How to add a new Super Admin

When you created a network of multiple sites in WordPress 3.0, you (the main blog admin) because a Super Admin with all kinds of fun powers. In some situations, you may desire to have additional Super Admins who can do things like install plugins & themes, perform upgrades, and manage global users and sites.

If you were using WPMU, not only did Site Admin change to Super Admin, the location of adding another one changed as well, so heads up.

Under the Super Admin -> Users menu, find the user you wish to promote. Hover over their username and a small “edit” link will appear beneath it. Click it. This will lead you to the user’s profile page.

Scroll down to the “Name” section.

I’ve obfuscated the username in this case, but here you can see the checkbox selected to make this user a Super Admin on my site. Hit the update button to save the chage, and the user now has access to the Super Admin menu.

3 Comments

  1. YAY! sometimes the simplest thing are the hardest to find, i’ve been racking my brains.
    thanks – I really appreciate your tutorials.

  2. I read recently that it is a good practice to foil would-be hackers by deleting the “admin” username, as that’s the one they will automatically target. Would it be possible to give another user super admin rights and then delete the initial admin account?

    Would that risk causing any problems?

    • One of the issues with doing that is there is nothing to prevent someone registering as admin other than you catching it.

      Instead of deleting the admin account, make the admin user a subscriber and give the account a strong password.

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