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Settings

Relay includes a full in-app Settings area for both end users and instance admins. This page focuses on what each Settings tab does. For the Relay-specific feature list itself, see Relay Features.

Settings tabs at a glance

Tab What it controls Notes
General App integration, settings sync, typing notifications, call display name, automatic away message Available to signed-in users
Appearance Message formatting, link previews, status message display, autocomplete and nick color behavior User preference tab
Themes Built-in themes, theme import/export, custom CSS Relay extends upstream theme handling
Aliases Custom IRC command shortcuts Relay-specific feature
Uploads Per-user upload cleanup and expiration preferences Only useful on authenticated instances with uploads enabled
Short Links Per-user short link review, sorting, and deletion Available when the link shortener is enabled on non-public instances
Security Keys Passwordless login keys and passkeys Private authenticated instances only
Notifications Push and browser notification behavior, highlight keywords Per-user notification preferences
Account Password changes and session management Lets users revoke old sessions
Stats Personal activity totals, message graphs, and storage usage Relay-specific visibility into usage
Admin Server-wide configuration, registration, uploads, short links, SMTP, OIDC, Jitsi, KLIPY, user management, restart controls Admin accounts only

General

The General tab covers client behavior that does not fit elsewhere:

  • Add Relay to the home screen as a native-style web app on supported browsers.
  • Register Relay to open irc:// links directly from the browser.
  • Synchronize settings between clients when settings sync is enabled.
  • Toggle typing indicators and whether your typing state is sent to others.
  • Set the display name used during Jitsi voice/video calls.
  • Configure an automatic away message.

Appearance

The Appearance tab controls how chat content is presented:

  • Show or hide the server MOTD.
  • Switch between 12-hour and 24-hour-style timestamp behavior, with an option to include seconds.
  • Control link preview expansion for media and websites.
  • Choose how status messages are shown: expanded, condensed, or hidden.
  • Enable colored nicknames.
  • Enable autocomplete and choose the nick autocomplete postfix.

Themes

The Themes tab lets users personalize Relay's look and feel:

  • Pick from the bundled built-in themes.
  • Export the active theme as a CSS file.
  • Import a CSS file as a new selectable theme.
  • Add custom CSS overrides directly in the browser.

This is one of Relay's most visible customization features, especially for communities that want custom branding without rebuilding the client.

Aliases

The Aliases tab manages custom IRC command shortcuts.

  • Create short commands such as /shrug or /j that expand into longer IRC commands.
  • Use positional variables like $1 and $2, $* for all arguments, and $channel for the current channel name.
  • Edit or delete aliases from the same screen.

Relay also supports alias expansion in chat input and command autocomplete.

Uploads

The Uploads tab is the user-facing side of Relay's file handling:

  • Configure the default upload expiration value for your own uploads.
  • Remove image metadata before uploading when desired.
  • Review previously uploaded files.
  • Sort uploads and delete individual items.

If the admin disables uploads or the instance is running in public mode with upload restrictions, some options may be limited.

The Short Links tab lets users manage links created by Relay's built-in link shortener:

  • Review the short links you have created.
  • Sort links by short code, creation time, or expiration time.
  • Open the short link directly to verify the redirect target.
  • Delete links you no longer want to keep around.

This tab is available when the short-link feature is enabled and the instance is not running in public mode.

Security Keys

The Security Keys tab provides passwordless sign-in management:

  • View registered hardware keys and passkeys.
  • Add a new key with a friendly display name.
  • Remove keys you no longer use.

This is Relay's WebAuthn/FIDO2 integration and works well with security keys, platform passkeys, and biometrics such as fingerprint-backed sign-in.

Notifications

The Notifications tab controls how Relay gets your attention:

  • Subscribe to push notifications.
  • Enable browser notifications and notification sound.
  • Choose whether all messages can trigger notifications.
  • Define custom highlight words.
  • Define highlight exceptions to reduce noise.

Typing notifications are configured in General, while message alerts live here.

Account

The Account tab is for account security and session hygiene:

  • Change your password.
  • Review the current signed-in session.
  • Review other sessions across browsers and devices.
  • Revoke old sessions without changing your password.

This is especially useful on shared devices or when testing across multiple clients.

Stats

The Stats tab surfaces usage information that is not documented elsewhere in the current docs:

  • Personal totals such as connected networks, joined channels, messages logged, and storage used.
  • A graph of messages logged over the last 7 days.
  • Server-wide totals such as total networks and total channels across all users.
  • Storage-by-user reporting, including upload and log usage.
  • A manual refresh action for on-demand recalculation.

Large instances may take a little longer to compute storage statistics because Relay scans cached usage data and user storage on demand.

Admin

The Admin tab is Relay's server-side control panel for administrators.

Server configuration

Admins can manage server-wide behavior without editing config files manually:

  • Allow or disable self-registration.
  • Enable or disable link prefetch and URL previews.
  • Disable inline media previews when needed.
  • Control whether prefetched media is stored on the server.
  • Set maximum prefetch image size.
  • Enable file uploads.
  • Set maximum upload size.
  • Set upload expiration defaults.
  • Choose the default theme for the instance.
  • Set maximum stored channel history.

Some server-level changes require a server restart to take effect.

Email / SMTP

Relay can enable SMTP for email-backed workflows:

  • Enable SMTP support.
  • Use SMTP for registration email verification.

This ties directly into Relay's optional self-registration flow.

Relay can automatically shorten long links pasted into the compose box before a message is sent:

  • Enable or disable automatic short-link creation.
  • Set the minimum pasted URL length that triggers shortening.
  • Configure short-link expiration in hours, including 0 for no expiration.
  • Choose the short-link path prefix, such as /s/.
  • Optionally set a dedicated base URL for generated short links.

Admins can turn the embedded link shortener on or off server-wide. When it is enabled, users manage their own created links in the Short Links tab. The feature mirrors Relay's existing upload-management pattern, but stores redirect data server-side so short links can resolve without needing the creating user to be known at redirect time.

Single Sign-On (OIDC)

Relay can also integrate with an OpenID Connect identity provider for single sign-on:

  • Enable single sign-on on the sign-in page.
  • Set the OIDC issuer URL.
  • Configure the client ID used for Relay.
  • Set or replace the client secret.
  • Define the requested scopes, such as openid profile email.
  • Choose the username claim path Relay should read from the provider response.

Users must already have a matching Relay account for sign-in to succeed. A provider-specific username claim such as relay_username is recommended so Relay can map the identity cleanly.

When configuring the provider, use Relay's OIDC callback URL from the admin screen as the redirect URI.

Voice/video calls (Jitsi)

Admins can configure the built-in Jitsi integration:

  • Enable or disable Jitsi Meet voice/video calling.
  • Set the Jitsi server URL used by the instance.

GIF Picker (KLIPY)

Admins can configure the KLIPY GIF experience:

  • Enable or disable the GIF picker in chat input.
  • Set or replace the KLIPY API key.

The API key remains server-side and is not exposed directly to clients.

User management and maintenance

The admin panel also includes operational controls:

  • Restart the Relay server from the web UI.
  • View users.
  • Grant or remove admin access.
  • Enable or disable per-user logging.
  • Reset passwords.
  • Add new users directly from the admin panel.