How to Customize Your WordPress Login Page Using Plugins

Why would you want a custom WordPress login page? Isn’t the default one good enough?

Here’s why: Say A visitor on your site devours all your free content and wants access to the premium stuff, so they become a member. The only catch is they just need to log in first.

You want to roll out the red carpet to assure them your site is not like any other WordPress site they’ve seen before. It’s a tall order, and WordPress’s default login page may not be up to it. Sure, it has all the functionality you need, but it doesn’t exactly stand out.

You know your mission: Give your members a unique experience even before they even log in. No worries if you don’t have a ton of time and resources to devote to giving this page a facelift. In this post, we’ll show you how.

How to Customize Your WordPress Login Page

You can customize a WordPress login page in two main ways: manually or with the help of plugins. If you want to do it manually, you’ll need some knowledge of CSS and PHP, or a little bravery. If you want to avoid coding, you can use a plugin such as Branda.

Why create a custom login page?

A custom login page isn’t just important for your brand — it also factors into your site’s user experience. You want to provide visitors with the most seamless experience on your site, right?

Well, picture this: A visitor falls in love with your brand and becomes a member. They’re then redirected to the default WordPress login screen, which happens to look nothing like your website:

Your brand is all about color, sleek typography, and eye candy. This default page isn’t setting the right tone for your users.

For a visitor, that’s a little suspicious. Maybe they just refresh the page, shrug, and type in their login info. It’s not the end of the world, but also not the frictionless experience you want to deliver to your members.

So, how can you deliver the most value to your members even before they log in?

Customizing your WordPress login page to reflect the look and feel of your business has never been easier. Why? One word. It rhymes with slugins.

WordPress Plugins for Custom Login Pages

WordPress Plugins are popular with non-developers who don’t have the time or resources to spend on customization. There are plenty of free and premium plugins that can help you create a custom login page that delights your visitors.

Let’s look at a few WordPress custom login page plugins that cover a range of needs and budgets.

Free WordPress Login Page Plugins

Free plugins are perfect for smaller budgets and projects. Here are the six best free plugins for the job.

1. LoginPress

LoginPress is the leading WordPress login page customization plugin with over 200,000 downloads to date. And it’s for good reason — it’s easy to use and lets beginners customize virtually any part of their login page.

Customize your page’s background, logo, form and text fields, and even add your own welcome and error messages if you want to get into the nitty-gritty of your page design.

LoginPress is a freemium plugin and also offers a paid version with an expanded set of features. You’ll get pre-made templates so you don’t need to start designing from scratch, custom background images for your login page, Google reCAPTCHA compatibility, and more.

2. Custom Login

The name says it all: This plugin allows you to customize four attributes of your login page: HTML, logo, login form, and links.

Within these sections, you can upload a custom logo or background image, customize the colors of text and form elements, and even add custom HTML, CSS or Javascript to the page for extended functionality.

Custom Login is also one of the most popular plugins of its kind and is occasionally updated with bug fixes and new features.

3. Custom Login Page Customizer

The Custom Login Page Customizer plugin allows you to tailor your login page precisely to your needs. How? It allows you to use the WordPress Customizer to make changes to the login page.

By using this live front-end editor, you can forget about saving your work every two minutes, switching browser tabs, and refreshing pages to see how your page will look. Instead, you can preview your changes as you make them.

Add your site's branding to your login page color scheme, add an image in the background, change the font of the text on the page, and save your designs as templates for easy access later on.

4. Ultimate Dashboard

You can give your login page a complete makeover with Ultimate Dashboard (previously Erident Custom Login and Dashboard). Add your company logo, replace the background image, and change the colors of your links and set the opacity of your login form.

5. Login Designer

Login Designer is a recent addition to the WordPress plugin ecosystem, and caters specifically to non-developers who want to customize their website’s login page.

This plugin provides a unique live-editing experience by allowing users to click on any element from their login page to fine-tune it, while hiding other settings so that there’s no time lost navigating the customization sections and panels.

Give Login Designer a try, and you’ll notice its interface and overall user experience is impressive given its lack of a price tag. If you find yourself tinkering with your site’s appearance often, this plugin can save you time and clicks.

Premium WordPress Login Page Plugins

If the above plugins are not enough for what you have in mind, consider checking out these premium plugins to see which suits your needs:

1. Branda by WPMU DEV

Want to quickly customize the look of your login form without touching any code? Branda is your girl. Literally.

With Branda, you can stick with simple customizations or completely overhaul your WordPress login page. That means some people can start with a pre-built theme, add their own logo, and call it a day, while others can start from scratch.

For the latter group, Branda provides the opportunity to insert a custom background image, replace the username and password input fields, adjust opacity, and even configure drop shadows, colors, and default settings.

If you have three minutes, watch the tutorial below to see how easy this tool is to use.

1. Install Branda.
2. Click Branda from the WordPress menu.
3. Scroll down to the box labeled "Front-end."
4. Click the pencil icon next to "Customize Login Screen."
5. Click "Choose a Template" to get started.
6. Choose a template that meets your needs from one of their pre-designed login pages.
7. Click continue.

From there, you'll have the ability to replace the template's elements with your own. The Customize Login Screen section of the Branda plugin allows you to specify the following (and more):

• A custom logo or background
• The form that users will see
• What your error message is for failed attempts
• What image displays in the background

2. WordPress Login Widget by Elementor

There’s a lot to love about Elementor’s WordPress Login Widget, but we’ll focus on two major benefits.

The first is that you can easily add login forms to any page by embedding them in sidebars throughout your site. Doing this minimizes the amount of navigation required for visitors to log into your site, making for a better experience overall.

The second is that you can fully customize every part of the form, from the button to the layout and much more in between. If you don’t want to design from the ground up, you can start with one of their three pre-designed templates.

For more guidance when customizing your login page in Elementor, we recommend watching this video tutorial from WP Academy:

3. White Label Branding for WordPress

It’s hard to say what this plugin doesn’t give you control to do. Want to change the logo and color scheme? Reposition the form on the page? Change the colors of every label, field, and border? Or maybe you want to completely replace the default login form with your own using HTML and CSS? White Label Branding can do it.

Create a custom WordPress login page with ease.

Now that we've reviewed a few helpful plugins to create rich experiences for all your visitors from the moment they log in, try experimenting with a few. You can always sample the free ones and then work your way up to a premium plugin as your site scales.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in September 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.