Favorite Messages

Better Messages lets each user star individual messages to bookmark them for later. The starred messages appear in a dedicated Favorites section accessible from the user's messenger sidebar — no need to scroll through long histories to find the link, snippet, or decision shared weeks ago.

What it adds#

Star/unstar button on every message in every conversation
Dedicated "Favorites" view in the messenger sidebar
Per-user storage — your starred messages are private to you
Works in DMs, group chats, and chat rooms — even messages from blocked-or-removed users stay in favorites
Quick deep-link from a favorite back to its conversation context
Survives message deletion by the sender (the favorite stub remains)

How it works#

When a user clicks the star icon on a message, Better Messages stores a user_id → message_id favorite record. The message remains in its original conversation; the favorite is just a saved pointer.

Action	Outcome
User stars a message	Star icon fills, message added to user's favorites
User clicks "Favorites" in sidebar	List of all starred messages, newest first
User clicks a favorite	Opens the source conversation, scrolled to that message
Sender deletes the original message	Favorite stays, but body shows "Message deleted"
User unstars	Favorite removed from list
Sender edits the message	Favorite reflects the edited content

Favorites are private per user — there's no team/shared favorites view. Two users in the same conversation can independently star different messages with no interaction.

When users benefit#

Use case	What gets starred
LMS course chat	Lesson links, assignment due dates, instructor announcements
Marketplace vendor inbox	Repeat customer info, shipping policies sent multiple times
Community manager	Recurring FAQ answers ready to copy-paste again
Personal DMs	Important addresses, phone numbers, links shared in conversation
Support team	Solution snippets to reuse for similar tickets

How to enable#

Navigate to WP Admin → Better Messages → Settings → Messaging.

Disable Favorite Messages — Toggle to turn the feature off

The feature is enabled by default on every install.

Frequently asked questions#

Can a user export their favorites?#

Not via the default UI. The favorites view in the messenger sidebar paginates over a REST endpoint, so a developer can hit that endpoint with the user's nonce to build a custom export tool.

Is there a limit on how many messages can be favorited?#

No hard cap. Power users with thousands of favorites may see slower load times on the favorites view — pagination is built in.

Do favorites work in guest conversations?#

Yes — guest users have a per-session favorites store (browser-local), since they don't have a persistent account. Their favorites disappear when they log out / clear browser data. Logged-in users get persistent server-side favorites.

Can administrators see what users have favorited?#

No. Favorites are private. Admins cannot view another user's favorites through the admin UI. (Technically the data is in the database and a custom script could query it; that's a code-level decision, not a built-in feature.)

Does the AI chat bot's response count as a starrable message?#

Yes — AI bot messages are normal messages from the favorites perspective. Users can star a particularly useful AI answer for future reference.