How to moderate a stream chat on Twitch

As you continue to stream more regularly, picking up frequent viewers, you may find that you will need to provide more moderation to the chat. As the broadcaster, you have the power to control everything that comes through your channel via the chat box so that any viewer that you consider disruptive or unwelcome can be removed.

However, you may not always be in a position to moderate your own chat and will need to assign moderators to help you with it. Alternatively, if you are a regular in another streamer’s chat and are trusted by them, they could ask you to be a moderator for their chat. In either case, you will need to be vigilant to look out for any trouble that could be brewing in the chat.

Related: The most useful Twitch mod commands

Moderating your stream

As the broadcaster, you make the rules that your viewers must follow in the chat. Using the Moderator settings in your Twitch Dashboard, you can announce the rules of your chat for any new visitors to your stream before they can type a message, while the About section under your profile information can also include this.

You can interact with users in your chatbox on your streaming software for direct moderation. If you want to interact with someone from your streaming software, you can right-click on their username and choose to ban them or delete a message from them, as well as time them out.

If you feel that you need extra help, look to assign a moderator to your channel. When choosing someone to make a moderator, picking a person who you can trust to do the role, such as a long-time viewer in your channel or someone that you know personally, will ensure that you can leave any extra moderation to someone reliable. Check with the person to make sure that they’re happy to perform the tasks for you during your streams.

It’s also important to communicate your expectations of a moderator when you reach out to someone to do the job. If you expect to be very hands-on with your viewers in your stream, they may not be required for the stream at all times. However, if you know that your attention will be drawn elsewhere for long periods of time, you need to tell your moderators to stay attentive as often as possible.  

Moderating another broadcaster’s stream

As a moderator for another streamer, you first need to ensure that you are familiar with all of the rules of the channel. These are going to dictate how carefully you govern the channel for the host, ensuring that any viewer that is talking in the chat is staying within the rules. Request a command list, as this will help you with moderation.

It’s good practice to check certain elements of the moderation with the streamer, such as how strictly they would like the rules to be enforced and how long they would like bans or timeouts to be for offenders. All of these can be enforced in the mod view, found by clicking on the green sword icon at the bottom of the chatbox whilst in their stream.

While the streamer plays a game and is unable to focus on their chat, they may leave other responsibilities with their moderators to ensure that it runs smoothly. This can include creating polls for the people in a chat to vote on, changing details of the stream such as the title or game category currently being played, or setting up a raid using the command. 

Moderators can also enable and disable channel point rewards if required and can use commands to provide a shout-out to another streamer, such as after they have raided the streamer’s channel if they have a custom command set up for it.

It is best that you check with the streamer for exactly what duties they would like for you to perform. These will vary depending on the audience of the streamer. Someone with a small audience may be able to review their chat themselves and you would only be needed occasionally or to offer moderator presence to deter bad behavior. Partners with a large audience may include a team of mods that need to be aware of each other’s roles.