Show Nicknames Instead of Full Names in an Experience Cloud Site

All users have nicknames by default, which they can modify by going to Your Name | Settings in their user profile.

Nicknames appear in place of first and last names in almost all locations in the Experience Cloud site. For example, they appear in feeds, list views, groups, search results, recommendations, private messages, and on user profiles and files. The Salesforce mobile app and any sites activated using Experience Builder templates show nicknames as well.

When your users make API calls from a site with nicknames enabled, you can hide the first and last name fields in SOAP API for Experience Cloud site users. Enable the Hide first and last name fields in the SOAP API for site users, when making API calls from within a site with nicknames enabled setting in Setup | Digital Experiences | Settings.

A few restrictions to keep in mind about nickname display:

• Records and user lookups on records show full names. Keep in mind, though, that you can control record and user visibility with sharing rules.
• Mobile notifications in the Salesforce mobile app show full names. You can turn off mobile notifications in the app to avoid this display.
• Searches by first, last, and full names aren’t restricted and return matches, but the search results display only nicknames. Global search auto-complete recommendations show any first, last, and full names that the user has searched by or accessed via a record or another location. The recent items list also shows first, last, and full under the same conditions.
• For email notifications only, when a user belongs to multiple Experience Cloud sites within an org, the Show nicknames setting for the user’s default site takes precedence. If the Show nicknames setting is disabled in the default site, then regardless of which site a user accesses, email notifications display the user’s full name. For other types of notifications, the Show nicknames setting is enforced on a site-by-site basis. This means that the setting is applied according to the configuration of the site a user accesses, even if the user’s default site has a different configuration.
• If the “Show nicknames” setting is enabled, but the “Require permission to view record names in lookup fields” setting is disabled, this behavior applies:
  • Direct queries, such as SELECT Name FROM User, return nicknames.
  • Relationship queries, such as SELECT Owner.Name FROM Contact, return full names.
  • Relationship queries that reference multiple fields, such as SELECT Owner.Name, Owner.Email FROM Contact, return nicknames.

Note Contact Salesforce Support if you want Experience Cloud site users to see nicknames in notifications shown in a site. Some notification types don't support nicknames, and always show first and last names instead.