Discord Chat Bridges

A chat bridge relays messages in both directions between a Minecraft server and a Discord channel, and often posts join, leave, death and advancement events too. For communities that spend more time on Discord than in game it keeps the two connected.

The choice is mostly about platform. DiscordSRV is a plugin for Paper and Spigot-family servers and covers chat, console access and account linking. Discord Integration is a mod and plugin that supports Fabric, Forge and NeoForge as well as Paper and Spigot. Discord-MC-Chat is a Fabric and Quilt bridge. Pick the one that supports the software your server runs.

Setup follows the same pattern for all of them: create a bot in Discord's developer portal, invite it to your server with only the permissions it needs, copy its token into the bridge's configuration and map a channel. Keep the token private and rotate it if it ever leaks.

Decide what crosses the bridge. Relaying everything, including commands, can surface private information, and a bridge lets Discord users send text into your game, so apply the same moderation to both sides.

Is a chat bridge a Discord bot? It uses a Discord bot account. Some bridges are plugins that run the bot inside your Minecraft server, so you do not host a separate program.

What permissions does the bot need? Only those for the channels it uses: read and send messages, and perhaps manage webhooks. Avoid giving it administrator.