Require Approval Before Reviews Go Live

Goal: make every new review wait until you have read it and approved it.

Turn approval on

1. Go to WB Plugins > Member Reviews and open the General tab.
2. Switch Auto Approve Reviews off. (“Automatically approve reviews without requiring manual approval.”)
3. Two new fields appear: Approval Email Subject and Approval Email Message. This is the email you will receive for each new review. Edit the wording if you like.
4. Check that Email Notifications is on, so the email is actually sent.
5. Click Save Changes.

From now on, new reviews are saved as drafts. Nobody sees them on profiles and they do not change anyone’s rating.

Approve or reject a pending review

1. Go to Reviews in the admin menu. A number badge next to the menu name tells you how many are waiting.
2. Find the review. Click the Draft link above the list to see only the waiting ones.
3. Hover over the review title. Click View Review to read it on the site, or open the review to read it here.
4. To accept it, click Approve under the title. The page reloads and the review is now published.
5. To reject it, click Trash under the title.

You can also open the review and click Publish in the usual WordPress box.

Only Administrators and Editors can approve. Contributors and Authors cannot.

What members see

• After submitting, the writer sees: “Thank you for sharing your Review! After admin approval, it will be displayed on members’ profiles.”
• When you approve, the reviewed member gets their usual email and BuddyPress notification, and the review appears on their profile.
• If Activity Stream is on, the review is posted to the activity stream at that moment.

Tips

• The “needs approval” email goes to the administrator email set in Settings > General. It links to the Reviews list.
• The Overview tab shows a Pending Approval count. Reviews hidden by reports are counted separately.
• Switching approval back on later does not touch reviews that are already published.
• Switching Auto Approve Reviews back on does not publish reviews that are already waiting. Approve those by hand.
• A review that was hidden because of reports looks like a draft too. See Handle a reported review.

If it does not work

• You do not get the approval email: see “Emails are not arriving” in Troubleshooting.
• The Approve link is missing: it only shows on draft reviews, for Administrators and Editors.