Send a chat message

Send instant messages to a single recipient or to a group of people within your organization.

To send a chat message, start a chat, type your message, and then press Enter. Edit a chat message that you just sent. To enhance your messages, format your text using markup and add emoji symbols. Reply directly to other messages, address specific people in conversations, type commands, and add media to your chats.


You can edit a previously sent chat message up to 60 seconds after you sent it.

  1. Click Edit next to the chat message or click the up arrow key on your keyboard. Edit chat messageA new chat edit window opens. 
  2. Change your message and press Enter to save your changes. If you decide not to save your edit, press Esc to cancel. If you do not press Enter before the countdown timer reaches zero, the edit window closes without saving your changes. Edit chat windowYour changes appear in the chat room with “(edited)” below the chat. Editing a chat generates no new notifications. You can edit the message as many times as you want, as long as your edits are within the 60 second time limit.Edited chat message

Note: To edit a chat message, you can also type the command s/former message/new message and substitute the original message with your edited message. When you use this command, you still have 60 seconds to replace your message, but the countdown timer does not display. 

Use simple markup to add formatting to chats. For a complete list of markup possibilities, see Format text in chats.

Format Use For example, type this… To send this…
Italic Single asterisks or underscores

Here is some *italic text* in a chat.

(Or substitute asterisks for underscores.)

Here is some italic text in a chat.
Bold Double asterisks or underscores

Here is some **bold text** in a chat.

(Or substitute double asterisks for double underscores.)

 Here is some bold text in a chat.
Strikethrough Double tilde symbols (~~)

Here is some ~~strikethrough text~~ in a chat.

 Here is some strikethrough text in a chat.
Highlight Backticks (`)

Here is some `highlighted text` in a chat.

 Here is some highlighted text in a chat.

  1. Click the emoji icon in the chat window.

    Emoji picker

  2. Select a category at the top of the emoji menu and scroll to view different emojis in each category.

    Emoji picker categories

  3. Select an emoji. Emoji in chat window

  4. Press Enter to send your message with the emoji.

    Emoticon example

Note: If you start a chat message with the loudspeaker emoji, then the background color of your message changes to yellow. Loudspeaker emoji in a chat with yellow background

Use the “@” symbol to mention a specific person in a group chat room and invite them to that chat room. 

Note:  Using the “@” symbol to mention someone in a group chat invites that person to the chat room, even if the chat room is private. Using it in a one-on-one direct chat room does not invite that person to the direct chat room. 

  1. In a chat message, type “@” and begin typing the person’s name.

  2. Select a name to address a comment to a specific person or invite them to the chat room. Address someone in a group chat

  3. Press Enter to send the chat message and “@” mention.
    The person’s name displays in your chat message in the chat room.

  4. Click the @username hyperlink to open that person’s profile page. Address someone in a group chat

Use the quotation mark symbol (“) to quote and reply directly to a specific person in a group chat or private chat room.

  1. Click the quotation mark symbol to the right of the chat that you want to quote and reply to.Reply directly in group chat - quote
  2. If you are in a group chat room, select whether you want to reply to the entire room or to the person directly. Reply directly in group chat - buttonTo reply to a different chat room, select another chat room from the chat roster.  
  3. In the chat reply window, type your message and press Enter. Your chat message and the original chat message display in the chat room.inline reply in chat room

Chat commands allow you control and add features to a chat room without using your mouse. To use chat commands, type a slash into any chat room and choose a command from the command selections displayed and press Enter, or type all of the command. Press Enter again to execute the command.

 

Type this… To do this…
Type this… To do this…
/leave Leave and close a chat.
/phone Make a phone call to the person you are chatting with in a one-to-one chat.
/video Video chat with the chat room.
/roll and the number of die, d,  and number of sides on the dice Roll virtual dice to generate a random number. For example, type /roll 3d20 to roll three 20-sided virtual dice and generate three numbers between 1 and 20. 
/selfie Take and instantly send a picture using your computer’s camera.
/pref Open the Preferences dialog box.
/mute Turn off notifications for the chat room.
/unmute Turn on notifications for the chat room.
/collapse Collapse all images in the chat room.
/expand Expand and show all images in the chat room.
/presence and presence Set your presence to Available, Away, Busy, or Out of Office. For example, type /presence available to set your presence to Available.
/whisper @mention  message Send a direct message to a person without leaving the current room. For example, to send a direct message from a chat room, type /whisper @Cooper,Dex Hi Dex! and press Enter.
/last Switch back to the previous chat room.
/dnd Set your presence to Busy. 
/afk Set your presence to Away.
/popout Open the current chat room in a new window. If you are on a video chat in that chat room, the video chat also moves to the new window.
You can use this command to keep multiple chat rooms open at the same time. 
/giphy and a search term Insert a gif from the Giphy website. For example, type /giphy cat to select a cat gif from www.giphy.com to display in the chat room.
/search and a search term Open the chat room’s search panel and search for a term. For more information about searching in a chat room, see Search chat room history. 

Send a specific hexadecimal color sample in a chat.

  1. Type # and the six character hexadecimal color code. For example, type #66CCFF to show light blue in the chat room.
  2. Press Enter to send the chat message. 
    The color displays below your chat message.Hexadecimal color sent in a chat

To clear the orange line that shows you have new unread messages, do one of the following:

  • Scroll to the most recent message.
  • Respond to the conversation with a new message.
  • Press Esc.
  • Select New Messages in the chat room.

    Conversation starting point bar

Close a chat conversation to stop receiving notifications for it and to remove it from your current chat categories.

Click the “X” that appears when you hover the mouse pointer over the chat.

Close a chat

The chat moves to the Recently Closed category in the chat roster where you can select it to reopen it for a limited time.

Recently closed chats

Note: If you are a member of an official group and you close the group’s chat room, the room opens again when someone sends a chat message in that room.

Notes: 
  • When you try to join a group chat room that is full, you can only browse the group chat's history. You cannot join the chat, post messages, or search chat history until other users leave the chat room. For more information, see What does it mean if the group chat room is full? 
  • Chat conversations are permanent and cannot be manually deleted.