Basics

First step is to include the Composer autoload file and import any required classes.

<?php

use Discord\Discord;
use Discord\WebSockets\Intents;
use Discord\WebSockets\Event;

include __DIR__.'/vendor/autoload.php';

The Discord instance can be set up with an array of options. All are optional except for token:

$discord = new Discord([

token is your Discord token. Required.

    'token' => 'Your-Token-Here',

intents can be an array of valid intents or an integer representing the intents. Default is all intents minus any privileged intents. At the moment this means all intents minus GUILD_MEMBERS, GUILD_PRESENCES, and MESSAGE_CONTENT. To enable these intents you must first enable them in your Discord developer portal.

    'intents' => [
        Intents::GUILDS, Intents::GUILD_BANS, // ...
    ],
    // or
    'intents' => 12345,
    // or
    'intents' => Intents::getDefaultIntents() | Intents::GUILD_MEMBERS, // default intents as well as guild members

loadAllMembers is a boolean whether all members should be fetched and stored on bot start. Loading members takes a while to retrieve from Discord and store, so default is false. This requires the GUILD_MEMBERS intent to be enabled in DiscordPHP. See above for more details.

    'loadAllMembers' => false,

storeMessages is a boolean whether messages received and sent should be stored. Default is false.

    'storeMessages' => false,

retrieveBans is a boolean whether bans should be retrieved on bot load. Default is false.

    'retrieveBans' => false,

disabledEvents is an array of events that will be disabled. By default all events are enabled.

    'disabledEvents' => [
        Event::MESSAGE_CREATE, Event::MESSAGE_DELETE, // ...
    ],

loop is an instance of a ReactPHP event loop that can be provided to the client rather than creating a new loop. Useful if you want to use other React components. By default, a new loop is created.

    'loop' => \React\EventLoop\Factory::create(),

logger is an instance of a logger that implements LoggerInterface. By default, a new Monolog logger with log level DEBUG is created to print to stdout.

    'logger' => new \Monolog\Logger('New logger'),

dnsConfig is an instace of Config or a string of name server address. By default system setting is used and fall back to 8.8.8.8 when system configuration is not found. Currently only used for VoiceClient.

    'dnsConfig' => '1.1.1.1',

---

The following options should only be used by large bots that require sharding. If you plan to use sharding, read up on how Discord implements it.

shardId is the ID of the bot shard.

    'shardId' => 0,

shardCount is the number of shards that you are using.

    'shardCount' => 5,

]);

---

Gateway events should be registered inside the ready event, which is emitted once when the bot first starts and has connected to the gateway.

$discord->on('ready', function (Discord $discord) {

To register an event we use the $discord->on(...) function, which registers a handler. A list of events is available here. They are described in more detail in further sections of the documentation. All events take a callback which is called when the event is triggered, and the callback is called with an object representing the content of the event and an instance of the Discord client.

    $discord->on(Event::MESSAGE_CREATE, function (Message $message, Discord $discord) {
        // ... handle message sent
    });

});

Finally, the event loop needs to be started. Treat this as an infinite loop.

$discord->run();

If you want to stop the bot you can run:

$discord->close();

If you want to stop the bot without stopping the event loop, the close function takes a boolean:

$discord->close(false);