Change WordPress Users to Guest Authors

With the PublishPress Authors plugin, it is possible to change WordPress users into Guest Authors.

Before you start, please note two things:

  1. Your users have a shared WordPress user role. For example, you will convert all your “Editors” to Guest Authors. You can choose multiple roles at one time. If the users you want to change are in multiple roles, I recommend that you create a new role and add the users to that role.
  2. As with all big site changes, please do this on a test site first.

Here's how to make the change from WordPress user to guest author:

  • Go to Authors > Settings.
  • Enter the roles you want to convert into the “Automatically create author profiles” box. In this example, I want to import Editors and Contributors.
  • Click “Save Changes”.
  • Go to the “Maintenance” tab.
  • Click “Create missed authors from role”.
  • Click “OK”.
  • Go to the “Authors” area.
  • Select the boxes for all the users that have imported.
  • In the dropdown, choose “Convert into guest author”.
  • Click “Apply”.

Now you can verify that everything is working correctly. Go to the “Posts” screen and test to make sure the authors are still with their correct posts.

If everything worked, you can now delete the old WordPress user accounts.

If something went wrong, at least you did this on a test website. Contact our support team and we'll be happy to help.