Auto-moderation keeps your server clean without a human watching chat 24/7. This guide shows the most useful moderation rules you can copy, and how to run them automatically on your own Discord bot — no code, in about five minutes.
What auto-moderation can catch
A moderation rule is always the same shape: a trigger (a new message arrives), a condition (does it break a rule?), and an action (delete it, warn the user, time them out). Here are the rules most servers want:
- Banned words — profanity, slurs, or server-specific terms you don't allow.
- Invite links — messages containing
discord.gg/(a classic ad-spam and poaching vector). - External links — block all links, or allow only a whitelist of trusted domains.
- Spam & flooding — the same message repeated, or many messages in a few seconds.
- Mass mentions — messages that
@everyone,@here, or ping many users at once (raid behaviour). - ALL CAPS / wall-of-text — messages that are mostly uppercase or extremely long.
- New-account posting — a brand-new member dropping a link in their first message.
Common rules to copy
Start with these three — they cover the majority of real abuse:
- Invite-link filter — delete any message where the content contains
discord.gg/ordiscord.com/invite/, then DM the user:Please don't post server invites here. - Bad-word filter — keep a private list (e.g.
word1, word2, word3); if the message contains any of them, delete it and add a warning. Repeat offenders get a timeout. - Mention-spam guard — if a message pings more than 5 users (or uses
@everyonefrom a non-moderator), delete it and time the sender out for 10 minutes.
Escalation ladder that works well: 1st offence → delete + warn, 2nd → 10-minute timeout, 3rd → kick or ban. You can build each rung as its own branch.
Locking the server down during a raid
Per-message rules handle the steady state. A raid is different: dozens of fresh accounts arriving at once, faster than any per-message rule can escalate. Two server-wide levers help, and both are one action each:
- Discord — Update Server with Verification level set to High stops accounts that only just joined from posting at all. Pair it with a second workflow (or a Wait node) that sets the level back afterwards, so you don't leave the server locked for weeks.
- Discord — Set Channel Permission, denying Send Messages for
@everyoneon your busiest channel, closes just that room instead of the whole server.
A common shape: a Member Join trigger counts joins with a Scores node, and if more than N arrive inside a minute, it raises the verification level and posts a heads-up in your mod channel.
Logging what your moderators do
Rules catch members. A mod log catches everything else — and Discord only records who performed an administrative action in the audit log, so that's where the answer lives.
The Discord — Audit Log Entry trigger fires whenever something is written there, giving you the action (member_kick, channel_delete, role_update…), who did it, the target and the reason. Two filters keep it useful: Action Filter narrows it to the actions you care about (leaving it empty fires on everything, which is noisy on a busy server), and Only when done by watches specific people.
Wire it into a Send Embed in a private #mod-log channel and you have a permanent, searchable record. Your bot needs the View Audit Log permission — without it Discord never sends the event at all.
Set it up with Noria (no code)
This is the real moderation workflow as it appears in the editor — click a step to inspect its example configuration:
You don't need to rent a generic bot — connect your own and let it enforce your rules:
- Connect your Discord bot to Noria (paste your bot token — it stays encrypted). Give it Manage Messages and Moderate Members permissions.
- Open the editor and add a Discord — Message trigger.
- Add a Condition that checks the message content against your rule — for example, "contains
discord.gg/". - On the match branch, add a Delete Message action, then an optional Send Message (a DM or channel warning) and a Timeout Member action.
- Click Activate. Every new message is now checked automatically.
The fastest start is the Discord Auto-Moderation template — it opens pre-wired so you only edit the word list and the channel.
Make it your own
- Whitelist your mods — add a condition that skips the rule if the author has a moderator role, so staff aren't caught by their own filters.
- Log every action — send a copy of each deletion to a private
#mod-logchannel with the user, the message, and the rule that fired. - Combine rules — an invite-link filter and a mention-spam guard can run as separate workflows on the same bot; they don't conflict.
- Tune the escalation — read the triggers and actions guide to add timeouts and role changes to the ladder.
That's a self-cleaning server — running on your own bot, with rules only you control.