Therefore, I am trying to use the custom field name "header_image with the value using the the correct url. Finally, you also have the option to visit theDevelopers Debug Tool on Facebook. But thats fine, as we all start learning somewhere. You may also want to set a Default Image URL to appear if a post doesnt have a featured image assigned to it. Now I just need to fix everything else on my website that I had turned off and messed around with while going slowly insane trying to trouble shoot a problem that was nothing to do with WordPress, themes or plugins GRRRRRRRR. An alternative is to install and activate a plugin like Export All URLs. We recommend checking boxes for the Title, URL, and Description. Its easy to grab a quick image that relates to the article just to save time. Overall, the best way to activate the Open Graph protocol for properly sharing content and featured images on social media is by installing a plugin like Yoast SEO or OG. But this is a reminder to ensure that your hosting provider either provides the tools needed to render featured images or find a plugin that activates the Open Graph protocol. Considering you should be uploading high-resolution images as featured images, it makes sense to automate optimization. Youve figured out how to upload a featured image and completed your post content. Find and select the triple-dot icon () in the far right corner of the dashboard. Replace featured images with the selected image. Upon activation, you can go to Code Snippets Header & Footer from your WordPress dashboard. I always prefer the classic editor. Maybe you encounter one of the following: Luckily, WordPress already includes a wide range of photo editing tools for you to ensure the featured image looks professional. By default, this featured should be enabled, but its possible you turned it off at some point. Now, go to your Facebook page (personal or business) and paste a link with a featured image into the Status field. Click the + Block Inserter icon to add a new block. If the goal is to have no featured image, you can remove it altogether. Now its time to look at the content within that page to ensure the featured images show up the way they should. That means you cant simply take any photo and expect it to look great as a featured image. On the other hand, user roles dictate which areas of the WordPress dashboard and the frontend website are accessible to certain people. If youre having problems with the SEO plugins discussed above, or you simply dont plan on using an SEO plugin (and therefore, dont have access to a quick Open Graph activation button), there are a few other options to activate Open Graph. Featured images dont show up as thumbnails in your lists of posts and pages on the dashboard. Talk with our experts by launching a chat in the MyKinsta dashboard. Click the Edit Image link to proceed with the edit. There are many ways to go about it, and well cover them all. The first few settings dont have anything to do with the featured image, but they can affect how the posts show up in the block and make your featured images look strange. This turns on the featured images for all the latest posts being pulled. Allow Featured Image for Viewing 6. However, the 1200 x 628 pixels suggestion is just a starting off point. Unfortunately, we cant walk you through the solutions to these issues as it requires you to either look into the theme settings or contact the theme developer. Yoast SEO is another SEO plugin that includes social sharing features and options to enable/disable the Open Graph functionality. Along with activating the Open Graph for all social networking sites, this plugin has the added advantage of including Twitter tags to improve your Twitter sharing results. Your theme layout does not support featured images. You can include your header image in your posts by placing it in the tag of your WordPress site's root document. You can go to Post > All Posts to review your list of articles. You can search for the Cover block or scroll through the library to find it. The Ixion theme page provides details of setting up your Header images and also the size specifications at the bottom of the page. Reinstalled GP plug in. The featured image should quickly appear whenever someone wants to share one of your posts or pages on a social network. For free, a fee, or with attribution. Open your site in MyKinsta. For instance, you might consider including things like the Site Name and Post Title but not having the URL. Click the Remove Block option at the very end of the list. For instance, you may want to revamp your homepage completely, and its easier to just make an entirely new page instead of editing the current one. For example, you might complete an action with multiple pages. We recommend solutions like Optimoleand Imagify. Upload the image here and click the Save button. The plugin works with posts and pages, including custom posts and WooCommerce products. Header Image is Not Showing Up in Posts Because It's Not Placed in the Correct Location If your header image is not showing up in posts, it's likely because it's not located in the correct location. This usually means that theres something wrong with the image itself, or you need to allow larger uploads to your WordPress site. You can also test this out for the other social networks like Twitter and Pinterest. Scroll to the bottom of the page to click on the Next button. Incorrect image URLs. Several images are pulled from the post, but you must choose which one you want to use. Hit the Enter key to activate the crop and see the result in the preview. I felt I should post it here for those having same issues. Click