Subsplash Groups makes it easy to cultivate a thriving, connected church community right inside your custom mobile app. By utilizing a group’s settings, you can effortlessly highlight your active groups while ensuring people land in the right spaces. This guide will walk you through managing these settings on both your Dashboard and mobile app to optimize your ministry's group experience.
Finding Your Group Settings
To access these settings, log in to your Subsplash Dashboard. Navigate to Groups > All groups, and click on the group of your choice. Simply select Settings to view your visibility, enrollment, and member limit options. Group managers can also manage visibility and enrollment settings directly inside the mobile app!
These visibility and enrollment settings require your app to be updated to version 5.20 or later. If your group managers or members are unable to find the groups they are looking for, encourage them to check the App Store or Google Play Store for an update.
Visibility & Enrollment Options
Your visibility and enrollment settings determine exactly how your community discovers your groups and who is permitted to join them. By combining these two features, you can easily control your group's privacy level while automating or managing the intake process for new members.
Visibility options
Public: Anyone can find and learn more about this group in the Group Finder.
Private: People can only find this group if invited by a manager or an existing member.
Enrollment options
Open: Anyone can join this group freely.
Closed: Only group managers can invite new people.
Request to join: People must request to join this group.
For join requests, group managers will receive an email and an in-app notification whenever a new request comes in. They can respond quickly by navigating to Messaging on either the web or the mobile app.
Group Member Limits
Setting a maximum number of members ensures your groups don't exceed their intended size, giving your community clear insight into group availability. When a group reaches its limit, it automatically displays a badge to users and pauses new entries until a spot opens up.
Setting a member limit on the Dashboard
Navigate Groups > All groups in your Subsplash Dashboard.
Find and open the group you want to manage.
Select Settings within that group.
Toggle on Member limit to reveal the maximum members field.
Enter your desired limit and click Save.
Anyone invited to a group counts toward your member limit immediately to prevent over-enrollment. If you set a limit lower than your current member count, the group will automatically enter a Full state without removing any of your current members.
Best Practices
Set limits before promoting a group. If you're launching a small group with limited space, set the member limit before sharing the Group Finder link. This prevents over-enrollment from the start.
Use Member limit for cohort-style groups. Small groups, discipleship cohorts, or volunteer teams with a fixed roster benefit most from this feature.
Communicate capacity in your group description. Even with a Full badge, giving members context in the group description (e.g., "This group meets weekly with a max of 12 people") helps them understand why they can't join and sets expectations.
Monitor status from the Groups dashboard. The All Groups view shows group status badges on each group tile, so you can quickly see which groups are open, full, or closed without clicking into each one.
Understanding Group Statuses & Member Experience
Every group displays one of three statuses in the Group Finder and on your Groups dashboard:
Open: The group has no member limit, or the limit has not yet been reached. Members can join based on your enrollment settings.
Full: The group has reached its set member limit. New members cannot join until a spot opens up. The group remains visible so members know it exists, ensuring they stay informed about your ministry's current communities.
Closed: The group is manually set to closed enrollment, meaning only managers can invite new members.
Filtering groups by status
By default, full and closed groups are automatically hidden from the Group Finder in the app to keep current openings front and center for your members. To show all groups, simply check Include Full/Closed Groups in the filter panel. This setting applies to both your standard mobile Group Finder and your website's embedded Group Finder.
FAQs
Who can set a member limit?
Who can set a member limit?
Dashboard admins and group managers can set or remove member limits directly from Group Settings.
Do pending invitees count toward the limit?
Do pending invitees count toward the limit?
Yes! Anyone invited to a group counts toward the member limit immediately to ensure your group capacity stays accurate and doesn't accidentally overfill.
What happens if I set a limit lower than my current member count?
What happens if I set a limit lower than my current member count?
The group will immediately display a Full badge. No existing members are removed. The limit simply pauses new entries until the member count naturally drops below your set limit.
Can members join a waitlist for a full group?
Can members join a waitlist for a full group?
Not at this time. Members can see that a group is full but cannot add themselves to a waitlist.