What does the Guilded game chat app offer?

The game chat app Guilded is con­sid­ered better than Discord among die-hard gamers. It offers nearly identical features for group chats and community main­te­nance, but it’s com­plete­ly free. Its features include server creation, in­di­vid­ual profile per­son­al­iza­tion, dedicated chat channels and server groups, and in­te­grat­ed high-quality streaming of video and audio. This has trans­formed Guilded into the game chat app gamers trust.

Guilded is a chat app for text, video and audio chats. It is aimed mainly at gamers. Guilded’s founder is former Facebook and Xbox employee and developer Eli Brown. In 2017, he launched Guilded with the aim of providing gaming com­mu­ni­ties with a powerful and free com­mu­ni­ca­tion platform. The app managed to become the most sought-after Discord al­ter­na­tive after a few years thanks to its free features. It is no wonder that the de­vel­op­ment team behind Roblox bought the app in 2021. Roblox is a Minecraft al­ter­na­tive. A bonus is that Guilded de­vel­op­ers regularly add new features and security features like 2FA and server sub­scrip­tions.

Guilded has a clear focus on gamers’ needs. It offers several at­trac­tive features. Gamers who are engrained in their community and want to support their team’s goals need a chat tool with as many com­mu­ni­ca­tion tools and per­son­al­iza­tion options as possible. This is exactly what Guilded offers. Unlike Discord, premium features are not behind a paywall. We’ll present Guilded’s most important features.

Servers are the heart of Guilded. This is where you meet your community, invite friends to your server, or chat on other Guilded servers. This is a simple task if you already know how to create a Discord server as Guilded works iden­ti­cal­ly. You can create private or public servers in minutes. You just need a Guilded account. Go to “Create a server” in the account menu and add an in­di­vid­ual avatar and server name. You can then invite your friends to join the chat with an in­vi­ta­tion link. If you’re attached to your Discord server con­fig­u­ra­tions, you can import them into the Guilded server.

Other server per­son­al­iza­tion options include server banners, a custom URL, an info area for server in­for­ma­tion, and an unlimited number of emojis. Server par­tic­i­pants can also be assigned roles and per­mis­sions as mod­er­a­tors. There is even the op­por­tu­ni­ty to fi­nan­cial­ly support yourself in a growing community with server sub­scrip­tions. Although you should be aware that Guilded charges a 2.5 percent trans­ac­tion fee for paid server sub­scrip­tions, plus fees for payment with Stripe.

Channels are the most important means of com­mu­ni­ca­tion on Guilded. Compared to Discord, the user interface is more stream­lined and clearer. Current channels can be found in the left menu. There is a par­tic­i­pant overview on the right side of the screen. New posts and messages appear in the middle chat area. All com­mu­ni­ca­tion takes place in your channels via text, video or audio chat. You can create an unlimited number of channels with Guilded and they can be clas­si­fied into one of the following ten cat­e­gories:

• Text chat (including saving and archiving threads)
• Voice chat (with in­te­grat­ed optional text chat)
• Streaming channel
• Event calendar for server members
• Calendar or­ga­ni­za­tion channel
• Channel for text an­nounce­ments to other servers
• Forum channel for questions or help in the community
• Channel for to-do lists (for all par­tic­i­pants and common goals)
• Docs channel for pub­lish­ing and or­ga­niz­ing server/community documents (e.g. guide­lines, server rules, plans, in­for­ma­tion­al materials, tutorials, fun facts)
• Media channel for uploading and or­ga­niz­ing videos, photos or other media

Creating your own avatar and your own digital per­son­al­i­ty is part of in­ter­act­ing in online com­mu­ni­ties. That’s why Guilded offers so many options to per­son­al­ize not only the server, but also your profile:

• Profile picture
• Profile banner
• “About me” section
• In­di­vid­ual URL (for the server)
• Flexible server name change
• Link your Guilded profile to profiles on Twitch, Steam, PlaySta­tion, Twitter, Patreon, YouTube accounts, Xbox, Roblox or Nintendo.
• Status messages (e.g. for pictures, quotes, jokes, polls, links)

Guilded allows you to share pictures with a maximum file size of 25 MB and videos with up to 200 MB in chats and Documents channels. Discord only offers 8 MB in the free variant. Free file sharing is essential if you want to share screen­shots or stream record­ings with legendary or funny moments in the community or with in­di­vid­ual members.

Bots are a standard tool in powerful chat apps. They offer many ad­di­tion­al features such as automated greetings, an­nounce­ments, music, mod­er­a­tion, polls, role as­sign­ment, and more. Guilded doesn’t have a wide selection compared to Discord bots, but Guilded bots are growing with the community. However, you can design your own Guilded bots for services in just a few minutes directly in the server.

One of the Guilded app’s greatest strengths is its in­te­grat­ed high-quality streaming for video and audio. This includes multiple si­mul­ta­ne­ous streams for streaming with friends. Streams also include chat features, optional layouts, screen sharing, shortcuts, and even noise can­celling. The quality of the streams is optimal with 1080p for video and 256kbps for audio.

Those looking for gaming com­mu­ni­ties for specific online games can use the server filter and get a list of local servers for the desired filter. There is even a database of player stats to find other Guilded users with similar skills or interests. Guilded has a focus on eSports and it allows you to host com­pe­ti­tions or search for in­for­ma­tion on par­tic­i­pants, leagues, teams, winnings, and or­ga­niz­ers.

You can benefit from creating server groups if you manage to generate a lot of traffic on your own server and organize channels. Simply open sub-servers in your server to do this. Specific roles and functions can be assigned to these. New members can decide directly whether they want to join a the­mat­i­cal­ly suitable sub-server. The division into sub­or­di­nate servers makes it easier to keep track of many different chat channels.

Guilded has some ad­di­tion­al in­ter­est­ing features and en­hance­ments which include:

• Ap­pli­ca­tions: Create forms that new members fill out to join your server. This helps you keep track of your community and prevent spam or trolls.
• Import server con­fig­u­ra­tions: Guilded saves you the trouble of con­fig­ur­ing the server if you already use a Discord server and imports the con­fig­u­ra­tions.
• Webhooks: Webhooks allow you to pull data and in­for­ma­tion from the internet onto your server.
• Third-party app in­te­gra­tions: If you use several platforms, you could use a Twitch bot, for example, to inform the server community that a Twitch stream is about to start. Twitch streams can also be watched on Guilded. You can also syn­chro­nize Patreon with Guilded.
• Surveys and polls: Col­lab­o­ra­tive decision-making is easy with survey forms and member polls. Member per­mis­sions determine who can see the results.
• Smart­phone app: You can use Guilded not only on your desktop, but also as an app on your smart­phone.

There aren’t strict system re­quire­ments when using Guilded. The app can be used on all major operating systems for desktop and mobile devices, such as Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS. However, a good webcam, mi­cro­phone, and speakers or head­phones are rec­om­mend­ed, es­pe­cial­ly for streams. Your device should have enough RAM for smooth streaming and chatting. Between 8 and 16 GB or more is rec­om­mend­ed.

Guilded is currently free with all features (as of August 2022). Guilded maintains that it will stay that way. Costs will only arise if you use server sub­scrip­tions (server subs) and make certain server features or channels only ac­ces­si­ble for paying sub­scribers. This will incur a 2.5 percent fee plus the fees for the online payment service Stripe.