# 📣 Introducing default chat channels (automatically add users)

**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/introducing-default-chat-channels-automatically-add-users/233141
**Category:** Announcements
**Tags:** chat, new-feature
**Created:** [July 18, 2022, 8:57pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/introducing-default-chat-channels-automatically-add-users/233141 "2022-07-18T20:57:34Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Showing post:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

### Author: ![rishabh](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/rishabh/32/179446_2.png) [@rishabh](https://meta.discourse.org/u/rishabh)
#### Post date: [July 18, 2022, 8:57pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/introducing-default-chat-channels-automatically-add-users/233141/1 "2022-07-18T20:57:34Z")

</div>

## Automatically add users to channel

While creating a new channel, admins will now see a preference to add all new and existing users to it. Using this, admins can configure “default channels” for groups of users to be included in automatically.

 ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/meta/original/4X/5/2/d/52d2466fc83ed90d5f06a681b3569495ec76a3b4.png)

For an existing channel, admins can toggle this behavior in Channel Settings. In all cases, a confirmation dialog will appear to indicate the number of users being added.

✅ Users auto-join a channel when:

- they are added to a group that has access to a channel with auto-join
- a channel is created or edited to have auto-join enabled

> Note that users are not removed from a channel automatically if auto-join was disabled after they were added. If any user was automatically added to a “default channel”, they may leave at any time.

[https://github.com/discourse/discourse-chat/pull/988](https://github.com/discourse/discourse-chat/pull/988)

## A new Info Panel

Clicking a channel title will now take users to a useful info panel with three tabs:

![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/meta/original/4X/0/c/c/0cc0017446e45803cbfb263a9b3c77aac6181500.png)

- The **About** tab will display title, description and linked category, so users have the context they need for each channel.

- The **Members** tab lets users see who else is in the room with them (member list and total count). It includes a filter so they can use search.

- The **Settings** tab will let you set notification preferences (mute, desktop / mobile push notifications). For admins, this tab also includes the auto-join mode toggle.

[https://github.com/discourse/discourse-chat/pull/947](https://github.com/discourse/discourse-chat/pull/947)

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