Campfire
- Campfire Features
- Reply to Chats
- Delete and Edit a Campfire Post
- Add Sounds to Campfire or Ping
- Add Code to Campfire or Ping
- Campfire Notifications
Sometimes posting a message isn't necessary, and you want to chat in real time. Campfire is the place to be!
Every project has its own Campfire room. To enter a Campfire, open the project and click the Campfire tool:
Scroll up in a chat window to view what you missed. When you want to add a comment, type your text at the bottom of the window and hit Enter:
Campfire Features
Click the A icon in chat to reveal a formatting toolbar you can use to add some spice, clarity, and emphasis to your message:
- Bold
- Italic
- Strikethrough
- Colors
- Headings
- Hyperlinks
- Quote block
- Code block
- Bulleted & numbered lists
Right alongside it, there's a quick emoji picker! 🚀 To use the full emoji picker, try control + command + space bar on a Mac. On Windows 10, use the Windows key + ; to pull up all the options. Older versions of Windows will work too:
You can also drag and drop saved images, use the attachment option to instantly post what you attach, or you can paste image URLs into a chat line — perfect for all the essential cat GIFs you need to share with the team.
To grab someone’s attention in Campfire, you can @mention them by typing the @
symbol followed by their name. They’ll receive a notification for the mention:
To see all the files posted in a Campfire, look for the ••• menu in the upper right corner of that Campfire:
You'll then be able to browse everything uploaded to that particular Campfire!
Reply to Chats
If you want to reply to someone's campfire, you can the click the ••• next to their chat and select the ↩ Reply option to reply directly to that message:
You can use all Campfire features in your replies, including formatting and images.
Delete and Edit a Campfire Post
If you need to delete or edit a message you posted, click the "•••" button next to your post.
Select "Delete" to remove what you've posted or select "Edit" to change what you've written:
Account owners and admins can also select how long Basecamp keeps everyone's Ping chat history in Adminland.
Add Sounds to Campfire or Pings
Campfire supports sounds! All the sound commands begin with /play
. Here's an example of /play greatjob
All Campfire sounds are listed out here at the bottom of the page, along with a preview of each sound. They work in Pings as well!
It's a fun way to comment on situation, support your peers, greet them, or bid them adieu. Here's a round of /play honk
to send Merissa off into the weekend:
Add Code to a Campfire or Ping
Click the A icon to bring up the code option that looks like < > then paste whatever code you'd like to share with folks:
Alternatively, you could also add code in a chat by writing your message in this format: /code log | <content>

Campfire Notifications
Click the Campfire tool and you'll see right away if you're set up to be notified. Click the 🔔 to turn off notifications or toggle them back on:
You can expect to be notified within Basecamp when someone starts chatting in a Campfire that you're getting notifications for. However, you won't receive a notification for every single new line item in the chat.
Say 5 people started chatting while you were on lunch. When you come back to Basecamp, you'll see just one notification:
Push Notifications
If you have push notifications enabled, you'll only receive push notifications if:
- You are @mentioned
- There is a new message after chat has been idle for 6+ hours
You can read more on our philosophy around chat notifications in our piece on Group Chat, Group Stress.
No Notifications
What if you don't need campfire notifications or maybe, any notifications from this project? Change your participation type to "Just following"!
Remove the Campfire tool
You can hide a tool from a Project if it's not needed. See if a clear space really does organize the mind!
Here's how: Changing Tools
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