Community Types serve two important purposes:

They categorize similar communities together, helping to keep them organized.
When creating a community, a Community Type must be selected. You can think of a Community Type as a template that quickly applies configuration settings and access permissions during community creation.

NOTE: Community Types simply apply default settings and permissions during community creation. Community Admins and Super Admins can edit individual communities belonging to a Community Type at any time to update these settings or permissions as needed. This gives these admins the ability to update their communities to coincide with its needs as time goes on.

Also, editing a Community Type does not retroactively update the settings and permissions of all communities belonging to it; it only applies these settings and permissions at the time of creation.

To manage your Community Types:

In the Admin Toolbar, click Admin.

Navigate to Community > Communities > Types.

TIP: On list pages, click a column header to sort on that column. Click the columns count below the list to add and remove columns in the current view.

Create a Community Type

Click the plus sign to the right of the page title.

In the resulting dialog, configure what will be the default settings for ALL communities belonging to this Community Type (refer to the table below for descriptions of each option).
When finished, click Save at the bottom of the dialog to create the Community Type and add it to the list.

Available options

Field	Description
Description
Name	Give the Community Type a name that aligns with the types of communities that will belong to it.
Description	Provide a description appropriate for the communities that will belong to this Type. This description doesn't display anywhere in a community; it's only for administrative purposes.
Integrated OR Higher Logic-managed	This option is automatically set per your site configuration (i.e., it's integrated or not). See Understanding How Communities Are Managed to learn more. NOTE: If you don't have an integration, this is automatically set to Higher Logic-managed.
Text to Show When Creating a New Community of this Type	Enter the text you want displayed when creating a new community of this Type. This gives you an opportunity to explain the types of communities that should be created of this Type. This text doesn't display anywhere in a community; it's only for administrative purposes.
Features
Website	Controls whether associated communities can have their own independent Microsite. If enabled: From the menu, select which site to model community Microsites after. The ability to create a Microsite is added to the Community Features list when creating and editing communities of this Type. Newly created community Microsites will use a copy of the specified model site. NOTE: Refer to the Create a Community Microsite page to learn more about Microsites, including how to establish models and create Microsites.
Discussion	Controls whether communities of this Type can have a discussion. If enabled, the ability to create a discussions added to the Community Features list when creating and editing communities of this Type. NOTE: Enabling this option doesn't mean these communities will have a discussion, just that the option to have one is available. You can enable a discussion during community creation or when editing an existing community's settings.
Workspace	Controls whether communities of this Type can have a Workspace. This option is only available if your organization licenses the option Workspace module. If enabled, the ability to create a Workspace is added to the Community Features list when creating and editing communities of this Type. NOTE: Enabling this option doesn't mean these communities will have a Workspace, just that the option to have one is available. You can enable a Workspace during community creation or when editing an existing community's settings.
Library	Controls whether communities of this Type can have a resource library. If enabled, the ability to create a resource library is added to the Community Features list when creating and editing communities of this Type. NOTE: Enabling this option doesn't mean these communities will have a Resource Library, just that the option to have one is available. You can enable a resource library during community creation or when editing an existing community's settings.
Calendar	Controls whether an event calendar can be created for communities of this Type. NOTE: Enabling this option doesn't mean these communities will have an event calendar, just that the option to have one is available. You can enable an event calendar during community creation or when editing an existing community's settings.
Members can create Events	Controls whether members of communities belonging to this Type can create events. If enabled, Community Admins and Super Admin can decide whether (a) only admins or (b) admins AND community members can create events when creating and editing communities of this Type.
Community admin can download the community member roster	This setting determines if a Community Admin can view and run community reports. They can access these reports via the Settings menu > Administration: Reports. (The Settings menu is located to the right of the community's title at the top of the Home page).
Support Tickets can be created from this community	NOTE: This option must be enabled by Higher Logic; it is only available to clients who have a Zendesk Support instance. If enabled, a Create a Support Ticket from this Thread button is added to discussion threads across your site; this enables Super Admins from your organization to quickly generate support tickets directly from threads in your Higher Logic community to your Zendesk Support instance.
Emails
Enable Community Admins to send emails to members	Controls whether Community Admins of these communities can send emails to their members. If enabled, Community Admins can send emails by selecting Email Community Members from the Settings menu on their community's Home page (the Settings menu is located to the right of the community's title at the top of the Home page). NOTE: The remaining options are only available if this one is enabled.
Limit the number of emails sent to members	If enabled, two new fields appear where you can define the maximum number of emails Community Admins can send per month for their community. The maximum will be multiplied by the number of members to determine the maximum number of emails per month. For example, 10 community members × 5 = 50 emails per month per community. NOTE: This feature is only available if your organization licenses Group Manager.
Enable sending meeting invitations	Controls whether meeting invitations can be included in emails sent from these communities. NOTE: This feature is only available if your organization licenses Group Manager.
Enable sending attachments	Controls whether file attachments can be included in emails sent from these communities. NOTE: This feature is only available if your organization licenses Group Manager.
Community Representative Role	On the Community Dashboard, you can click the Rank Block widget to view the Leaderboard page. From there, you'll notice that each community has a "representative" that helps put a "face to a community" – in hopes of sparking a sense of friendly competition among communities. Use this option to can determine which Community Role should be considered the "representative" for each Community Type.
