# Configuring and managing the sign-up flow with user approval

**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/configuring-and-managing-the-sign-up-flow-with-user-approval/112128
**Category:** Site Management
**Tags:** explanation, invites, users
**Created:** [March 20, 2019, 7:41am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/configuring-and-managing-the-sign-up-flow-with-user-approval/112128 "2019-03-20T07:41:54Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
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### Author: ![Discourse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/discourse/32/148734_2.png) [@Discourse](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Discourse)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2019, 7:41am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/configuring-and-managing-the-sign-up-flow-with-user-approval/112128/1 "2019-03-20T07:41:54Z")

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> 🔖 This guide explains the sign-up process when the “must approve users” setting is enabled, including configuration steps and the user experience.
> 
> 🙋 Required user level: Administrator

When you want to control who can join your Discourse community, you can enable a setting that requires new users to be approved before they can log in. This feature is commonly used for private communities or public forums that want to limit participation.

## Configuring user approval

To set up user approval for your Discourse site:

1. Enable the `must_approve_users` site setting.  

2. (Optional) If you want to make your community private, enable the `login_required` site setting. This prevents anonymous users from viewing your forum’s content.

## User sign-up process

Once you’ve enabled user approval, here’s what the sign-up process looks like for new users:

1. The user visits your forum and clicks the “Sign Up” button.  

2. The user enters their account details and receives an activation email.

3. After activating their email, the user sees this message on the forum:

## Moderator approval process

1. Moderators receive on-site notifications for pending user approvals.

2. If a request remains in the review queue, a reminder private message is sent to moderators who haven’t yet seen a previous reminder. The reminder is managed by the `PendingUsersReminder` background job, which runs every 5 minutes but can be delayed using the `pending_users_reminder_delay_minutes` site setting (default: 480 minutes).

3. Once a staff member approves a user, the user receives an email notification.  

## Additional resources

- [Configuring Discourse for a closed or private community](https://meta.discourse.org/t/configure-discourse-for-a-closed-or-private-community/27014)

> Last edited by @hugh 2024-07-05T01:35:58Z
> 
> > **Check document**
> >
> > Perform check on document:

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