With WordPress, you can define the roles and permissions assigned to your users in order to give them certain capabilities. These roles and permissions also apply to The Events Calendar and Events Calendar Pro. As the site owner, you can control what users can and cannot do with your events, using WordPress’s built-in user roles.

We’ll show you the available roles and how they apply to your event capabilities for your users.

Roles and permissions

Super Admin

This role only applies to multi-site installations and encompasses all of the capabilities possible with WordPress. This includes:

• create_sites
• delete_sites
• manage_network
• manage_sites
• manage_network_users
• manage_network_plugins
• manage_network_themes
• manage_network_options
• upgrade_network
• setup_network

Administrators

The capabilities of Administrators differ between single site and Multisite WordPress installations. All administrators have the following capabilities:

• activate_plugins
• delete_others_pages
• delete_others_posts
• delete_pages
• delete_posts
• delete_private_pages
• delete_private_posts
• delete_published_pages
• delete_published_posts
• edit_dashboard
• edit_others_pages
• edit_others_posts
• edit_pages
• edit_posts
• edit_private_pages
• edit_private_posts
• edit_published_pages
• edit_published_posts
• edit_theme_options
• export
• import
• list_users
• manage_categories
• manage_links
• manage_options
• moderate_comments
• promote_users
• publish_pages
• publish_posts
• read_private_pages
• read_private_posts
• read
• create Reusable Blocks
• edit Reusable Blocks
• read Reusable Blocks
• delete Reusable Blocks
• remove_users
• switch_themes
• upload_files
• customize
• delete_site

For single-site installations, Admins also have the following capabilities:

• update_core
• update_plugins
• update_themes
• install_plugins
• install_themes
• delete_themes
• delete_plugins
• edit_plugins
• edit_themes
• edit_files
• edit_users
• add_users
• create_users
• delete_users
• unfiltered_html

It’s worth noting that all of the above capabilities apply to events as well. So Administrators can add their own events, as well as edit and delete all events on the site itself.

Editor

An editor user role can modify, read, and delete other post types (like events). Though the editor role is limited for other post types, they can add new events as well by default. The limitations of the Editor role include not being able to add, update, and delete plugins and themes or manage other users. This is the full list of WordPress capabilities for the Editor role:

• delete_others_pages
• delete_others_posts
• delete_pages
• delete_posts
• delete_private_pages
• delete_private_posts
• delete_published_pages
• delete_published_posts
• delete Reusable Blocks
• edit_others_pages
• edit_others_posts
• edit_pages
• edit_posts
• edit_private_pages
• edit_private_posts
• edit_published_pages
• edit_published_posts
• create Reusable Blocks
• edit Reusable Blocks
• manage_categories
• manage_links
• moderate_comments
• publish_pages
• publish_posts
• read
• read_private_pages
• read_private_posts
• unfiltered_html (not with Multisite)
• upload_files

Author

Authors can add new events, but cannot modify or delete events other users’ events. They also do not have access to Event Settings. This is a great option if you’d like to let users add new events from the WordPress backend, without giving them other capabilities. When it comes to WordPress in general, these are the capabilities:

• delete_posts
• delete_published_posts
• edit_posts
• edit_published_posts
• publish_posts
• read
• upload_files
• create Reusable Blocks
• read Reusable Blocks
• edit Reusable Blocks (own)
• delete Reusable Blocks (own)

Contributor

Contributors can create new events and submit them for review with an Editor or above role. This differs from the Author role, since they can publish their own events without review. Here is the complete list of WordPress capabilities:

• delete_posts
• edit_posts
• read
• read Reusable Blocks

Subscriber

Subscribers can only read and view events. They cannot add, edit, or delete events. When it comes to WordPress, the only capability is read.

Editing user roles and capabilities

Lastly, you can customize user roles to contain the capabilities that you’re looking for. The best way to do this is with a third-party plugin. Learn more about how to customize user roles in our Knowledgebase article.