# Creating private groups
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/creating-private-groups/155896
**Category:** Support
**Created:** [June 25, 2020, 9:27am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/creating-private-groups/155896 "2020-06-25T09:27:05Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@membership1](https://meta.discourse.org/u/membership1)
#### Post date: [June 25, 2020, 9:27am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/creating-private-groups/155896/1 "2020-06-25T09:27:06Z")
How do I set up private groups within a forum? They have a group email address but the conversations must be private - but they must be able to see all public discussions.
thank you!
---
### Author:  [@merefield](https://meta.discourse.org/u/merefield)
#### Post date: [June 25, 2020, 9:30am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/creating-private-groups/155896/2 "2020-06-25T09:30:40Z")
> [@Understanding groups and category permissions](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-use-category-security-settings-to-create-private-categories/87678):
>
> bookmark This guide explains how to manage category visibility and user permissions using groups in Discourse. person_raising_hand Required user level: Administrator Groups and category permissions are crucial for managing access and content creation within your Discourse community. This guide will help you understand how to use these features effectively. Summary Category permissions control visibility and user actions Permissions are managed through group access lists Different perm…
---
### Author:  [@Qursch](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Qursch)
#### Post date: [June 25, 2020, 10:51am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/creating-private-groups/155896/3 "2020-06-25T10:51:24Z")
When creating a group, you can make it private and not visible to the public by changing the Visibility settings.
Set the ‘Who can see this group?’ to ‘Group owners, members’ and the 'Who can see this group’s members?" to the same. This will allow this group to only be seen by forum admins/moderators, and group members.
After doing the above, unless you had previously changed a group permission, the group can still see all normal posts and reply to them as if they were a normal user. But the (real) normal users will not be able to see their group.
---
### Author:  [@pearsonified](https://meta.discourse.org/u/pearsonified)
#### Post date: [July 11, 2025, 4:36pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/creating-private-groups/155896/4 "2025-07-11T16:36:27Z")
Will “normal” users still be able to see people who are in this Group when they participate in larger discussions? I want to make sure all users can be seen and that Titles added to these “special” users are always visible.