Welcome to the comprehensive beginner's guide to Discord!
What Does This Article Cover?
What is a server?
Discord gives you the power to create an invite-only home for your friends or community - a place where you can talk, hang out, and have fun. We call these special places - servers, and they look like this:
- You can join or create servers for all kinds of communities -- be it a book club 📚, a dance class 💃 , a study group 🖊️, or just some friends you want to spend time with.
How to Use Text and Voice Channels
Your server is made up of text channels and voice channels.
- Text Channels
Text channels are separate spaces for talking over text. They keep conversations organized and give everyone plenty of room to talk. Create separate channels for all the topics your group likes to talk about--from fishing trips to cooking tips.
- Voice Channels
Voice channels are where you can hang out over voice and video. There’s no calling or ringing required - just click on a voice channel to enter it. Friends in your server can see you’re in there, and pop in to talk, wave hello over video, or share their screen.
Want to go further with your server setup? Check out these articles for more info:
- How to Organize Members with Roles
- How to Make Private Text or Voice Channels
- How to Set up a Read-Only Announcement channel
- How to Customize Your Notification Settings
- How to Get More Server Features with Server Boosting
How to Talk and Hang Out in Your Server
With voice channels, you can easily start chatting with your friends and community right away! Follow these guides below to learn how to voice chat, video chat, or share your screen or watch other people stream right within your server!
Note: A small group of users will notice that voice/video call participants in a focused stream are oriented in a horizontal layout instead of a vertical sidebar as part of an experiment.
How to Voice Chat
Step 1: Join a Voice Channel!
- Click a
voice channel in your server
Step 2: Start talking!
You should see a green outline around your avatar when you speak.
- If you need to adjust your voice settings, click the
cog icon to open your User Settings. On desktop, you’ll find it in the lower left corner of your server. From User Settings, head to Voice and Video settings to adjust your audio input, input sensitivity, and more.
Bonus Tip: You can adjust the volume of other people in the voice channel by right clicking their avatar on desktop, or pressing their name on mobile.
Bonus bonus tip: You can use Discord’s Krisp noise suppression to filter out unwanted background noise like lawnmowers or your neighbors dog 🐕 barking up a storm. You can enable Krisp from the 
icon in the lower left voice panel.
How to Video Chat
Step 1: Join a Voice Channel!
- Click a
Step 2: Share your Video!
- Press the Video button in the bottom left corner and your video will be added to the voice channel. If you navigate away from the channel, just click it again to bring up
Desktop
Mobile
- To change your input device, click the
How to Share your Screen
Step 1: Join a Voice Channel!
- Click a
Step 2: Activate screen share
- Press the
Screen icon in the voice status panel near the bottom left corner and a new window will pop out.
Step 3: Pick an application or screen to share
- Select an individual application window to share, or select an entire screen to share.
Step 4: Go Live!
- Press the "Go Live" button at the bottom of the window when you are ready to share your stream
Special Note: At this time, audio sharing is only available when sharing an application window on Windows 10. Audio sharing is unavailable on Mac and Linux at this time, too.
How to join and watch a stream or screen share:
Step 1: Find a stream
- Look for any people with the
Live icon within a
Step 2: Join the Stream
- Click on the username of the broadcaster with the
Once you've joined, you can change the size and location of your viewing window. You can also control the stream’s audio from the volume icon while hovering over the stream.
More Tips and Tricks
If you want to add some more fun into the mix with listening to music together, making your own custom emojis or avatars, or adding extra emphasis in your text, check out these guides below!
How to Listen to Music Together (Spotify Connect)
Listening to Spotify on your computer? You can also invite your friends to listen in with you!
Step 1: Connect your Spotify account
- Head to User Settings by clicking the
Step 2: Invite friends to listen along
- While Spotify is playing, click the + in your chat bar to invite your friends to listen with you.
Important Note: To invite friends to listen, they'll need to have Spotify Premium or they'll receive an error!
How to Make Your Own Emojis
Every Discord server has a library of emojis, and you can turn any image into a custom emoji for your server’s library. You know that cute little tongue blep your dog makes? Yeah, that could be an emoji, too!
:p
Step 1: Make sure you have the Manage Emoji permission
- If you’re the server creator, you have this automatically. If not, you can ask your server’s owner to grant it to you.
Step 2: Head to your Server Settings
- On Desktop, click on your server name to open the dropdown menu, and select Server Settings.
- On Mobile, swipe left to your channel view, and tap your server name and select Server Settings.
Step 3: Go to the Emoji tab and Upload!
- From Server Settings, select the Emoji tab and from there you can upload custom emoji that anyone on the server can use!
Pro Tip: If you’re a Discord Nitro subscriber, you can also upload gifs to use as ✨animated emoji.✨
How to Customize Your Profile Image
- To change your avatar on desktop, click the User Settings
- If you’re on mobile, swipe left to your channel view, and check out the tab bar at the bottom of your screen. The rightmost tab will take you to User Settings (it should look like your profile picture if you’ve added one, and a Discord logo if you haven’t!). From there, tap on your profile avatar to upload a new image!
Pro Tip: If you’re a Discord Nitro subscriber, you can upload a gif for an animated avatar.
How to Bold, Italic, Spoiler Tag, and More!
Check out our help center article for a detailed guide on all things Markdowns and learn all the shortcuts for how to easily edit your text formatting!
How to Add a Status to Your Voice/Video Call
Note: This feature is not available on mobile clients at this time.
Want to give your friends a heads up on what you’re all chatting about in the server before they join the channel? You can set a status in your voice channel to give everyone else in your server context on the topic of the chat - whether that’s “The Great Waffles vs Pancakes Debate”, “Planning the Next Hangout”, or “Just Listening to Kpop”.
Step 1: Enable the permissions
- Make sure you have the Set Voice Channel Status permission enabled in your server.
Step 2: Edit your status message
- Join a voice channel, and press on Set a channel status under the voice channel name in the server’s channel list and you’ll see a new window pop-up for you to input the status message. You can even add emojis in your voice channel status to add a little extra flair.
Step 3: Confirm and set your status!
- Once you’re all ready, press Set Status and your status will be online for everyone else in the server to see!
If you’re a server owner or have moderator permissions:
- Enable/Disabling Status Permissions: You can control which server members can change the voice status through the Set Voice Channel Status permission within the role/channel permission settings.
- Moderating Statuses: You can use Automod to block phrases/words from being used within a channel status. Additionally, all voice channel status changes will be shown in the audit log so that you can see a history of changes.
Troubleshooting & Support
And last but not least, we want to also provide resources to support you on your journey to learning how to use Discord, and the initial steps to try when you're attempting to troubleshoot an issue!
Voice & Video Troubleshooting
We want to make sure your experience is as smooth as possible. If you’re experiencing voice and video issues, check out this Voice and Video Troubleshooting guide here for steps on how to resolve these issues!
Discord Support
Need help with anything else? We’ve got your back.
Contact our support team here with a full description of what questions or issues you're running into! We’re always around to answer questions.