# Display remote avatars

If this option is enabled, the Gravatar online service will be used to display profile pictures for people who don't have one set. This allows people to set their profile picture once on the Gravatar site instead of having to do it on every Mahara and online service individually. If Gravatar does not have a picture for that person, then the default Mahara picture will be shown.

## Reasons to turn it off

This option requires both the person and the web server to have access to the Gravatar server (`https://gravatar.com`). In installations such as locked-down intranets, where such access is not available, enabling this option would simply add extra delays.

## Custom avatar server

If you have a custom avatar server which implements the Gravatar protocol, you may specify its base URL in your config.php file:

`$cfg->remoteavatarbaseurl = 'https://example.com/avatar/';`