Direct Messages are private conversations in Disco that let Members and Admins talk one-on-one or in a small group without posting to a public channel.
Overview
Direct Messages (DMs) power personal, private communication inside your Academy. A DM can be a 1:1 conversation between two Members or a group conversation between a small set of Members, and any message in a DM can have a thread of replies attached to keep follow-on discussion organized. DMs are enabled by default and work across every Member role in the Academy.
Turn Direct Messages On or Off
DMs are on by default. If DMs have been turned off, for example on an internal workspace version of Disco, an Admin can re-enable them for the whole Academy.
- Go to Admin → Appearance → Sidebar.
- Toggle Direct Message on.
- Click Save.
Turning DMs off removes the DM entry points and the DMs tab for everyone in the Academy, Members and Admins alike. It does not delete existing conversations. When you toggle DMs back on, the full message history reappears after a page refresh.
DM access is all-or-nothing. When DMs are on, any active Member can DM any other active Member. There is no built-in way to restrict DMs to a specific role, Member Group, or shared Program enrollment.
Start a Direct Message
Once DMs are enabled, Members and Admins can start a DM from several entry points.
From the Chat area:
- Click the + icon at the top of the sidebar and select New Direct Message.
- Or click the global add button in the bottom-left of the screen and select Direct Message.
Each of these opens the Start a Direct Message modal.
- Select one or more Members from the search list. Selecting one Member creates a 1:1 DM. Selecting multiple Members creates a group DM.
- Click Start Conversation.
- Type a message in the chat input and send.
The DM appears in the DMs tab for every participant once the first message is sent.
Start a DM with one click
These shortcuts skip the modal and open a 1:1 DM directly.
- From any Member’s profile popover, click Message to open a 1:1 DM with that Member.
- From the Contact Admins carousel at the top of the DMs page or sidebar, click Message on an Admin card to open a 1:1 DM with that Admin.
Navigate the DMs Area
Opening Chat and switching to the DMs tab shows every DM you are part of, with the most recent conversation at the top. Each row shows the other participants’ names and avatars along with a preview of the latest message.
From this area you can start a new DM, click into an existing conversation, or use the Contact Admins carousel at the top of the list to message another Admin with one click.
Send Messages in a DM
Opening a DM loads its message history, a header showing the other participants’ names and avatars, and a chat input at the bottom of the page.
From the input you can post messages with:
- Rich text (bold, italic, strikethrough, links, bulleted and numbered lists)
- Emoji
- File, image, or video attachments
- Deep links to other Disco content (an Event, a piece of Content, a Program, or a Survey), which post as a clickable link card
You can @-mention another participant in a DM the same way you would in a channel. @channel is a channel-only feature and does not apply in DMs.
Draft a message with AI
The chat input has a Write with AI button. Click it to open a modal, describe what you want to say, and Disco drops a generated draft into the input. Review the draft and send it manually. Write with AI never posts a message on its own.
Reply in a Thread
Reply to any message in a DM to start a thread. Thread replies open in a thread pane to the right of the main feed, keeping follow-on conversation tied to the original message without cluttering the main DM timeline.
Use Per-Message Actions
Hovering a message reveals its options bar. Anyone in the DM can:
- Add a reaction
- Reply in a thread
- Quote reply
- Edit or delete their own messages
- Mute the author (mute hides that author’s messages from your own DMs going forward)
- Mark as unread
Unlike channels, DMs do not support pinned messages.
The Contact Admins carousel at the top of the DMs page and sidebar gives Members a one-click way to reach the Academy’s Owners and Admins. Admins see the same carousel and can use it to message one another. Only Owner and Admin roles appear in the carousel. Program Managers and Instructors do not show up there.
Use the Contact Admins carousel as your Academy’s front door for 1:1 support questions, and keep group discussion in channels. DMs are best for personal, short-lived conversations (a welcome nudge, a quick check-in, coaching). For longer-lived team or cohort conversations, create a private channel instead. Channels support pinned messages, per-conversation notification control, and the ability to add or remove people later. DMs lock the participant list at creation and share a single notification setting across every conversation.
