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Do you want to disable the WordPress admin bar for all users except administrators?
By default, you can easily disable the WordPress admin bar for individual users. However, this can take time if you have lots of registered users on your site.
In this article, we will show you how to easily disable the WordPress admin bar for all users except administrators.
What Is the WordPress Admin Bar?
By default, WordPress shows an admin bar at the top of the screen for all logged-in users. When you are logged into your account, you can see this toolbar in the WordPress admin area and all other pages.
The WordPress admin toolbar has useful shortcuts to different areas of WordPress, and these shortcuts change based on a user’s role and permissions in WordPress.
However, the admin bar can be distracting when you’re looking at the front end of your website.
It may also affect your website’s design and user experience. This can be a problem if you are building or managing a WordPress site for a third party, as it stops them from seeing what their website really looks like.
Luckily, there are multiple ways to disable the admin bar for all users except administrators. Simply use the quick links below to jump to the method you want to use:
Video Tutorial
If you prefer written instructions, just keep reading.
Method 1: Disable the WordPress Admin Bar for Individual Users
You can disable the admin bar for specific users by simply editing their user profile. This is a quick and easy method if you just need to remove the bar for a small number of people. However, if you run a membership site with a lot of users, then we recommend choosing a different method.
To remove the admin bar manually, simply go to the Users » All Users page. Then hover your mouse over the user who doesn’t need the admin bar, and click on ‘Edit’ when it appears.
This will bring open that user’s profile.
From here, uncheck the box next to the ‘Show toolbar when viewing site’ option.
After that, scroll to the bottom of the screen and click on ‘Update User’ to save your changes. This will disable the admin bar for that specific person only.
To hide the toolbar for more users, simply follow the same process described above.
Method 2: Disable Admin Bar for All Users Except Admins (Recommended)
If you need to hide the admin bar for lots of different people, then changing each user’s settings manually would take a lot of time and effort.
For that reason, we recommend disabling the admin bar by adding code to your WordPress theme files. If you haven’t done this before, then check out our guide on how to copy and paste code snippets in WordPress.
Some guides will tell you to edit the theme files manually, but this can cause common WordPress errors and may even completely break your website.
For that reason, we recommend using WPCode. It is the best code snippet plugin and makes it easy to add custom code in WordPress without putting your site at risk.
First, you will need to install and activate the free WPCode plugin. For more information, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Once the plugin is activated, go to Code Snippets » Add Snippet.
Here, you will see all the pre-made snippets you can add to your site. This includes a snippet that allows you to completely disable comments, upload file types that WordPress doesn’t usually support, disable attachment pages, and much more.
On the next screen, you need to hover your mouse over the ‘Add Your Custom Code (New Snippet)’ option and click the ‘Use snippet’ button when it appears.
On the next screen, type in a title for the code snippet. This is just for your reference, so you can use anything you want.
Then, open the ‘Code Type’ dropdown and choose ‘PHP Snippet’.
With that done, simply paste the following into the code editor:
This code identifies any non-admin users who are not currently looking at the admin dashboard. For these users, it disables the WordPress admin bar.
After that, scroll down the page to the ‘Insertion’ section. Here, you can keep the default’ Auto Insert’ method to make sure the code runs everywhere.
Finally, scroll to the top of the screen and click on the ‘Inactive’ slider so that it shows ‘Active.’
Then just click the ‘Save Snippet’ or ‘Update’ button to make the code snippet live.
That’s it! Just remember to check your WordPress website to make sure everything is working fine.
Method 3: Disable Admin Bar for All Users (Including Admins)
Do you want to disable the admin bar for all users, including site admins?
You can do this by adding some code that disables the admin bar for everyone who is viewing your site’s public pages. This means the admin bar will only appear when you are in the WordPress dashboard area.
To make things simple, WPCode has the exact code snippet you need in its built-in Snippet Library. Simply go to Code Snippets » Library.
Here, search for ‘Disable The WP Admin Bar’.
When the right snippet shows up, just click on its ‘Use Snippet’ button.
The plugin will automatically add the code to your site, give the code a descriptive title, choose the correct insertion method, and even add tags to help you identify the snippet.
All you need to do is toggle the switch from ‘Inactive’ to ‘Active’ and then click on ‘Update’.
Now, if you visit your website’s front end while logged into your WordPress account, the admin bar will disappear.
Method 4: Disable WordPress Admin Bar for All Users Except Admins (No Code Required)
If you don’t want to add code to your website, then you can hide the admin bar using a plugin. Hide Admin Bar Based on User Roles lets you remove the toolbar based on different user roles, so this is a good choice if you want to disable the bar for all members, WooCommerce customers, or some other user role.
First, you need to install and activate the Hide Admin Bar Based on User Roles plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, you need to go to the Settings » Hide Admin Bar Settings page. From here, check the boxes next to the user roles where you want to disable the admin bar.
With that done, simply click on ‘Save Changes’ to store your settings.
We hope this article helped you learn how to disable the WordPress admin bar for all users except administrators. You may also want to see our ultimate WordPress security guide and our comparison of the best WordPress page builders for creating custom page layouts without any code.
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