Sender Photos and Your Gravatar in Webmail

TrekMail webmail can show a small photo next to each sender, so your inbox is easier to scan at a glance. These photos come from Gravatar, a free service that links a photo to an email address. When a sender has no photo, you simply see their initials instead — nothing is ever missing or broken.

Where photos appear

When sender photos are turned on, you will see them in two places:

• The message list — a small round photo next to each sender's name (on tablet and desktop screens).
• An open message — a larger photo next to the sender's name and address.

If a sender has not set up a Gravatar, TrekMail shows their initials in a coloured circle instead.

Setting your own photo

Your own photo is linked to your mailbox email address through Gravatar. Once you set it, it can appear for the people you email who also use TrekMail or any other app that supports Gravatar.

1. Click your avatar in the top-right corner to open the menu, then click the round photo at the top of the menu — the profile-photo window opens. (You can also open Settings → Profile and use the Profile photo row.)
2. In the window that opens, click Open Gravatar. Gravatar opens in a new browser tab.
3. Sign in to Gravatar (or create a free account) using this mailbox's email address, then upload the photo you'd like to use.
4. Come back to the TrekMail tab and click Refresh photo. Your new photo appears right away — no need to sign out and back in.

Tip: Make sure you use the same email address in Gravatar as your TrekMail mailbox. Gravatar matches photos by email address, so a different address will not show up here.

Refreshing after a change

Gravatar photos are cached so your inbox stays fast. If you change your photo on Gravatar and don't see the update immediately, click your avatar again (or go to Settings → Profile) and click Refresh photo. That clears the saved copy and pulls your latest image.

Turning sender photos off

If you would rather not see photos next to senders, you can turn them off:

1. Open Settings from the top-right menu (or the gear icon).
2. Find Show sender photos and switch it off.

When this setting is off, TrekMail shows initials for everyone and no information about your senders is sent to Gravatar. You can turn it back on at any time.

A note on privacy

To show a sender's photo, TrekMail looks it up from Gravatar on our own servers — your browser never talks to Gravatar directly. We never send the actual email address; we only send a scrambled, one-way fingerprint of it that cannot be turned back into the address. Photos we find are stored on TrekMail's servers so they load quickly the next time. If you prefer, the Show sender photos setting above stops this lookup entirely.

For the full details, see our Privacy Policy.