Prerequisites

Before setting up Discord Forum API, make sure you have the following.

System Requirements

Requirement	Version	Notes
Node.js	20.x or later	Download
pnpm	9.x or later	Install guide
Git	Any recent version	For cloning the repo

Discord Requirements

You’ll need a Discord application with a bot. If you don’t have one yet, don’t worry—we’ll walk through creating one in the Discord Bot Setup guide.

What You’ll Need

• Discord Account with access to the Developer Portal
• Discord Server with at least one forum channel
• Admin permissions on the server where you’ll add the bot

Tip

Forum channels require Community to be enabled on your Discord server. Go to Server Settings → Community to enable it.

Quick Checklist

• Node.js 20+ installed (node --version)
• pnpm 9+ installed (pnpm --version)
• Discord account ready
• Discord server with Community enabled
• Forum channel created (or will create one)

Installing Prerequisites

Node.js

Download and install from nodejs.org. Choose the LTS version.

Verify installation:

node --version
# v20.x.x or higher

pnpm

Install pnpm globally:

npm install -g pnpm

Or use Corepack (included with Node.js 16.13+):

corepack enable pnpm

Verify installation:

pnpm --version
# 9.x.x or higher

Optional Tools

These aren’t required but can be helpful:

Tool	Purpose
Docker	For containerized deployment
Turso CLI	For Turso database management
VS Code	Recommended editor with great TypeScript support

Hardware Requirements

Discord Forum API is lightweight:

Use Case	RAM	Storage
Development	512MB	100MB
Small community (under 1000 threads)	512MB	500MB
Large community (10000+ threads)	1GB+	2GB+

Note

Storage depends on message count and attachment metadata. Actual media files are served from Discord’s CDN, not stored locally.

Next Steps

Ready to go? Head to the Quick Start guide to set up the project.