There are two solutions to this. This allows you to paste in up to 50 URLs and run the tool so that Facebook scraps their metadata properly again. If you find a photo that you really love, reach out to the photographer or artist and ask if you can use their work on your website. Click the Choose Image button to proceed. This gets around the idea of uploading an image to your WordPress Media Library and activating that image as a featured image. But what if those thumbnail images are nowhere to be found? The most important piece of image metadata is its Alt Text, which can be found by opening your featured image in the Media Library. Alternatively, you may find yourself in the older version of the WordPress editor. Theres a field for choosing where the image should come from when sharing a post or page to social media. Disable Lazy Loading 4. This way, youre not limiting your sites resources with too many large photos. The problem prevents images from displaying on both the backend and frontend. 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. Find the section called Featured image settings. As with most WordPress settings, these also tend to modify the way your featured images appear. There are several reasons for images to disappear from WordPress. Make sure to get this agreement in writing (email works too). Incorrect image URLs. Check out our guide here to learn more about the Facebook Debug Tool. An image optimization plugin does much of the work for you, ensuring that your featured images actually show up and dont slow down your website. @chrissel: Hello there, I am afraid the option to display Header Images on all pages is only available in the pro version of the theme. 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. 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. The Featured Image Settings are towards the bottom. Its also possible to generate featured images based on post authors, tags, and post types. If the goal is to have no featured image, you can remove it altogether. Make sure its on the Block settings tab. You also agree to receive information from Kinsta related to our services, events, and promotions. Returning back to the original page, the image suddenly shows up. Overall, if youre editing an image, like a cover or a standard media item, youre not using a featured image in the WordPress post or page editors. You have the option to choose one and click the Set Featured Image button. To begin, go to your WordPress dashboard. No matter the reason, you may find that your WordPress theme doesnt offer support for standard featured images. Click the Save & Activate button. Its possible that your current user role doesnt allow you to upload or view featured images. Upload the image here and click the Save button. Still, WordPress provides simple editing features which may prove easier for some users, or for those who want to edit featured images that have already been uploaded to WordPress. 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. I felt I should post it here for those having same issues. The advantage of using a method like this is that theres no relying on a default featured image that may not apply to the post. It could be a good thing but it downgrades the development experience. This is particularly important if youre highlighting your recent posts on the homepage. The Large Size often dictates the featured image dimensions when shown at the top of a post or page. To move forward and see the featured image in action, click the Publish button. 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. An alternative is to install and activate a plugin like Export All URLs. Considering you should be uploading high-resolution images as featured images, it makes sense to automate optimization. Check out how this strategy can help get your blog get more traffic. The great part about this plugin is that it doesnt replace the featured images you already have on your posts. Learn how to fix it once and for all , Featured images matter. Your theme, or a plugin, has an error or is causing a conflict with your featured images working. For instance, you may want to pull the first image in your content and make it your featured image for a post. The featured image field is missing when youre trying to edit or create a page or post. Another option is to take action with no selected image, like removing a featured image that repeats several times on multiple posts, or if you need to remove all featured images without existing image files. Unfortunately, an image with malware or a virus is already compromised. The preview image should look a bit smaller than before unless the change is so minuscule that you dont notice it. Some WordPress users complete all the right steps to upload a featured image but realize that a duplicate of the featured image appears. Finding free images for personal and commercial is hard. I suggest you to upgrade to pro. The next part is the most important element since it activates the featured images in the Latest Posts block. Think about using the built-in image editing tools in WordPress for featured images that are already uploaded but could use some changes. We particularly like its ability to set rules for your past and future featured images. This means you can upload several featured images and choose which one of them gets shown on different parts of your website. Check this box so that the featured image from a WordPress post or page gets populated upon sharing to Facebook. 