Any way to go offline the new chat or disable it?

[Sicmendor Obscurox]

Hi there. Before the stable update of the new chat interface, I was mostly offline of the steam chat on my own will.

However, with the update I'm forced to be 24/7 online in the chat (including Invisible status, where I appear as offline to others), and the workaround of Steam > Settings > Interface > Set Taskbar Preferences > (check) Offline and selecting the Offline status in the taskbar menu doesn't seem to work properly (I can still see online and playing people in the Steam main chat window and interface).

Is there a way to go fully offline or disable the chats in the meaning that everyone appears offline, the way it used to be before the update?

Additional info.: The workaround that I mentioned doesn't work at all, not even when I select Offline (status) in the taskbar menu and restarting Steam after selecting the status. It forces the user to connect to the chats. I want to remind that Invisible is Not the same as Offline.

Off-topic: The feature to sort user alphabeticaly in the main list is missing.

Addition 1 (25th of July, 2018): I forgot to mention. I'm searching for a way to go offline or deactivate the chat at any moment without restarting steam (as well as go back online/invisible the same way). I would like to enter the chat and disconnect from it at any moment without having to restart Steam. Sorry, I forgot this important info.

Addition 2 (25th of July, 2018): The post that I marked as the solution works the way that I was looking for. However, this solution puts the steam friends chat to the old style before the update and image attachments may not work. Make sure to name the shortcut something as "Steam (Old Chat)" to identify if you want to run Steam with the new chat or the old chat.

And last but not important, to switch the style of the chat (new to old and vice versa), you have to exit Steam and then run the Steam shortcut with the style that you want to use.

FYI: The post that I marked as the answer is the best one that works for me. There is another alternative method that may work for you if you prefer this one instead of the answer of this post:

Messaggio originale di markS:

Btw my english sucks but i hope this tutorial helps you

Follow my steps:

1. Right-click the steam icon of the task bar, the little one at the right, not the one as big as Chrome icon for example.
2. Click settings.
3. Go to interface.
4. Click on "Set taskbar preferences"
5. There you can select the offline option, then you press OK.
6. To go offline right click the steam icon and there you can change your status.

Again sorry for my english i did my best

Big News (28th of July, 2018)

Valve has rolled out a a Beta Update where you can check a Do Not Disturb status combined with Online, Away or Invisible, making the notifications of any kind (chat, announcements, events) not pop-up, as far as I know (I haven't actively tried it)

And Offline status is added and it works Almost OK... it would be awesome that every friend is shown Offline instead of remembering the last status that friends got before logging out.

Final Addition (03rd of August 2018): I marked this new post as the answer because Offline (and Do Not Disturb) status are implemented in the main stable client for everyone. Steam still remembers the last status in the Library section when you go from logged in friends to Offline, but that's a story for another post.

[Jeriacor]

Messaggio originale di markS:

Btw my english sucks but i hope this tutorial helps you

Follow my steps:

1. Right-click the steam icon of the task bar, the little one at the right, not the one as big as Chrome icon for example.
2. Click settings.
3. Go to interface.
4. Click on "Set taskbar preferences"
5. There you can select the offline option, then you press OK.
6. To go offline right click the steam icon and there you can change your status.

Again sorry for my english i did my best

This worked for me. I restarted Steam and no chat pop-up. I restarted my computer. Steam started but still no chat pop-up.

Go to taskbar -> Steam -> Settings -> Interface -> Set taskbar preferences -> Check "Offline" and uncheck "Friends"

Don't need to do any fancy regedits or shortcut tags.

For all you people who are like me and track your friends IRL instead of on Steam :)

[tGA* MarijuanaMan]

they just changed the name from offline to invisible

[Sicmendor Obscurox]

Messaggio originale di ^1tga*^^0Marijuana^1Man™:

they just changed the name from offline to invisible

I disagree.

In Offline, I didn't receive any announcement pop-up and neither event pop-up, besides that all friends where shown Offline in the Steam library when my status was Offline.

In Invisible, I receive those pop-ups and I can see the friends (that are not invisible) Online, even I can see what game they are playing.

