Spaces help you organize your community by grouping posts into different topics, making it easier for members to find and follow conversations they’re most interested in.
By creating spaces, you can structure your community around specific themes, discussions, or types of content, giving members a more organized experience.
You can also control access to each space by granting entry based on specific products, events, plans, or individual member access.
Introduction
Spaces are where your posts, discussions, and updates live, helping you organize content inside your account.
Members can have access to one or multiple spaces, depending on how you structure things. Inside those spaces, they can create posts, comment, reply, and interact with other members.
You can organize spaces in whatever way makes the most sense for your business — whether that’s by membership tier, content type, products, programs, or anything else you'd like.
Creating a new space
Here's how to add a new space:
From your home feed, click on your site name and select Admin from the dropdown menu.
From the Admin dashboard, click Spaces in the sidebar menu.
Click "+ New space" to create a new space.
Enter your space Details, such as Name, Icon, description, and an image.
Set your space availability settings. These settings determine:
Set your space option settings.
When you're done, hit Create at the top right corner.
Space settings
Let's take a closer look at each one of the available space settings.
Availability
Define your space availability options, defining who can access and follow your space.
Access
Choose whether the space is available to all members or only to specific members.
If you select Only specific members, choose which members should have access to the space. You can grant access based on specific products, events, or plans, and you can also manually add individual existing members if needed.
Following
Choose whether members automatically follow the space and whether they’re allowed to unfollow it later.
Members automatically follow this space: Turn this on to have new members automatically follow the space you’ve created. This means they’ll automatically receive notifications and see updates from this space in their home feed.
Members can unfollow the space at any time if they no longer want to receive updates.
Members cannot unfollow this space: This option is available when “Members automatically follow this space” is turned on. Enabling it prevents members from unfollowing the space.
This is useful for important spaces you want everyone to stay subscribed to, such as an Announcements space.
Options
Post layout
Choose how posts are displayed in the space. You can use either a Social feed layout or a more compact List layout.
Here's the difference between social feed and compact list layouts:
Compact list
Social feed
New posts
Use this option to control and prevent members from posting in the space.
Choose whether all members with access to the space can create new posts or if only you can post.
Notifications
Choose whether members who follow the space should receive notifications for new posts by default.
Changing this setting updates the default notification preference for all current followers of the space. Members can still change their own notification preferences at any time.
FAQs
Can I create private spaces?
Can I create private spaces?
Yes. You can create private spaces so only those with access can view.
To make a space private, select the "Only specific members" option from the Access dropdown menu.
Once this option is selected, choose which members should have access to the space. You can grant access based on specific products, events, or plans, and you can also manually add individual existing members if needed.
I’m seeing way more people following my spaces than expected... HELP!
I’m seeing way more people following my spaces than expected... HELP!
With the new Podia, community access works a bit differently, which is why you’re seeing more members in your spaces.
Community is now built in by default, so anyone who creates an account on your site gets free access to your community. This means that, by default, they can view any spaces that are set as open.
If you previously had open topics, these have been migrated as open spaces.
After the migration, everyone is considered a member, so anyone — including those with free access — will be able to view any spaces that are set as open.
How to restrict access
To restrict who can access a space, simply turn these open spaces into private ones and control who has access (for example, only people on paid plans).
To control access to a space:
From the Spaces page, click Edit next to the space you'd like to edit
Select the "Only specific members" option from the Access dropdown menu
Choose which plans, products, events or members should have access
Once set, only the selected people will be able to view and follow the space, and anyone who previously had access will be removed.
