How does chat discoverability work on Fedi?

To maintain user privacy, discovery on Fedi works a bit differently than on most other messaging apps.

To find someone via username in order to initiate a direct chat, you must enter their display name exactly; omitting an emoji, for example, will not return the intended result.

Additionally, you must also already share a chat group with the user you are searching for. Otherwise, they will not be discoverable by their display name.

The only exception is if the user has previously joined a public chat group. Joining a public group makes you discoverable by anyone on the Fedi platform even after you leave the group.

Note that the default announcements channels associated with most communities are view-only rooms and therefore do not constitute sharing a group with the other users who can view those channels.

This is to say that simply being part of the same community does not make you discoverable to all other members of the community.

Discoverability aside, you can always initiate a direct chat with a user whom you do not already share a chat group with by simply scanning or pasting their entire Fedi member code.