In your website’s General Settings, you can control several aspects of your site, including the title, language, privacy, and more. This guide will explain each setting.
In this guide
To visit the General Settings:
- Visit your site’s dashboard.
- On the left side, click on Settings near the bottom
The General Settings page will load first. On the left side, you can then navigate to other settings areas:
Click the links above to view our guide to each settings screen.
Video Transcript
The first step is to choose a name for your site, which will tell visitors what your site is about.
Once you decide on the perfect name, select your site and choose “Settings” from the navigation menu on the left-hand side.
Enter your site title, then add a tagline to explain what your site is about.
You can also upload or select a site icon, which you’ll see in browser tabs or bookmarks in your web browser.
When you create a site on WordPress.com, you’ll automatically have a site address that includes your site’s name dot WordPress dot com. But you can add a custom site address if you prefer. WordPress dot com will suggest a list of domain names that are available based on the site name you choose. You can search for a different domain name or choose from the list of domains below. Best of all, your domain is free for the first year with any WordPress.com plan.
Your Site Profile includes the following settings you can customize to your liking:
Your site’s title and tagline are displayed in the tab of a web browser and in the header for most themes:
Your Site title will also appear in your website’s dashboard and as the sender’s name when your subscribers receive email notifications when you publish a post.
Your site’s title can be anything you’d like to describe your site. It doesn’t have to be the same as your site’s address or your account’s username. It’s recommended to use a cleaned-up version of your address (e.g., myawesomesite can become My Awesome Site) or change it to whatever best reflects your site’s personality and topic succinctly.
The Site tagline is a short description or catchy phrase to describe what your site is about and can be beneficial for SEO.
To change your site’s title or tagline:
- Visit your dashboard.
- Navigate to Settings → General.
- Type the new title and tagline in the boxes provided.
- Click the “Save settings” button to commit the change.
You can change these texts as often as you would like. Changing your site title does not change your site address or your domain.
The Site Icon is a small image that is visible next to the site title on the browser tab:
See our Add a Site Icon guide to learn how to change the site icon and recommended image guidelines.
The Site address section shows your .wordpress.com site address and provides quick links to:
- Register a custom domain address.
- Connect a domain you already own.
- Redirect the
.wordpress.comaddress to another URL.
The Language setting controls your site’s default language as seen by the public. It sets the language used for certain text elements of your site that you cannot edit directly, e.g., the comments form and some built-in buttons.
Each site has its own language setting, so if you have multiple sites associated with your account, each one can have a different language.
The language setting will not translate the text you have written on your site. See options for creating a multi-language site here.
If you select an RTL language (for example, Hebrew), the theme’s layout will mirror itself so that the text can be read properly from right to left.
You can help translate WordPress.com themes into more than 100 languages. Learn how to get started on our translation portal site.
You can also change your Interface Language, which is the language used for your WordPress.com dashboard (not visible to the public.) This is a separate setting from your site’s language.
Set your site’s timezone to the timezone you are based in to ensure scheduled posts and pages are published at your desired time. Using the dropdown, you can select your closest city or choose a specific UTC offset.
The Privacy settings control who can and cannot view your site:
See our Privacy Settings guide to learn what each option means for your site.
With gift subscriptions enabled, a visitor will see a banner at the top of your site to pay to renew your WordPress.com plan and domain when they are close to expiring. Toggle this option off, and no banner will be shown.
See our Gift a WordPress.com Subscription guide to learn more.
All WordPress.com websites display a link to WordPress.com in the footer. You can click the “change footer credit” button to adjust what it says, or remove it entirely on eligible plans.
Visit our Footer Credit Options guide to learn more.
The Site Tools section provides the following options. Click the link to visit our instructions for each topic:
