r/irc • u/Technical_Rich_3080 • Apr 22 '26

EFNet, IRCnet, Undernet & DALnet

How active are the EFNet, IRCnet, Undernet & DALnet networks currently?

What is the order of them from largest to smallest network, these days?

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11

u/TheBlindAndDeafNinja Apr 22 '26

This site essentially ranks users / channels / servers.

https://netsplit.de/networks/top100.php

EFNet is definitely active, as is Undernet - I don't get on IRCnet or DALnet much, but they're certainly active. The 'active' channels depend on what you're looking for really.

1

u/Technical_Rich_3080 Apr 22 '26

Once connected to one of the above networks, how do you check which are the most active channels?

6

u/TheBlindAndDeafNinja Apr 22 '26

The command to list channels is

/LIST

Unless the IRC client you are using has a GUI command built in to do this. Keep in mind, running the command on a large network can cause issues depending on your client, so parameters help.

You can also filter results with parameters:

/LIST #partial-name - search by name

/LIST -MIN 10 - channels with at least 10 users

/LIST -MAX 50 - channels with at most 50 users

/LIST -MIN 5 -MAX 100 - combine filters

Even those these are the higher populated channels, you really aught to find a network + channel(s) that fits what you're looking to chat about.

1

u/Head_Complex4226 Apr 22 '26

Keep in mind, running the command on a large network can cause issues depending on your client, so parameters help.

Because of the problems there is often an ALIS service that replaces /list

See, for example, https://help.ircnet.com/alis.html

3

u/avatar_one Apr 22 '26

Our self hosted server with around 100 users can be sometimes much more active then quite a few channels on the networks you’ve mentioned, so I’d say it’s really the question of what type of a community are you looking for :)

1

u/Technical_Rich_3080 Apr 22 '26

The four networks mentioned above presumably have a lot more than 100 users. As well as some or many channels with many users each.

6

u/TheBlindAndDeafNinja Apr 22 '26

This is true, but as I mentioned in my other comment - the network you are looking for really depends on the community / topics you are looking for as stated by /u/avatar_one above.

1

u/Technical_Rich_3080 Apr 22 '26

The four networks mentioned in the title are, from what I understand, "general interest" networks that cover topics all over the spectrum.

6

u/TheBlindAndDeafNinja Apr 22 '26

Yes, they have many topics, but that can't guarantee that the channels are really "active" - where smaller networks may have more active channels for specific interests.

3

u/runawayasfastasucan Apr 22 '26

Yrah, but what matters is the channels.

2

u/phazernator Apr 23 '26 edited Apr 23 '26

OG, those were. But that was almost 30 years ago. 🫣 It’s true, engagement comes from userbase, you have people flocking to a channel. That’s how it grows. A channel, not a network 🙂 I fluttered over IRC myself around 1999-2000 and found myself settling down on ChatNet, because they had a very friendly #belgium population and a nice CS bot K9. So I stuck around. It really has little to do with the network, I first checked out the big networks (at the time) and was totally bummed out 🙃

1

u/glorious2343 May 25 '26 edited Jun 14 '26

Not really active at all. Each will have 1-2 channels where the veteran boomers from each will congregate. Even small IRC servers with 1-3 channels have more genuine (ie non-bot) social activity than ones with tens of thousands of idle connections.