the Homepage dropdown field to reveal the list of pages you currently have active on your website. Go to Appearance Editor. Many of them provide tools for seeing previews of what shows up on Facebook and other social networks. The Preview button also does the trick for testing a featured image, but the public cant see it until you hit Publish. Problem with image name. The Ixion theme supports featured images on single Posts and Pages. The the_post_thumbnail(); function may lie before the page title or after the contentthat depends on your page and theme configuration. Other times, you may notice that a theme presents a featured image in a different spot than whats expected. You are not familiar with PHP so you can use this plugin for the header image. The Quick Featured Images plugin handles bulk editing for featured images along with a myriad of other functionalities, like adding a default featured image for all posts or setting presets for default featured images. But what if thats not the case? All you have to do is paste the post link into the Facebook status field (you can also do this on personal or business pages) and wait to see if the post content gets rendered, along with the featured image. Check this box so that the featured image from a WordPress post or page gets populated upon sharing to Facebook. All of these come into play when highlighting your recent posts and ensuring they look presentable while also displaying your featured images. Its also possible that you would like to replace a certain category of post or page to all have the same featured image, whether thats a professionally designed image that indicates the article is for a tutorial or maybe for putting your logo a relevant image on all webpages. Click the Choose Image button to proceed. This helps speed up your featured image creation process while also helping your brand. You can upload a featured image to every post and page. Such plugins may not be the best solution if they block the featured image from being shown on a Latest Posts list, or if they make the featured image load slowlythe featured image should load immediately for optimal user experience. Itll avoid causing problems with your own server. Type in the new dimensions and click the Scale button. Set the selected image as the new featured image. I agree Pedro, I have never liked working Gutenberg editor, It has a way of messing things up. Your themes coding often structures the featured image location and formatting. You can also configure settings to have a default Post Image Source, like pulling the first image from a post or going with the Featured Image. The only thing to do next is to review and publish the post. Or if the featured image fails to show up on social media, but its working fine on your website. Some websites already have hundreds or even thousands of featured images, so a bulk editing tool is required. Alternatively, you may find yourself in the older version of the WordPress editor. The good news is that all future posts without featured images will automatically add the default photo. Select the first two checkboxes to grab the Open Graph image, while the other is for using the page or post featured image. Once everything is configured, hit the Publish button. But didn't notice the header image was missing from the desktop view until today. It promises to make the featured image upload process a little easier for website owners. It often presents useful information in the form of a photograph or graphic image, granting the user a sneak peek into the information behind that link. Participant. The Large Size often dictates the featured image dimensions when shown at the top of a post or page. Get all your applications, databases and WordPress sites online and under one roof. Make sure its on the Block settings tab. This code snippet is a reference to your featured image. We covered this solution already in the previous section, yet it fits well in the best practices, too. Keep in mind that the initial Select page in the Quick Featured Images plugin offers a wide range of actions to take with your featured images. This is done by using the align feature. You may have to switch it from Page to Block. It does this by halting the loading of images on a page until they come into view on the screen. You also agree to receive information from Kinsta related to our services, events, and promotions. Its not uncommon for brands to share a list of the most recent posts, yet a gallery or feed with just links may not attract as much attention. It is primarily used for replacing featured images in bulk. This should be empty, asking you to upload a featured image. Choose Preferences from the bottom of the menu that appears. Go to its Post Settings panel and open the Featured Image section. Think about installing a plugin that resolves problems for featured images without you having to do much work. These best practices cover everything from design recommendations to uploading tactics, enabling you to feel confident about all featured images while also cutting down on the amount of time you spend with featured images. This could be just above your site's title and menu, for example. Regardless, the best course of action is to follow these steps: An interesting thing about featured images is that some WordPress themes may not support them. Visuals can be decisive in your content marketing plan. Its getting placed on a digital medium where the photos resolution doesnt necessarily have to be print-worthy to look good. Therefore, it serves as a backup to the real featured image field, just in case you forget to upload the featured image but still want something