Manage DM Notifications
Each Member controls whether they receive email notifications for DMs from their profile’s Notifications settings. Toggling the Direct Message kind off stops email notifications for DMs for that Member.
In-app and push notifications for DMs are not separately configurable per notification kind in the UI today. They follow the Academy’s default delivery.
There are no per-conversation DM notification preferences. Channels let a Member pick All, @ Mentions, or Off per channel. DMs share one setting that applies to every conversation a Member is part of.
Disco debounces email notifications on a single DM, so a fast back-and-forth does not generate a separate email for every message.
Edge Cases
- Group DM participant lists are locked at creation. You cannot add a Member to an existing group DM or remove a Member from one. To include a new participant, start a new DM with the updated set of Members.
- Messaging a deactivated account. In a 1:1 DM where the other participant has been deactivated, the chat input is replaced with a notice that the account has been deactivated and no new messages can be sent. The existing message history remains readable. In a group DM, you can keep sending messages as long as at least one other participant is still active.
- Members removed from the Academy. When every other participant in a DM has been removed from the Academy, the DM stops appearing in your DMs list.
- DMs without a first message disappear. If you start a DM but navigate away before sending the first message, the conversation is not saved. Send at least one message to keep the DM.
- Starting a DM with the same group opens the existing one. Disco reuses an existing DM when the set of participants matches exactly, so there is no way to start a fresh conversation with the same people. Scroll to the top of the existing DM, or start a thread off an earlier message, if you want to re-open a topic.
FAQ
Can I send a DM to more than one person? Yes. Select multiple Members in the Start a Direct Message modal to create a group DM. All participants can post, reply in threads, and react.
Do group DMs send email notifications? Yes. Group DMs respect the same Direct Message notification kind as 1:1 DMs. If a Member has that notification kind turned on, they will receive email for group DM activity.
Can I add someone to an existing group DM? No. Group DM participant lists are locked at creation. To include a new person, start a new DM with the updated set of Members.
Can I remove someone from a group DM or leave one myself? No. There is no way to remove a participant or exit a group DM. If a DM is unwanted, mute the author or turn off the Direct Message email notification kind in your profile’s Notifications settings.
Can I rename a group DM (for example, “Project Phoenix team”)? No. The DM header is always the list of the other participants’ names. If you need a named, long-lived space, create a private channel instead.
Can I restrict DMs to specific roles, like only between Members and their Program Manager? No. DM access is all-or-nothing for the Academy. When DMs are on, any active Member can DM any other active Member. When they are off, no one can start a DM. Teams with safeguarding requirements typically turn DMs off and route member-to-staff communication through channels or email.
Can I personally block someone from DMing me? No. Disco does not have a per-Member “do not DM” setting today. You can mute an author from their message options bar, which hides their messages from your own DMs going forward, but it does not prevent them from sending.
Can I hyperlink a Member’s name in a Feed post so clicking it opens a DM? No. Feed posts support deep links to an Event, a piece of Content, a Program, or a Survey. They do not support deep links to a Member profile or to a pre-filled DM.
If I turn DMs off, do I lose the message history? No. Toggling DMs off hides the entry points and the DMs tab for everyone, but Disco does not delete DM conversations. Turn DMs back on and refresh the page to see the full history restored.
Can I pin an important message in a DM? No. Pinned messages are a channel-only feature.
Can I attach Events, Programs, or Content to a DM? Yes. The chat input lets you attach an Event, a piece of Content, a Program, or a Survey. The attachment posts as a link card the recipients can click to open the attached item.
Does Write with AI send the message for me? No. Write with AI generates a draft and drops it into the chat input. You review, edit if needed, and send manually.
Can I search or filter my DMs to see only the unread ones? Not today. DMs are ordered by most recent activity. There is no built-in filter for unread-only, and no DM-level search in the sidebar.
Why do numbered lists in my automated welcome DM lose their numbers? This has been reported when DMs are sent via automation. If formatting does not render as expected, rewrite the message without a numbered list (for example, using plain text “Step 1…”) and reach out to support so the team can investigate. 