Display Options
Show in Community List	Controls whether communities of this Type are included on: your site's list of available communities (for users who have the appropriate View permissions); users' profiles list of communities (My Connections > Communities); and any widgets. NOTE: This option is also available as Show communities of this type in the Communities List in the Preview Panel when you select a Community Type.
Represent Meetings/Events	Communities that have Discussions and Libraries for events (conferences, annual meetings, etc.).
List membership as an Activity on Profile Page	* This option is no longer used and is likely to be deprecated in a future release *
Home Page Code (advanced)	Providing a Home Page Code for this Community Type means the communities belonging to it will direct to this page code. This enables communities belonging to specific Community Types to have a custom Home page. EXAMPLE: Let's say your Committees want a different community home page layout and set of widgets than your Chapter communities. If so, you can create two unique Home pages and assign their Page Codes in this field for the Committee and Chapter Community Types.
Dashboard Page Code (advanced)	The Dashboard Page Code determines the page in the CMS that should be used for this Community Type’s Group Manager Dashboard.
Permissions
Users can join	Controls whether users can join communities of this Type. NOTE: Only users meeting the View and Join permissions for a community will be able to join. If they do, a Join button will be available on your site's community listing pages.
Users can leave	Controls whether users can leave communities of this Type. If enabled, members of these communities can leave by selecting Leave Community from the Settings menu on the community's Home page (the Settings menu is located to the right of the community's title at the top of the Home page).
Members can invite others to join	Controls whether member invitations can be enabled when creating and editing communities of this Type. If enabled, the Member invitations option will be available when creating and editing communities of this Type; Community Admins and Super Admins can enable this to allow members of these communities to invite others to join. They can do so by selecting Invite Others to Join from the Settings menu on the community's Home page (the Settings menu is located to the right of the community's title at the top of the Home page).
Members can create new communities of this type	Controls whether users with Member access to your site can create communities of this Type (i.e., any users belonging to a Security Group with Member rights). If enabled, the Create a New Community button is available on the All Communities page (allcommunities page code).
Allow Community Admins to add members without invitation	If enabled, Community Admins can invite others to join the community AND add them immediately, bypassing the invitation process altogether. Enable this for communities where you want to give more control to their admins over member management.
Group admins can create subgroups of this type	This applies to Nested Communities. This determines whether Community Admins can create new sub-communities for this Community Type.
Members can work collaboratively on library Entries	If enabled, version control is enabled, by default, for communities belonging to this Type but Community Admins can turn this feature ON/OFF at the community level. Version control allows members to collaborate on Library Entries. If disabled, version control is not enabled and Community Admins cannot enable it at the community level. NOTE: See How to Enable Version Control to learn more.
Default View Permission for New Communities	Select the View permission you want to be the default for communities of this Type. Options are: Invitation Only - Users can only view these communities by invitation from an admin (or other member if community members are allowed to invite). Members Only - Only users belonging to Security Groups with Member rights can view these communities. Those with Member permissions can also view communities set to Authenticated. Authenticated - Any logged in user can view these communities. An authenticated user may or may not have Member status. Public - Both users with a login AND without a login to your site can view these communities. Members of Immediate Parent Community - (This option only applies to nested communities) Only members of the parent community can view these communities.
Default Join Permission for New Communities	Select the View permission you want to be the default for communities of this Type. Options are: Invitation Only - Users can only join these communities by invitation from an admin (or other member if community members are allowed to invite). Members Only - Only users belonging to Security Groups with Member rights can join these communities. Those with Member permissions can also join communities set to Authenticated. Authenticated - Any logged in user can join these communities. An authenticated user may or may not have Member status. Members of Immediate Parent Community - (This option only applies to nested communities) Only members of the parent community can join these communities. Request to Join - To join this type of community, users must manually submit a request. A Community Admin or Super Admin can then either approve or reject these requests. Requests are managed per community, and placed in a queue for easy management. See Request to Join Communities to learn more.
Add Roles	Allows Super Admins to indicate which Higher Logic-managed community roles can be applied to users belonging to communities of this Type. For example, you could include the Chapter President role for your Chapter Community Types but not your Special Interest Groups.

Manage your Community Types

The default Community Types are listed on the page, along with any that have been created.

Edit Community Type

Select a Community Type and click Edit to manage its settings.

NOTE: Refer to the Available options table above for descriptions of each setting.

Delete Community Type

If you want to remove a Community Type, select it and click Delete.

NOTE: You cannot delete a Community Type if there are any communities associated with it. The Delete button is disabled for these Community Types.

Search and filter Community Types

Here at the top right, you can use the search and filter features to quickly find Community Types:

Click the magnifying glass icon to expand a search field, allowing you to find specific Community Types by their name. The list will automatically update with each typed character and display all records (visible and hidden) that contain a match. Click the X to clear the search field to restore the original list.
Click the filter icon to filter Community Types by their Auto-subscription type (Real Time, Daily Digest, Topic Community Digest, and Topic Community Hybrid. If the filter icon is solid orange (i.e., filled in), the list is refined by an active filter. Click the filter icon and click Clear Filter to restore the original list.

Next steps...

Now that you have created Community Types, you can create communities and base them on your Community Types.

See Create and Manage Your Communities

You can also create hidden Community Types which you can use to hide and archive communities.

To learn how, see Hiding and Archiving Communities