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user-roles

WordPress User Roles: How To Use Them and Their Permissions

Tired of handling your website on your own? If you want to change that, then learning about WordPress user roles and how to add them will be of use to you. In WordPress, there is a functioning role organization system that allows you to supervise and manage what certain users have or don’t have access to when it comes to your website content. With this handy feature, you will be able to assign specific roles to different users. You can, as well, allow your users to easily change WordPress username or to change their WordPress password.

As a result, your website content will be easier to organize than ever. Moreover, the amount of work you have to do will be evenly balanced, and you will notice your website prospering in a rapid manner. Most important of all, if previous user role system you have set does not work for you, you can modify anyone’s role as you please with no strain whatsoever. In other words, with this useful feature, you will be able to hit multiple birds with one stone.

List of User Roles in WordPress

When it comes to users, there are 5 different roles in WordPress. All the website users can only be divided into these roles and get specific WordPress role permissions. But what makes each user unique is his WordPress-user ID.

1. Administrator

If you’re a website creator, then you hold the Administrator title. As administrator, you’re on top of the WordPress user role chain. You can create, modify or delete site content and user accounts, change themes, add plugins, edit code, and more.

In short, administrator can do pretty much anything in WordPress and holds complete power over every other user role. Therefore, if you plan to assign this role to another account, you should be extremely cautious of who you’re giving this role to.

2. Editor

Overall, an editor is someone whose responsibility is managing website content. Their role includes creating, editing and deleting of posts and pages, even those made by other users. In addition, editor can moderate comments as well as manage links and categories. Nevertheless, editor has no access to meddling with themes, plugins or widgets. Still, compared to other user roles in WordPress, this role holds a higher level of authority.

3. Author

When set side by side with previous two roles, whoever holds the role of Author in WordPress has significantly less freedom in handling the website content. For instance, users with Author role can’t edit pages and are also not permitted to modify content made by other users. What they are allowed to do, however, is create, edit, delete and publish their own posts. Furthermore, they can upload media files to media library and modify comments on their posts as well.

4. Contributor

When looking into characteristics of Contributor, this role is pretty much a reduced version of Author role. These users can create, edit or delete their own posts. As for publishing their work, this falls under Administrator or Editor’s job description.

Also, another limitation of this role is the fact that they can’t use Media Library, so they have to ask Administrators or Editors for help in this area. If someone is not a regular content creator on the website, then this user role is an ideal choice for them.

5. Subscriber

In the eyes of WordPress platform, all new users are Subscribers. Their only ability is reading of all posts on the website, writing comments on posts and managing their own profiles. For subscribers, editing of content or settings is completely disabled.

Additional User Roles in WooCommerce

If you have integrated WooCommerce plugin in your website, then there are two additional user roles on your WordPress list. These are:

1. Shop Manager

By giving someone permission to handle your website store, you are assigning them the role of Shop Manager. This user can view orders, order history and WooCommerce reports. Along with already mentioned capabilities, Shop Manager can also edit WooCommerce products and settings. In fact, in some ways, this role is similar to the WordPress Editor role.

2. Customer

Overall, an editor is someone whose responsibility is managing website content. Their role includes creating, editing and deleting of posts and pages, even those made by other users. In addition, editor can moderate comments as well as manage links and categories. Nevertheless, editor has no access to meddling with themes, plugins or widgets. Still, compared to other user roles in WordPress, this role holds a higher level of authority.

Users Role Plugin

If all role options available in WordPress are not enough for you, and you would still prefer to change some settings, you can install Capability Manager Enhanced plugin for managing roles. Installing WordPress plugins is easy, and usually takes a few minutes only.

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Upon installing this plugin, one more option in Users tab will appear, called Capabilities.

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Here you can modify capabilities for users in far greater detail. By using check boxes on the screen shown below, you can assign anything that is available to specific role that you want to modify.

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On your right menu you can choose or add new role for this user. Last but not least, you can copy preexisting role or add custom capabilities to it.

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This completes out guide to WordPress user roles and how to add them to your site. As an admin, you can use this privilege completely to your advantage. Flexibility of WordPresss allows you to be in charge of your website at any given moment. Thus, user role management is quick, effective, and most importantly – simple to manage!

How to Set WordPress User Roles and Why?

Now that we listed all user roles in WordPress, we will go through easy steps of how to add them.

1. Go to Users > All Users

First, click on Users option in your Dashboard. Then, select All Users button.

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2. Click on Edit to change User settings

Here you will be able to find a list of all site users. In order to change user settings, select the Edit button.

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3. Find Role and select

Now, a long list of options available will appear. Scroll down and select Role that you wish to assign to that particular user.

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4. Possibility of disabling visual editor

On the same page, you can also remove the Visual Editor for any particular user. To do this, just uncheck the Disable the visual editor when editing box.

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5. Don’t forget to save

After you’re done, make sure to click on Update Profile button in the bottom left corner to apply changes.

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We hope that you found this article to be helpful. If you liked it, please feel free to check out some of these articles as well!

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