Common IRC Commands

Despite the many popular clients which have added tons of their own commands, this page will only focus on the basic IRC commands (not all of them). We hope that you will be able to use this information to improve your knowledge of Internet Relay Chat.

Command Description
/admin <server> shows contact information about an IRC server
/away <message> marks you as away
/server <server> allows you to connect to an IRC server
/info provides information about an IRC server
/invite <nick> <channel> invite a person to your channel
/join <channel> lets you join a channel
/kick <channel> <nick> kicks a user from your channel
/links shows IRC servers linked to the network
/list <arguments> shows list of channels on IRC
/lusers shows number of people on IRC
/map shows IRC servers in a map format
/msg <nick> or <chan> lets you message someone or a channel
/mode <chan> +<mode> <nick> or /mode <nick> +<mode> changes user or channel modes depending on format that is used
/motd <server> shows the message of the day on IRC
/nick <nick> lets you change your nickname online
/notice <nick> or <chan> lets you notice a person
/part <chan> lets you leave a channel
/quit <message> lets you quit IRC
/time tells you what time it is from the IRC server
/version reports server version from an IRC server
/who <hostmask> global lookup for users on IRC
/whois <nick> gives detailed information about a user
/whowas <nick> tells you if a user was previously on IRC
/ctcp <argument> gives client to client information
/dcc <chat/send> direct chat or file transfers
/register <account> <password> Register an account with AuthServ
/auth <account> <password> Login to your account on AuthServ