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. Reactivate each plugin one-by-one. Whenever youre done editing an image, you can click Enter to active the edit, and then Save the image. For instance, if your article has tips on using Instagram, the featured image better have elements that reference Instagram (legal ones, of course), along with creative items that make the article look appealing. All you have to do is click on the icon to insert it somewhere on the homepage. You can find the Featured Image in the right-side Settings panel for all posts and pages. Several images are pulled from the post, but you must choose which one you want to use. Honestly, I really dont like the Gutnberg editor. Another way to use featured images is by listing a feed of your blog posts on your sites homepage (or any other page). Plugins, although rather useful for building a WordPress website, occasionally have questionable coding. You may discover that your theme does well with slightly wider or shorter featured images. Best regards . Feel free to go back and choose more images if you missed any. Update: finally used WordPress reset plugin and cleared everything out. The next best method is using a managed host like Kinsta, which already has Open Graph configured for you. Images in my header seem to be spontaneously not showing in my headers. Thats a problem, so follow the steps below to ensure your featured image is always ready to go for social sharing. 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 way, the thumbnails remain proportional, and you dont see any unexpected cropping effects. The most important option right now is the Include Image field. Kind Regards, Skandha. For instance, you may notice that the featured image appears nicely on your own website, but it has trouble rendering when a post is shared to a social site like Facebook. Simple, Clean and Lightweight Responsive WordPress Themes . Make sure the area that says Your homepage displays is set to A Static page. 'Posts > Add New' link in WordPress dashboard Insert any content you want for the blog post. Did we miss anything important? However, with the Default Featured Image plugin active, all you have to do is click on the posts Update button. To begin the process of bulk editing featured images, scroll down on the page. Once thats all said and done, click on the Debug button to process all URLs in the list and make it so that the featured images, and all other relevant post data, appear when shared on Facebook. Is there a way to do that without using an external plugin? That way, you can scale it down for a digital interface while still maintaining much of its resolution. Our last option for turning on the Open Graph protocol to reveal featured images is called the Open Graph and Twitter Card Tags plugin. Thats because having four columns will require having much more space (and smaller images) than a block with two or three columns. Stick with landscape sizes over portrait photos. The plugin also has a wonderful native search engine that pulls from places like Google, Pixabay, and Unsplash. You would usually find the featured image right below the title and above the first line. Other times, you may notice that a theme presents a featured image in a different spot than whats expected. Under there, youll find a field called Featured Image. It uses a widget and shortcode, both of which ask which of the featured images youd like to display whenever implementing one of the tools. But thats fine, as we all start learning somewhere. You must host the image in a third-party location and ensure that it will be hosted there for the future. Just make sure its the right image and that the plugin is recognizing it. Kinsta Hosting already offers Open Graph support, along with the possibility to control this using Yoast SEO. 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. One way to ensure your featured image field is never empty is to set a default featured image for all posts. However, you also want to stick to a consistent theme. You may already have the Latest Posts block activated on your homepage, but if not, you can find it by searching in the Gutenberg block library. Another Screen Options dilemma comes into play when you do not see the actual field to upload and insert a Featured Image. 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. The new cover shows up in the editor preview, and you can also edit the blocks settings on the right-hand panel. It also helps when your older posts dont have appropriate featured images. WordPress added the Cover block to its Gutenberg editor only recently. Get all your applications, databases and WordPress sites online and under one roof. The Featured Image from URL, or FIFU, plugin allows you to take an external image and use it as a featured image for a post or page. Larger images get compressed and lose quality, while smaller images get stretched out and end up looking terribly blurred. The big question is whether or not the featured image for a post gets rendered properly when you share a link on Facebook. Once everything looks good and youve decided that those old featured images are ready to be replaced, click the Apply button to finish the bulk edit. 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. Take a photo with your own camera. You may have a lot of old posts that dont generate featured images when shared on Facebook. By submitting this form: You agree to the processing of the submitted personal data in accordance with Kinsta's Privacy Policy, including the transfer of data to the United States. Note: Sometimes newer websites have trouble with Facebook and other social sites because Facebook hasnt crawled the site already. A first page header\footer. To fix the situation, find and click on the Screen Options tab in the dashboards upper right-hand corner. Without automated featured images, youre left with blocks of text and links to webpages. When I exported post and media and imported on my new site everything was fine eventually. Therefore, you may have to use custom code to customize the featured images appearance. I later deactivated the plugin, but that hasn't made a difference. Sometimes, featured images for pages are completely blocked. The longest list of the most common WordPress errors and how to quickly fix/troubleshoot them (continuously updated). This lists various settings for the entire post and can also reveal Block-specific settings if you have a WordPress Gutenberg block currently selected.