(); ?>
           

That’s it, you’re done! In this tutorial we placed the author’s avatar at the top of the post (for the homepage). If you’d like show the author’s avatar from anywhere else within the post (or on other pages), simply use the following code:

   <? echo get_avatar( get_the_author_meta('user_email'), $size = '50'); ?>

Congratulations, now you know how to show an author’s avatar within WordPress!