How to Add Roles in Discord (Make Roles, Change Name)
Discord is the go-to messaging tool for gamers. It’s also great for finding other types of communities but there’s no denying that it is most popular with gamers. Discord allows users to create and host their own servers and users can freely invite and join other servers.
How to add people on Discord
Discord servers aren’t always open and server admins can control who is invited to a server but even with this user-level control, moderation is important. The more users join a server, the harder it is to moderate. It’s a good idea to spread moderation duties between other users or restrict what they can and cannot do in a server. This is where server roles come in.
Discord server permissions
Discord provides a lot of different permissions that can be assigned to a single user. A user can be given one of several permissions and a combination of these permissions give that particular user a ‘role’. The roles themselves do not have specific names. Instead, you have to enable/disable permissions for a user to change their role.
The permissions that can be enabled for a user in a Discord server are;
General Permissions
- Administrator: Every permission and also bypass channel specific permissions.
- View Audit Log: Access to view the server’s audit logs.
- Manage Server: Change the server’s name or move regions.
- Manage Roles: Create new roles and edit/delete roles lower than this one.
- Manage Channels: Create new channels and edit or delete existing ones.
- Kick Members: Remove a member from the server.
- Ban Members: Ban a member from the server.
- Create Invite: Create invites or send them to users for the server.
- Change Nickname: Change their own nickname.
- Manage Nicknames: Change nicknames of other members.
- Manage Emojis: add/remove emoji that can be used on the server.
- Manage Webhooks: Create, edit, and delete webhooks.
- Read Text Channels & See Voice Channels: Read all text-based channels on the server and view video channels on.
Text permissions
- Send Messages: Send text messages over channels.
- Send TTS Messages: Send text-to-speech messages to everyone in the channel.
- Manage Messages: Delete messages by other members or pin any message.
- Embed Links: Send links over a channel.
- Attach Files: Send files over a channel.
- Read Message History: View message history for a channel.
- Mention @everyone, @here, and All Roles: Send a message on a channel that will send an alert to everyone or everyone with a particular role in the channel.
- Use External Emojis: Use emojis from other servers in this server.
- Add Reactions: Add new reactions to a message.
Voice permissions
- Connect: stream into this server.
- Mute: Mute a member in a particular channel or the entire server.
- Deafen: Block user from hearing other users on voice channels.
- Move: Move members between channels both they and the members they are moving have access.
- Use Voice Activity: Use Push-to-talk in a channel if this permission is disallowed.
- Priority Speaker: User will be more easily heard when talking. The volume for other users will be reduced when this user speaks.
Discord roles, how to add them
Now that you know the various permissions that can be given to a user on a Discord server, you’re ready to start creating roles. Follow the steps below.
- Open Discord, and right-click your server in the column on the left.
- Select Server Settings>Role.
- Under the Roles column, click the little plus button to create a new role.
- Give the role a name. You can name it anything you want but it should make sense to you and to the function that the role will play.
- Assign the role a color. This color will be used as a highlight when a member with this role sends a message over the server.
- Go through the various permissions and allow the role permissions that suit its function.
- Click Save Changes.
Assign a role to a member
Now that you’ve created a role, it’s time to assign it to a user/member on your server.
- Open Discord.
- Right-click the server and select Server Settings>Members.
- Click the plus button next to a member’s name and select a role from the listed roles.
- The role will be assigned and all permissions will be granted to the user immediately.
Remove member role
To remove a role for a member, follow the steps below;
- Open Discord.
- Right-click the server and select Server Settings>Members.
- Click the more options button next to a member that has a role you want to remove.
- In the menu that opens, go to Roles and uncheck the role you want to remove for the member.
Delete a Discord role
Roles can be deleted just as easily as they can be created.
- Open Discord.
- Right-click your server and select Server Settings>Roles.
- Select a role from the list of roles, and scroll to the very bottom of the permissions list.
- Click Delete Role Name.
Roles and permission inheritance
A single member can have multiple roles and multiple roles can have varying permissions. On a Discord server, a member’s abilities are determined by the highest role the member has.
For example, let’s say you have a role called Admin. This role is allowed complete control over the server and every single permission for this role is enabled. You have a second role called Message Moderator. This role is allowed to delete messages, add/remove emoji, and ban or remove members.
If the same person is assigned the Admin role and the Message Moderator role, they will have all the permissions that the Admin role has as that is the highest level role. It will give the member access to permissions that they did not have under the Message Moderator role.
Conclusion
Server roles are one of the most remarkable features that Discord has. Not only are they easy to manage, they’re also suitable for every moderation need you can have on a messaging server, public or otherwise. It basically allows users to create a comprehensive server management team right out of the box.
