Behaviour and Session Settings
The Behaviour tab (under Super Speedy Chat in wp-admin) controls how the chat behaves at runtime: admin chat alerts, when it suggests logging in, how often it polls, sounds, message limits, and whether login is required. This guide explains each setting and when to change it.
Reply timeout and contact details
The Admin Reply Timeout, the Timeout Action and Contact Details to Ask For are on the Automated Responses tab, under When Nobody Replies. See Automated Responses and Canned Responses.
Prompt Login After
If a visitor isn’t logged in, the widget can suggest logging in (to save their chat history) after they’ve sent a set number of messages. Default is 5 messages.
This only shows a gentle prompt – it does not block chatting. To actually require an account, use Require Login below. Leave it high (or rely on Require Login) if you don’t want to push accounts at all.
Max Message Length
The maximum characters a visitor can send in one message. Default is 500. Messages are also truncated server-side to this length as a safeguard. Raise it if your visitors routinely need to paste longer details; keep it modest to discourage abuse.
Polling intervals
The widget polls for new messages on an adaptive schedule that backs off while the visitor is inactive and speeds back up on activity or a new message:
| Phase | Default (Ultra Ajax on) | Default (off) |
|---|---|---|
| Poll Interval (active) | 1000 ms | 2000 ms |
| Idle Poll Interval (after ~30s) | 3000 ms | 5000 ms |
| Deep Idle Poll Interval (after ~2 min) | 10000 ms | 15000 ms |
Lower values deliver messages faster but make more requests. Because Ultra Ajax makes each request extremely cheap, the more aggressive defaults are safe on most hosting. If you’re not running Ultra Ajax and see load issues, raise these. See the Ultra Ajax Performance guide.
The adaptive schedule already does most of the work for you: a visitor sitting idle drops to the deep-idle interval on its own, so you rarely need to slow the active poll down. If you do see load, turn Ultra Ajax on before you raise these numbers. It cuts the cost per poll so far that the fast defaults stay comfortable even at busy times.
Sounds
- Play Sounds – master toggle for chat sounds (new message, open/close).
- Message Sound / Open/Close Sound – pick from the bundled sound files. Use the Preview button to hear them.
- Sound Volume – 0 – 100%. Default 30%.
Sounds play for both visitors (incoming replies) and admins (new waiting conversations).
Require Login
When ticked, only logged-in WordPress users can chat. Off by default (chat is anonymous). Logged-out visitors see a log in / create an account invitation in place of the message box, and the server refuses any chat request that doesn’t come from a logged-in user.
Turn this on for membership sites, internal/staff chat, or to cut spam. With login required, conversations are automatically linked to the user’s account and their display name is used. Pair it sensibly with the Prompt Login After setting – if login is required, the soft prompt is redundant.
One technical note: authenticated requests need full WordPress to check who’s logged in, so with Require Login on, chat requests go through the standard REST API instead of the Ultra Ajax fast path. Chat stays quick – it just doesn’t get the extra mu-plugin speed-up while this setting is on.
This trade-off only matters for high-traffic anonymous chat. On a membership or staff site the visitor count is small and every request is authenticated anyway, so losing the Ultra Ajax fast path here costs you nothing noticeable.
How these relate to sessions
A visitor’s identity is the ssc_visitor_hash cookie, set on first interaction (256-bit, HttpOnly, SameSite=Lax, ~1 year). That cookie is what lets a returning visitor resume the same conversation and what the polling settings above operate against. For the privacy implications of that cookie and the stored session data, see the Privacy and Data Handling guide.
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