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  2. Using Slack
  3. Message features & tools
    4. Get your work done from the Activity view

Get your work done from the Activity view

Activity is the best place to view everything that you need to pay attention to in Slack. From   Activity, you can quickly reply to messages without bouncing between all of the channels, direct messages (DMs) and canvases where you’re working.

Slack desktop app showing new Activity view with main feed, creation of a custom view and sorting to Dense view from the default

Note: A new version of Activity is being rolled out gradually. If this guide doesn’t reflect your experience, take a look at the legacy Activity article instead.


Activity overview

  • When you open Activity, you’ll see a feed of all your recent messages and notifications.
  • Switch between dense view to scan lots of messages at once or detailed view for extra context.
  • Choose a filter to view only certain notifications (such as mentions, DMs and reminders) and create your own saved views to customise your feed. 
  • Mark notifications as read so it’s easy to see what you’ve already looked at, or clear them to keep things tidy.
     

Switch between detailed and dense layouts

There are two views available to you when working from Activity in Slack on desktop – detailed and dense. Detailed layout gives you more context for each notification in the feed, while Dense offers a more traditional inbox-style layout where you can see more entries at once. 

  1. From your desktop, click   Activity in the sidebar.
  2. Select   View as detailed or   View as dense in the top right-hand corner.


Filter Activity

Each type of notification that appears in Activity has its own filter so you can view only certain items. From the All view on desktop, click   Filters to see a complete list:

Work from Activity

Reply to messages and threads

Reply to any message or thread from Activity. Messages that you reply to will automatically be marked as read, or you can clear the notification from your feed. 

Desktop

Mobile

  1. Click   Activity in the sidebar. 
  2. Select a message to reply, or hover over a message and click the
       three dots icon to view additional options such as opening it in a channel or DM, setting a reminder or turning off thread reply notifications.
  1. Tap   Activity at the bottom of the screen. 
  2. Tap a message to reply, or long press a message to view additional options, such as setting a reminder or turning off thread reply notifications.


Clear notifications

To keep Activity organised, you can clear any notifications that you no longer need in your feed. 

Desktop

Mobile

  1. Click   Activity in the sidebar.
  2. Hover over a message, then click   Clear notification.  
  3. To clear in bulk, tick the box next to multiple notifications and select   Clear selected notifications.  
  1. Tap   Activity at the bottom of the screen. 
  2. Swipe left on a message to clear it.

Tip: On desktop, tick the box at the top of your feed to select and clear or mark all notifications as read.


Create and manage custom views

Saved views let you personalise how Activity is organised by preserving custom combinations of filters that you can access from tabs at the top of your feed at any time. While you can only create saved views on desktop, you can also access them on mobile.

Create a custom view

  1. From your desktop, click   Activity in the sidebar.
  2. Click the   plus icon at the top of the screen and select Create a custom view.
  3. Enter a title for your view.
  4. Choose between detailed or dense layout.
  5. Click the toggle to only show unread messages in your view, then tick the box next to the notifications that you’d like to include.
  6. You can then optionally select specific channels or sections from the drop-down menu. 
  7. Click on Save.


Edit a custom view

  1. From your desktop, click   Activity in the sidebar.
  2. Click the   plus icon at the top of the screen and select Edit views.
  3. Select the view that you want to edit, and tick or untick the boxes for your preferred filters.
  4. Click on Save.


Delete a custom view

  1. From your desktop, click Activity in the sidebar.
  2. Right-click on a custom view and select Delete view. 
  3. Click Delete.

Tip: Drag and drop tabs at the top of Activity to re-order them.

Who can use this feature?

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