to show up. I have experienced similar issues, I exported my post from another website to another new site I am building when I tried importing, it didnt come with the featured images. Thats a tremendous problem. The new cover shows up in the editor preview, and you can also edit the blocks settings on the right-hand panel. Three options are available for you to bulk edit the featured images: Choose the right option depending on what youre trying to achieve. One of the last areas to consider for the Featured Image section (in the Latest Posts block) is the number of items you show in the block and how many columns make up the block. To begin, install and activate the OG plugin on your WordPress site. Legal information. On the way, you also learned tips to improve your image editing skills and workflows. We dont recommend trying to enlarge an image as itll only make it blurry. You should now see a thumbnail of that image for all posts that dont have featured images already uploaded. A theme or plugin usually defines it. Regardless, all of these errors are frustrating and confusing for users. Relevance also comes into play when you manually insert an image for each featured image in an article. Now that you have the featured images ready, get sharing! Think about using a default featured image plugin to fill in the blanks and list temporary or permanent featured images when you forget to do so. The FIFU plugin also includes features to auto-set featured images from images and videos by using iframe tags and other elements. Every hosted image, including featured images, has metadata crawled by the search engines to figure out what your post or page is all about. This is particularly important if youre highlighting your recent posts on the homepage. A thumbnail of the image you go with shows up under the Featured Image panel in your Post Settings. Because of this, pasting and Debugging the URL in the Sharing Debugger Tool from Facebook could actually solve your problems altogether. Run your Node.js, Python, Go, PHP, Ruby, Java, and Scala apps, (or almost anything else if you use your own custom Dockerfiles), in three, easy steps! You can search for specific keywords and set them as your featured images. This field is available on all WordPress posts and pages by going to the Post Settings panel on the right side of the article or page. Lets start with the simplest of solutions, making sure youre uploading your featured images properly. Visit our Facebook page; Visit our Twitter account; Visit our Instagram account; Visit our LinkedIn account Start your free trial today. Added a featured image and it was finally appearing. But what if those thumbnail images are nowhere to be found? You can now go to Posts > All Posts in your dashboard to view the posts in a list and make sure the featured images truly got replaced in the posts. As an alternative, its often a better idea to leave the Crop Thumbnail box unchecked, so the Thumbnail dimensions are used as more of a guideline. For instance, you could type in a 2 x 1 aspect ratio. This means that as long as you click Save Draft or Publish, the image remains active on that post until you remove it. As you can see, a different image appears in the Featured Image section. Select the image you like, then click on the Choose Image button. 3. If youve uploaded your posts or pages featured image correctly and it still doesnt appear, then there can be several reasons. As with most WordPress settings, these also tend to modify the way your featured images appear. Another way to see if this works is if you have any social sharing buttons on your website. You can also do this with pages or click on the All Posts option if youre interested in adding a featured image to a previously generated post. We recommend you follow these steps to ensure youre doing it the right way. Incorrect references in image URLs. Configure WordPress Dashboard Settings 5. Simply having a header.php in your theme's folder will not output your header to the browser. This brings up the Media Library, from where you can choose an image to serve as your Default Featured Image. This tells us the plugin is doing its job by adding the default featured image to the right posts and leaving out the ones that already have featured images. One way to complete this task is by opening up your Facebook account and pretending youre about to share a status update. The thumbnail images arent showing up as the right sizes. Sometimes other settings override this, but its not a bad idea to mark down the dimensions to ensure you at least know the optimal width for a featured image. Not all themes have the same featured image settings. Its usually located at the top of the post or page. Although automating the process isnt for everyone, there are tricks to ensure that a WordPress featured image is always shown for posts and pages, minimizing the chance that an author forgets to upload one. Check out our post on the 10 best places to find free images for WordPress, no strings att, Get started, migrations, and feature guides. To edit featured images in WordPress, open a post and scroll to the Featured Images section in the Post Settings panel. Wrong file permission or ownership. I don't understand why the image only works in . However, with the Default Featured Image plugin active, all you have to do is click on the posts Update button. The only problem is that it doesnt tell you which of your Media Library images have been previously uploaded as featured images. Many blind people are using the internet through screen readers. To start, install and activate the Open Graph and Twitter Card Tags plugin on your WordPress