Feature reference

Private invitations

Choose Private squad invitation while creating a request, then select each connection you want to invite. