Create a Group and Choose Who Can Find It
Groups are the communities people belong to at your church, like a Tuesday Bible study or a young adults fellowship. Each group has its own page, and you choose who can find it and how people get in.
Before you begin
- You need admin or staff access to your church dashboard.
- Think about who the group is for: anyone, your church members, or only people you invite.
The four group types
| Type | Who can find it | Who sees who's in it |
|---|---|---|
| Public | Anyone | People in the group |
| Members only | Church members | People in the group |
| Private, listed | Anyone can see its name and description | People in the group |
| Private, hidden | Only people who are invited | People in the group |
Step-by-step
- Go to the People page. In the dashboard, open People, then click the Groups tab.
- Click New group. A window titled New group opens.
- Add an emoji and name. Under Emoji and name, click the square to pick an emoji, then type the group's name.
- Add a description (optional). Say what the group is about and when it meets. The line under the box tells you who can read it.
- Choose the type. Under Who can find it, pick Public, Members only, Private, listed, or Private, hidden.
- Choose who can join. For every type except Members only, pick Anyone with a Churchday account or Members of your church. Members only groups are always for church members.
- Choose how people join. For Public and Members only groups, pick Join right away or Ask first. A Private, listed group always asks first, and a Private, hidden group is invitation only.
- Choose who can invite (private groups only). Under Who can invite, pick Only group admins or Anyone in the group.
- Click Create group. The group opens, ready for you to add people and its first group admin.
Good to know
- New groups start as Public, joining right away. Change any setting before you click Create group.
- Accepting new members is a switch in the same window. Turn it off to pause joining. Email invitations and waiting requests still go through.
- Show events on the church page appears for Public and Members only groups. This setting takes effect in a later update. For now, a group's events show on the group's own page, to the people in it.
- Making a group more open asks you to confirm. If a change lets more people find or join the group, you see a list of what becomes visible and click Save changes to confirm.
- Change settings later. Open the group from the Groups tab, then click the options button (...) and choose Edit group. To see what members see, choose View group page.
- Archive a group you no longer need. In the group's settings, click Archive under Archive group. It's hidden from Groups and closed to new members, and its history is kept. Click Restore on the group's page to bring it back.
- Groups you had before keep working the same way. Public groups became Members only and private groups became Private, hidden. A one-time notice at the top of the Groups tab explains this.
- Subgroups stay internal. These settings apply to top-level groups only.