Discord has introduced a new quality-of-life feature that most of us never realised we needed. Available now to all users on the platform is the aptly named Text Chat In Voice Channels function which, well, adds a standalone text-based chat room for voice channels.
This is particularly useful for sending images, GIFs, links, memes and so on to other participants of a voice channel that you’re in. Needless to say, sparing you the need to direct them to a separate text-only channel in the server for this purpose.
The new function also helps to reduce the amount of spam and clutter in text channels with content that may confuse those who are not taking part in the voice chat. Therefore, keeping text conversations between participants private, especially for non-public voice channels that only involve selected members in the server, such as VIPs, admins and so on.
Since the text-based chat room is unique to the voice channel, it will keep chat histories like regular text channels. However, do keep note that non-participants may also drop in to view and contribute to the text chat if the voice channel is set to public. And should that channel be deleted for whatever reason, all text-based conversations in it will be purged as well.
On the moderation front, Community-based servers are also getting new tools for admins and channel moderators to manage the new feature. These include new role assignments and permissions for various Text Chat in Voice Channels settings.
Provided that you’ve updated your Discord app to the latest version, you can easily find the new quality-of-life feature by hovering the mouse pointer over a voice channel’s name and then clicking on the chat bubble icon beside it. As mentioned earlier, it is available to all users and servers of any size completely free of charge. However, Discord notes that Community enabled servers have a period of time to opt into the feature before it is automatically activated across all servers on the platform by 29 June 2022.
(Source: Discord [official blog])
