Have you ever seen:
Mahafuz is online
or:
3 members online
That is an example of presence.
Presence tells an application which users are currently connected or active.
Where Is Presence Useful?
It can be used for:
- Chat
- Collaboration
- Team dashboards
- Multiplayer interfaces
- Support systems
- Shared documents
Basic Concept
The flow looks like:
User joins
↓
Presence state
↓
Other users receive update
When the user leaves or disconnects, the presence state changes.
Presence Is Not a Permanent Record
Being online is temporary.
Do not treat presence as a permanent database record.
For historical activity, use a separate database model.
Displaying Users
A team dashboard might show:
Online now
● Alex
● Sarah
● John
The UI updates when presence changes.
Connection Handling
Network connections are not always stable.
Users can lose Wi-Fi, close browsers or switch networks.
Your application should expect presence information to change.
Final Thoughts
Presence is useful for making collaborative applications feel alive.
Supabase Realtime provides a foundation for implementing these experiences without requiring every connection-management component to be built from scratch.