Channel Management

Learn to use Slack API calls to manage channels in the workspace.

We'll cover the following

Let’s look at the following endpoints in this lesson:

  1. conversations.kick: This endpoint removes a user from a channel.
  2. conversations.archive: This endpoint archives a channel.

Remove a user from a channel

To remove a user from a channel, we access the https://slack.com/api/conversations.kick endpoint.

Only channel owners and workspace admins can remove users from channels by default. Change the admin settings to allow the application to remove users.

  1. Click the name of your workspace.
  2. Open “Workspace settings” in the “Settings & administration” menu.
  3. Go to the “Permissions” tab.
  4. Expand the “Channel Management” section.
  5. Go to the “People who can remove members from public channels” drop-down menu.
  6. Select “Everyone, except guests,” and press “Save.”

Request parameters

Some important query parameters for the conversations.kick endpoint are as follows:

Parameter

Type

Category

Description

token

token

required

Authentication tokens carry the required scopes that govern the usage of different Slack applications and APIs. We usually pass these tokens as an HTTP Authorization header or as a POST parameter.

channel

string

required

This parameter specifies the channel to which the message will be posted. It can be a public channel, a private group, or an IM channel (direct message). The value for this parameter can either be an encoded ID or a name of a channel.

user

string

required

This is the user ID that is removed.

Let’s call the conversations.kick endpoint. Click the “Run” button to remove a user (in this case, yourself) from the specified channel.

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import fetch from "node-fetch";
const url = "https://slack.com/api/conversations.kick";
const headerParameters = {
  Authorization: "Bearer {{TOKEN}}",
  "Content-Type": "application/json; charset=UTF-8",
};
const bodyParameters = JSON.stringify({
  channel: "{{CHANNEL_ID_APP}}",
  user: "{{USER_ID}}",
});
const options = {
  method: "POST",
  headers: headerParameters,
  body: bodyParameters,
};
async function kickUser() {
  try {
    const response = await fetch(url, options);
    printResponse(response);
  } catch (error) {
    printError(error);
  }
}
kickUser();

Let’s look at the highlighted lines in the code widget shown above:

  • Line 3: We specify the conversations.kick endpoint.
  • Lines 10–13: We specify the channel and the user parameters to remove the user from a channel.

Response fields

A response from this endpoint includes only the ok property indicating whether the request was successful.

Archive a channel

To archive a channel, we access the https://slack.com/api/conversations.archive endpoint. We use this endpoint if a channel is no longer needed.

Note: As of now, once a conversation is archived, you can’t use the bot token to unarchive it.

Request parameters

Some important query parameters for the conversations.archive endpoint are as follows:

Parameter

Type

Category

Description

token

token

required

Authentication tokens carry the required scopes that govern the usage of different Slack applications and APIs. We usually pass these tokens as an HTTP Authorization header or as a POST parameter.

channel

string

required

This parameter specifies the channel to which the message will be posted. It can be a public channel, a private group, or an IM channel (direct message). The value for this parameter can either be an encoded ID or a name of a channel.

Let’s call the conversations.archive endpoint. Click the “Run” button to archive the channel made by the application. You shouldn’t be able to see the channel in the “Channels” list on Slack.

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import fetch from "node-fetch";
const url = "https://slack.com/api/conversations.archive";
const headerParameters = {
  Authorization: "Bearer {{TOKEN}}",
  "Content-Type": "application/json; charset=UTF-8",
};
const bodyParameters = JSON.stringify({
  channel: "{{CHANNEL_ID_APP}}",
});
const options = {
  method: "POST",
  headers: headerParameters,
  body: bodyParameters,
};
async function archiveChannel() {
  try {
    const response = await fetch(url, options);
    printResponse(response);
  } catch (error) {
    printError(error);
  }
}
archiveChannel();

Let’s look at the highlighted lines in the code widget shown above:

  • Line 3: We specify the conversations.archive endpoint.
  • Line 11: We specify the channel that needs to be archived in the parameters.

Response fields

A response from this endpoint includes only the ok property indicating whether the request was successful.