Forum boards elevate and organize the Forum by grouping posts by topic, timeframe, member type, etc. Boards encourage community growth in niche interest areas and provide a solution for easier navigation and access to space-restricted Forum discussions and engagement.

You control the access and visibility of boards and posts in the main community Forum from the Forum tab in your main admin dashboard.

Each post must be assigned to a board, and boards (and all posts within) can be accessible to visitors, only signed-in members, or only to selected spaces.

Boards are displayed at the top of the Forum and members can read posts in each Board by selecting the board cover, or the board tag on the post.

Members can follow a community forum board directly from the board page by selecting Follow. Followed boards appear in the member’s personalized Following view in the Forum and in the Following Boards tab on the Watching & Following page.

To stop following a board, select Unfollow from the board page.

Club forum boards do not include a separate follow action. Joining the club is what adds that club’s forum posts to the member’s Following view.

Learn more in Following Content in the Forum.

You can set the access and visibility settings in the forum board dashboard. This controls who can see the board and all posts within.

Boards that are marked Public are visible to visitors to the community and all members who are signed in.

Boards that are gated (either by skippable gate or enforced gate) are visible to visitors to the community and all members who are signed in. Visitors cannot engage with the posts within that gated boards (upvote or like, comment, or read all comments) unless they sign in.

Boards that are restricted to 'All Members' are only visible to members who are signed in and not to visitors.

Individual posts cannot be restricted to spaces, but boards can be. If a board is restricted to a space, only those members in the space can see the Board cover and any posts within that Board. In-club forum boards can also be assigned to spaces.

Boards can be restricted so only Forum Moderators can post to that board. This limits who can post to that board, but any member can comment on the posts within.

Restrict posts to moderators only in the Forum Board Dashboard Settings:

Each board can allow for discussion posts, question posts, support posts, and idea posts. To configure what type of posts are allowed in the board, you will navigate to the board detail page in the dashboard, and in Post Types, select the types you want to allow members to use.

Members posting on the Forum select which board their post is assigned to at the base of their post creation. Only boards that they have access to and that are active will appear as selection options, and they cannot create new boards.

The board topics are displayed at the top of the board’s main page, and act as a sub-board within the forum board. They are important as they are what prompt topic based conversation, and better organize your club forum board.

Learn more about Board topics here.

Forum moderators and club collaborators can moderate posts on the front end in forum, but you can now add up to 10 additional board moderators to moderate singular boards. Those added as board moderators can take action to pin, feature, and delete posts made by members just within the board they're assigned.

Add board moderators by selecting 'Edit' and searching for the member from the complete community member list. Select 'Add' to complete the action.

Those added as board moderators can take action from the front end, in the list of posts:

Or, they can take action from the front end, in the post itself:

You can also choose to toggle on/off if posts and comments need to be approved before they show in the community.
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Forum moderators and admins can now move or change the board assignment by the author from the post or in the dashboard.

From the post list page, or within the post, Forum moderators will select the three-dot menu icon in the upper right and select 'Change board'.

From the Posts & Comments menu item, admins will select the box in line with the post or posts, and select the 'Change board' button at the top of the list

Community forum boards can be archived from the Board page in the dashboard. If a board has posts, those posts must first be removed from the board before the board can be archived.

When posts are removed from a board, they are archived in the dashboard rather than permanently deleted. Once all posts have been removed from a community board, admins can archive the board after confirmation. Archived boards are removed from board lists and are no longer available in Gradual.

If you'd like the board to be temporarily hidden but still kept active, hide it from the dashboard. If you'd like to remove an inactive community board from use while retaining its underlying dashboard records, archive the board instead.

Only community boards can be archived directly from the board list. Club boards are archived along with their clubs.

Dashboard Admins can add and customize the Forum Boards in the dashboard to match branding and language, and set their access levels and visibility.

Learn more about Forum Settings and Data here.