By default, WordPress shows user avatars via Gravatar — a global, email-linked avatar service. It requires zero setup on your part, which is exactly why it's the default. But it comes with real limitations depending on what kind of site you're running.
Works out of the box, and for sites where users already have a Gravatar set up (or don't care about their avatar at all), that's genuinely enough. The limitations show up for community, membership, or forum-style sites: it requires an external account most casual users have never set up, it shows the same avatar across every site the user's email is registered on (not scoped to yours), and users who'd rather not use their real photo are stuck with a generic default identicon.
A dedicated plugin flips the model: avatars are built and customized on your site directly, no external account needed. Users pick from customizable facial features, hairstyles, and background colors to build something that's actually theirs — no real photo required, which matters for users who prefer privacy but still want a personalized presence rather than a generic gray silhouette.
This is the more relevant option specifically for community and membership sites, where avatars are part of how users express identity on your platform — a bare Gravatar fallback undersells that.
If your site is small, low-engagement, or avatars genuinely don't matter to your users, Gravatar's default is fine — don't add a plugin you don't need. If avatars are part of the user experience (forums, membership communities, anywhere identity matters), a dedicated builder like WPAvatar gives users something better than an external-account fallback.
See the WPAvatar plugin page for pricing, or try the free version first.
