Office 365 Profile Picture Not Displayed Inside SharePoint Online Webparts

Last Updated on February 17, 2024

From time to time you may notice that SharePoint Online does not display updated user photos in webparts.

You may see or experience something like this:

• Profile picture displayed in Office 365 Suite Bar: Yes
• Profile picture displayed in Office Delve: Yes
• Profile picture displayed in Outlook on the Web: Yes
• Profile picture displayed in Microsoft Teams: Yes
• Profile picture displayed in SharePoint People Web Part on a Modern SharePoint Page or trying to load user profile through custom web part on a classic SharePoint Page: No

There is a simple solution to this. Navigate to this URL in your SharePoint tenant:

• https://[tenant name here]-my.sharepoint.com/User%20Photos/Forms/Thumbnails.aspx?RootFolder=%2FUser%20Photos%2FProfile%20Pictures

This list stores three photos for each user in your Office 365 tenant.

The photos have the following naming convention and dimension requirements:

• username_tenantname_tld_SThumb.jpg: 42px x 42px
• username_tenantname_tld_MThumb.jpg: 78px x 78px
• username_tenantname_tld_LThumb.jpg: 300px x 300px

If my username was ryanclark, my tenant name was mrsp1, my TLD (top-level domain) was .com (could be .net, .org, .co, etc.), then we’d have the following:

• ryan.clark_mrsp1_com_SThumb.jpg
• ryan.clark_mrsp1_com_MThumb.jpg
• ryan.clark_mrsp1_com_LThumb.jpg

Save (and possibly overwrite) the three images in the user photos library and you should be good to go. You will have to do a hard refresh and/or clear your cache to see the results on the front-end.

Update: 11/9/2021

I’ve provided a PowerShell script below that can help with syncing photos from Exchange Online to SharePoint Online.

You must set the two input parameters ($siteURL and $SPOAdminPortalURL) on lines 96 and 97. In addition, you can enter an individual user’s email address or put in “All” when prompted for UserEmail.

Test on a test account first. Use at your own risk.

#Add references to SharePoint client assemblies and authenticate to Office 365 site as required for CSOM
Add-Type -AssemblyName System.Drawing

Function UploadImage ()
{
	Param(
	  [Parameter(Mandatory=$True)]
	  [String]$SiteURL,

	  [Parameter(Mandatory=$True)]
	  [String]$SPOAdminPortalUrl,

	  [Parameter(Mandatory=$True, HelpMessage="Enter user email address or All for all mailboxes")]
	  [String]$UserEmail

	)

	#Default Image library and Folder value 
	$DocLibName ="User Photos"
	$foldername="Profile Pictures"

    Connect-ExchangeOnline
    $siteConnection = Connect-PnPOnline -Url $SiteURL –Interactive -ReturnConnection

    #NOTE: there is a bug in Set-PnPUserProfileProperty in which the ConnectPnPOnline must connect with the UseWebLogin option 
    # https://github.com/pnp/powershell/issues/277
    $adminConnection = Connect-PnPOnline -Url $SPOAdminPortalUrl –UseWebLogin -ReturnConnection

	$spoimagename = @{"_SThumb" = "48"; "_MThumb" = "72"; "_LThumb" = "200"}


    $allUserMailboxes = Get-Mailbox -ResultSize Unlimited -RecipientTypeDetails UserMailbox

    Foreach($mailbox in $allUserMailboxes)
    {

        if(($mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress -eq $UserEmail) -or ($UserEmail -eq "All")){

            Write-Host "Processing " $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress

            try{
		        #Download Image from Exchange online 
                $photo = Get-UserPhoto -Identity $mailbox.Identity
		        Write-Host "Exchange online image downloaded successful for" $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress

		        $username = $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress.Replace("@", "_").Replace(".", "_")

		        $Extension = ".jpg"
		        Foreach($imagename in $spoimagename.GetEnumerator())
		        {
			        #Covert image into different size of image
                    $ms = new-object System.IO.MemoryStream(,$photo.PictureData)
			        $img = [System.Drawing.Image]::FromStream($ms)
			        [int32]$new_width = $imagename.Value
			        [int32]$new_height = $imagename.Value
			        $img2 = New-Object System.Drawing.Bitmap($new_width, $new_height)
			        $graph = [System.Drawing.Graphics]::FromImage($img2)
			        $graph.DrawImage($img, 0, 0, $new_width, $new_height)

			        #Covert image into memory stream
			        $stream = New-Object -TypeName System.IO.MemoryStream
			        $format = [System.Drawing.Imaging.ImageFormat]::Jpeg
			        $img2.Save($stream, $format)
			        $streamseek=$stream.Seek(0, [System.IO.SeekOrigin]::Begin)

			        #Upload image into sharepoint online
			        $FullFilename=$username+$imagename.Name+$Extension
                    Add-PnPFile -Connection $siteConnection -Folder "User Photos/Profile Pictures" -FileName $FullFilename -Stream $stream                                

		        }
		        Write-Host "SharePoint online image uploaded successful for" $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress
		        #Change user Profile Property in Sharepoint onlne 
		        $PictureURL=$SiteURL+$DocLibName+"/"+$foldername+"/"+$username+"_MThumb"+$Extension

                Set-PnPUserProfileProperty -Connection $adminConnection -Account $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress -PropertyName PictureURL -Value $PictureURL

                Set-PnPUserProfileProperty -Connection $adminConnection -Account $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress -PropertyName SPS-PicturePlaceholderState -Value 0

                Set-PnPUserProfileProperty -Connection $adminConnection -Account $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress -PropertyName SPS-PictureExchangeSyncState -Value 0

                Set-PnPUserProfileProperty -Connection $adminConnection -Account $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress -PropertyName SPS-PictureTimestamp -Value 63605901091

		        Write-Host "Image processed successfully and ready to display for" $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress
            }catch{
                $ErrorMessage = $_.Exception.Message
                Write-Host "Failed to process " $mailbox.PrimarySmtpAddress -ForegroundColor red
                Write-Host $ErrorMessage -ForegroundColor red
            }
	    }        

    }

}

#Input parameter
$siteUrl="https://company-my.sharepoint.com/"
$SPOAdminPortalUrl = "https://company-admin.sharepoint.com/"

uploadimage -SiteURL $siteUrl -SPOAdminPortalUrl $SPOAdminPortalUrl

If you have any questions, reach out to me at any time.