site. In this module, you can select multiple images from your Media Library. Auto Featured Image even has a bulk featured image generation tool. We recommend experimenting with the content settings, like showing Post Content, Display Author Name, or Display Post Date. After all, a theme or plugin could be causing the problem. Theyre vital to help your post or page move up the rankings. We have an excellent guide on optimizing your WordPress images. You may have a lot of old posts that dont generate featured images when shared on Facebook. Giving it a new position within the template will also tell WordPress that it should render somewhere else on the frontend. It would be troubling and potentially illegal to simply search for an image online, take its URL, and use the image for your featured image, as you do not know where the image URL is hosted. You can also do this with pages or click on the All Posts option if you're interested in adding a featured image to a previously generated post. Clicking on that brings you directly to the WordPress Media Library. The featured image field is missing when youre trying to edit or create a page or post. Here, enable the Display featured image option. You can type in custom width and height, or decide on a percentage, so that the tool automatically changes the size of all featured images based on the percentage given. Featured images look much better when the width is longer than the heightoften around a 2:1 ratio. We covered the Open Graph essentials in the section above. This means that as you move the crop box, and it sticks to the aspect ratio. Click the featured image thumbnail to access its various settings. These are the general settings for all social media sharing, making sure Facebook and Twitter dont randomly select photos from your article or other places on your website. Note: Featured images get pulled from WordPress and populated on social media sites with the use of something called Open Graph. Skandha. However, we usually recommend clicking the Select Image button, as that provides a few extra choices for deciding on a source for the featured image. If youre still having problems, go to SEO > Social in the WordPress dashboard. The Add Block button looks like a + sign. The longest list of the most common WordPress errors and how to quickly fix/troubleshoot them (continuously updated). Its possible a theme changed this. The Thumbnail size is the featured image shown in other parts of your website, outside of the post itself. Another concern is that a certain page or post in your WordPress files isnt accessible because of user permissions. Plugin Conflicts. For example, you may rather have one featured image appear in the sidebar, but a different one shows up when the post is in a list on your homepage. Check out how this strategy can help get your blog get more traffic. This allows you to type in new dimensions, both the width and height, so that the already uploaded featured image shrinks. Also, you can typically enable the Open Graph markup directly from an SEO plugins settings. There are two solutions to this. Lazy loading is preventing your featured image from showing. To call the header.php file, you should use get_header (); at the top of almost every template (Almost!) We also recommend looking at the Image Dimensions. Here are some common reasons that lead to issues with featured images in the first place: A few errors are more common than others when uploading images to the Media Library in WordPress. Our feature-packed, high-performance cloud platform includes: Get started with a free trial of our Application Hosting or Database Hosting. After that, click on the Save Changes button and test to see if Facebook sharing allows the featured image to appear. Theres also an Image Alignment setting to indicate if the images should slide to the right, center, or left. Whenever you make a change, its good to go back to the Facebook Sharing Debugger Tool to promote Facebook to search for more data on the post. Here, you need to fill in fields like the Description Length, Homepage Description, and Default Description. Creating a website with stunning content to find that featured images dont show is both frustrating and potentially harmful to your brand. such as page.php, single.php, archive.php and so on. For instance, we added a Recent Posts feed on the homepage of our test site. This might be the root of your featured image problems. The Featured Image column should now appear in your list of posts or pages. We often encounter people who want that featured image and simply thought that the content editor was the place to put it. Both cover and featured images function in similar ways, providing large photos at the top of posts and pages, yet they have some differences. The theme is not coded well, or the developer has removed the default featured image functionality on purposemainly because they have other settings to control the featured image. The Progress Bar indicates exactly where you are in the process of bulk editing the featured images. A featured image serves as the primary post or page image representing the entirety of that article when it gets shared or distributed elsewhere on your website or online. Figuring out the optimal dimensions before uploading the images allows you to minimize instances where the featured image gets stretched out or cropped strangely. We also recommend you host your site with a company that takes malware seriously and provides a malware security pledge. The following screenshot shows a post working well on Facebook since it includes a summary of the post content, with a link, the title, and the featured image.