If Invisible status behaved like Offline status then I wouldn't have done this post at all, but that's not the case and here we are.

And besides, if there were an option to silence the announcement and event pop-ups, even in-game, that would be a great improvement for the new chat ui. Notifications (Windows, Cell Phone, Steam, etc) is synonym of interruption and the users should choose if they want to receive it or not, and when.

[xdave200164x]

how u stop the messager app commin on screen

[The End]

Messaggio originale di The General:

Bring back the old way to go offline please :(

That would be nice, the new invisible keeps changing to online on it's own, and all the dang popups, it's a PITA.

Why remove the offline at all, seems like a brainfart to me.
¨

Messaggio originale di ^1tga*^^0Marijuana^1Man™:

they just changed the name from offline to invisible

No, it's working in a completely different way.

[Sicmendor Obscurox]

Big News

Valve has rolled out a a Beta Update where you can check a Do Not Disturb status combined with Online, Away or Invisible, making the notifications of any kind (chat, announcements, events) not pop-up, as far as I know (I haven't actively tried it)

And Offline status is added and it works Almost OK... it would be awesome that every friend is shown Offline instead of remembering the last status that friends got before logging out.

[The End]

Messaggio originale di Sicmendor Darkaxe:

Big News

Valve has rolled out a a Beta Update where you can check a Do Not Disturb status combined with Online, Away or Invisible, making the notifications of any kind (chat, announcements, events) not pop-up, as far as I know (I haven't actively tried it)

And Offline status is added and it works Almost OK... it would be awesome that every friend is shown Offline instead of remembering the last status that friends got before logging out.

Sounds good, thank you for the headsup.

[Sicmendor Obscurox]

Messaggio originale di Rockon:

Messaggio originale di Sicmendor Darkaxe:

Big News

Valve has rolled out a a Beta Update where you can check a Do Not Disturb status combined with Online, Away or Invisible, making the notifications of any kind (chat, announcements, events) not pop-up, as far as I know (I haven't actively tried it)

And Offline status is added and it works Almost OK... it would be awesome that every friend is shown Offline instead of remembering the last status that friends got before logging out.

Sounds good, thank you for the headsup.

You're welcome. I'll see if my word can reach them about fixing the remembering status issue of Offline mode (I want it to Not remember the friends status when logged off).

[-=HawK=-]

Just to confirm that this worked for me as per Glimmers post (adding the options to the run key in registry):

hkey_current_user\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\
Steam= "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steam.exe" -silent -nochatui -nofriendsui

[Feargan]

Messaggio originale di Old Man Smokey:

From another thread in this support...

Add this to the shortcut of steam. -nochatui -nofriendsui

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\Steam.exe" -nochatui -nofriendsui

Enjoy.

This appears to work, changing things (including the "FRIENDS" tab in the settings menu) back to the way they were before this most heinous update. THANK YOU!

[raby760]

I'm so angry. I didn't ask for this ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ chat. Now I have to dig for answers just to disable this crap. I wish games wouldn't force me to buy from Steam to begin with. I'd rather not have this third party program.

[raby760]

Whoever at Steam thought this was a good idea is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ retarded.

[Matt]

Messaggio originale di raby760:

Whoever at Steam thought this was a good idea is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ retarded.

Comments like this are absolutely pointless and have no value what so ever. If you can't post without hurling insults, then simply don't post at all.

[º✽• p1nkw0w •✽º]

Well, I've tried all suggested solutions and reviewing all the settings. So far, I still prefer the way it was before. Let's hope they include this option in their next update :)

[JamesRaithe]

While "-nochatui -nofriendsui" works to prevent the new UI's from loading, it doesn't actually stop the new VOIP client from loading.

My steam load times have gone from ~5 seconds without issue to locking up my computer for ~5 minutes while it loads. Adding these parameters does not stop this, which means the new "improved" chat client is still loading even though you cannot see it anymore in the UI.

There needs to be an option that allows us to launch Steam without the new VOIP client loading AT ALL. And it appears most of the user base don't want it and didn't ask for it. And right now it's a poorly optimized feature that crashes and freezes computers.