I had known about Gravatar since its early days. I was under the (incorrect) impression that it could only be used to comment on blogs. I thought when you created an account, you added your name, e-mail, and image as part of your profile. Then, when you wanted to comment on blogs, instead of creating individual accounts or profiles, you could just reuse your Gravatar profile. That's partially true. However, I'm happy to report I was wrong and there's so much more.

While commenting on Matt Mullenweg's Birthday Gift post, I didn't use a Gravatar profile. This prompted Matt to kindly respond via e-mail and suggest I check out Gravatar. I put it off for a few days. Eventually, I decided to check it out and I'm glad I did. Thanks Matt!

The signup process was simple. All I had to do was enter my e-mail address. This immediately sent me a confirmation e-mail which I then used to proceed with onboarding.

Here's where things got interesting.

You can add all the things I was already aware of (name, e-mail, photo). However, you can also do much more than that! You can add your own verified accounts, links, contact information, and payments.

As of the time of this writing these options include:

• Accounts
  • WordPress
  • Instagram
  • X / Twitter
  • TikTok
  • Tumblr
  • Mastodon
  • GitHub
  • Twitch
  • Fediverse
  • Stackoverflow
  • Calendly
  • Vimeo
  • TripIt
  • Foursquare
• Contact info
  • E-mail
  • Phone number (home, work, mobile)
  • Contact form
  • Calendar
• Payments
  • PayPal
  • Patron
  • Venmo
  • Crypto
    • Bitcoin
    • Litecoin
    • Dogecoin
    • Ethereum
    • XRP
    • Cardano
    • Custom

In addition to those integrations, you can also provide as many of your own custom links as you'd like. In my case, I've chosen to link to my website and RSS feeds. The options are endless though.

I don't have a Linktree profile so I can't objectively say how Gravatar compares to those offerings. At their core though, Gravatar and Linktree seem to address similar problems.

If you're not yet committed to having your own place on the internet (website/blog) or if you're looking for a way to organize your digital identity in single place, Gravatar is an excellent option. I'd encourage you to check it out.

You can find my Gravatar profile at lqdev.me/gravatar!