Profile, Chatter
A Chatter profile is the social, people-facing side of a Salesforce user's record.
Definition
A Chatter profile is the social, people-facing side of a Salesforce user's record. It pulls together a photo, an About Me statement, contact details, a personal feed, and the lists of who that person follows, who follows them, and which Chatter groups they belong to. Other users in the org can open it to learn who someone is and what they work on.
The term is now treated as a legacy label. The same information still exists, but Salesforce folds it into the modern user profile page in Lightning Experience, often surfaced through the People list. Newer orgs rarely call it the "Chatter profile" on its own, yet the photo, About Me, and following model it described are still very much in use.
What a Chatter profile actually holds
The pieces that make up the profile
A Chatter profile is built from a handful of named sections. At the top sits the profile photo, the single most useful element for letting colleagues recognize a person at a glance. Salesforce guidance suggests a professional headshot rather than a group shot or a pet. Below the photo is the About Me statement, a short paragraph the person writes about their role and interests. The Edit Profile dialog splits the rest into two tabs. The Contact tab covers phone, email, and address style details. The About tab captures department, the kind of work the person does, and current projects. Around these fields runs the personal feed, which shows that user's posts, comments, and the items they have shared. The profile also exposes social context: a count and list of followers, a list of people the user follows, and the Chatter groups they have joined. In Lightning Experience the page can also carry a banner image and links to external social accounts. Together these elements turn a flat user record into something a coworker can read and act on.
Why it sits in the "legacy" bucket
Chatter shipped in 2010 as Salesforce Classic's enterprise social network, and the standalone Chatter tab with its profile placeholder image was the original home for this content. That Classic layout, with the small profile photo on the left of the Chatter tab and the Edit Profile dialog behind a pencil icon, is the version most "Chatter profile" documentation still describes. As orgs moved to Lightning Experience, the dedicated Chatter profile stopped being a separate destination. The same photo, About Me text, and follow relationships now live on the standard user profile page, often reached through the People tab or by clicking a name anywhere in the app. So the concept did not disappear. The packaging changed. Calling it a "Chatter profile" today usually signals an older mental model or an org still on Classic. The data model behind it, the User object plus Chatter's social graph, is unchanged. That is why this entry is tagged legacy rather than retired: nothing was removed, but the modern term of art is simply the user profile, with Chatter as the feed and follow layer underneath.
Editing the profile, field by field
Filling out a Chatter profile is a self-service task, not an admin one. The person opens their own profile by clicking their name, then works through three quick actions. First, they hover over the photo placeholder and choose Add Photo to upload an image. Second, they click the pencil icon under the photo to open the Edit Profile dialog and complete the Contact and About tabs. Third, they click Save All to commit everything at once. In Lightning Experience the flow is similar but more visual: a camera or edit control on the photo, a pencil under the image to edit the About Me statement, and separate controls to set the banner image and add social media links. One detail trips people up. Even if the org has not turned Chatter on, users can still add and edit this personal information through the same screens, because the fields belong to the user record. The profile feed itself only fills with activity once Chatter is enabled and the person starts posting, commenting, or sharing files.
Visibility and who controls access
A Chatter profile is visible to other licensed users in the same org, which is the whole point: it makes people findable. What a given user can see and do inside Chatter, including their own profile feed, depends on whether Chatter is enabled for them. Two layers govern this. At the org level, an administrator turns Chatter on in Setup under Chatter Settings. At the user level, access can be scoped through profile-based Chatter rollout. With that approach, only people whose user profile or permission set grants Chatter can see record feeds, post, or comment, even though they still reach every other object normally. The relevant toggle on a user profile is the Enable Chatter permission, found in Administrative Permissions. A subtle gotcha: selecting Enable Chatter on a profile does not by itself switch Chatter on for those users. The org-wide setting still has to be active. This split lets regulated companies or large enterprises roll Chatter out department by department rather than flipping it on for everyone at once.
The follow model and the social graph
The most distinctive part of a Chatter profile is the follow relationship. Following a person means their public posts and certain activity show up in your own Chatter feed, so the profile is where that connection starts. From someone's profile you can choose to follow them, see how many followers they already have, and browse the people they follow in return. The same following mechanic applies to records and groups, but on a person's profile it reads as a lightweight social subscription. This graph is what turns a directory of names into a working network. When a new hire follows the people on their team, their feed immediately starts carrying relevant updates. When an expert has a complete profile and a healthy follower count, it becomes obvious who to ask about a topic. Mentions tie into this too: typing @ and a person's name on a post links straight back to their profile and notifies them. None of this requires admin work. It is driven entirely by users filling out profiles and choosing who to follow, which is why adoption depends so much on people taking a few minutes to complete their own page.
Treating profile completion as onboarding
Because the profile is user-maintained, its value rises and falls with how many people bother to complete it. An org full of grey placeholder photos and empty About Me sections gives you a directory you cannot really use. The fix is cultural, not technical. Mature orgs bake Chatter profile completion into employee onboarding, asking new joiners to add a real photo, write a short About Me, and follow their immediate team in their first week. That small effort pays off twice. It helps the new person feel part of the company, and it makes them findable to everyone else from day one. Some admins reinforce this with a welcome post that links to a profile checklist, or by following new hires themselves so the feed is not empty when the person first looks. The point is to treat the profile as participation in a shared workspace, not as an optional vanity page. A directory where most people have a face, a role, and a few projects listed quietly makes the whole org easier to work in.
How to complete your Chatter profile
Completing your own Chatter profile is a self-service task that takes a couple of minutes. These steps follow the Salesforce Classic flow; Lightning Experience uses the same fields with a more visual layout.
- Open your profile
Click your name anywhere in Salesforce, or open the Chatter tab and select your name next to the profile placeholder image on the left.
- Add a photo
Hover over the placeholder image and click Add Photo, then upload a professional headshot. A clear face photo is the single biggest help for colleagues trying to recognize you.
- Edit the details
Click the pencil icon under your photo to open the Edit Profile dialog. Fill in the Contact tab (phone, email, address) and the About tab (department, the work you do, current projects).
- Save everything
Click Save All to commit your photo and both tabs at once. In Lightning Experience, also set your banner image and any social media links from the profile page.
Your face across the app. Use a headshot, not a group shot or a logo, so people can identify you in feeds and mentions.
A short statement plus department and current-project fields. This is what teammates skim to understand your role.
Phone, email, and address details that make you reachable outside of the feed.
Follow your immediate team and a few key experts so your Chatter feed carries relevant updates from day one.
- You can edit your profile fields even if Chatter is not enabled, because they belong to your user record. The feed only fills with activity once Chatter is turned on.
- Selecting the Enable Chatter permission on a user profile does not switch Chatter on by itself. An admin still has to enable Chatter org-wide under Chatter Settings.
- The standalone "Chatter profile" is a Classic-era idea. In Lightning Experience the same content lives on the user profile page, often reached through the People list.
Trust & references
Cross-checked against the following references.
- Set Up Your Chatter ProfileSalesforce
- Profile-Based Chatter Rollout OverviewSalesforce
Straight from the source - Salesforce's reference material on Profile, Chatter.
- Chatter Profile OverviewSalesforce
- Control Chatter Access Through User ProfilesSalesforce
Hands-on resources to go deeper on Profile, Chatter.
About the Author
Dipojjal Chakrabarti is a B2C Solution Architect with 29 Salesforce certifications and over 13 years in the Salesforce ecosystem. He runs salesforcedictionary.com to help admins, developers, architects, and cert/interview candidates sharpen their fundamentals. More about Dipojjal.
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