Discord Basics

Discord servers have a three-level structural hierarchy: 

Server

Categories within the server

Channels within each category

Servers

The community spaces hosted on Discord. 

They can be public or private, as large as hundreds of thousands of people or as small as two. Whether it's to connect on similar interests, hobbies, or a shared mission, you'll find servers of all shapes and sizes floating around the internet.

💡

Tip: You can join up to 100 servers for free, or 200 if you're willing to pay for Discord Nitro. We recommend engaging deeply with 2-3 max after exploring a few different servers.

Categories

Groups of channels you can collapse/expand. 

Categories are used to help organize the server and make it easier to navigate. In the image, 🏫 Live Campus is a collapsed category, and 🎓 Semester 1 is expanded.

Channels 

Spaces where members interact via text, voice, or video. 

There are four types of channels: click on the triangle to find out more

Clicking into a given channel will present you with its details, including a name and description preview at the top of the screen. 

You can expand the Channel Description by clicking on the preview text. This shows you the full description. 

When you click on Pinned messages icon, a popup will open and it will show all the pinned messages in that channel.

💡

Tip: You can also use the shortcut Ctrl+P to directly see the pinned message of a particular channel.

▶️

Next:

Discord Basics

Discord servers have a three-level structural hierarchy: 

Server

Categories within the server

Channels within each category

Servers

The community spaces hosted on Discord. 

They can be public or private, as large as hundreds of thousands of people or as small as two. Whether it's to connect on similar interests, hobbies, or a shared mission, you'll find servers of all shapes and sizes floating around the internet.

💡

Tip: You can join up to 100 servers for free, or 200 if you're willing to pay for Discord Nitro. We recommend engaging deeply with 2-3 max after exploring a few different servers.

Categories

Groups of channels you can collapse/expand. 

Categories are used to help organize the server and make it easier to navigate. In the image, 🏫 Live Campus is a collapsed category, and 🎓 Semester 1 is expanded.

Channels 

Spaces where members interact via text, voice, or video. 

There are four types of channels: click on the triangle to find out more

Clicking into a given channel will present you with its details, including a name and description preview at the top of the screen. 

You can expand the Channel Description by clicking on the preview text. This shows you the full description. 

When you click on Pinned messages icon, a popup will open and it will show all the pinned messages in that channel.

💡

Tip: You can also use the shortcut Ctrl+P to directly see the pinned message of a particular channel.

▶️

Next: