Gravatar engine

Name: gravatar. Output: a Gravatar URL. Content type: image/png.

The engine hashes the seed (treated as an email: lowercased and trimmed, then MD5) and builds a https://www.gravatar.com/avatar/{hash} URL with query parameters. It does not perform a network request itself; it returns the URL.

Avatar::engine('gravatar')
    ->seed('user@example.com')
    ->size(256)
    ->defaultImage('identicon')
    ->rating('g')
    ->generate()
    ->toUrl();

Options

Option	Method	Gravatar parameter	Default
Default image	defaultImage()	d	mp
Rating	rating()	r	g

The avatar size becomes the s parameter. f=y (force default) is always sent.

defaultImage accepts the standard Gravatar values: 404, mp, identicon, monsterid, wavatar, retro, robohash, blank. Setting it to 404 makes Gravatar return an error when no profile image exists, which is useful in a fallback chain.

rating accepts g, pg, r, or x.

Fallback note

Because the engine returns a URL without verifying that an image exists, it does not decline on a missing profile image on its own. Combine defaultImage('404') with a downstream local engine if you want a real fallback when the user has no Gravatar.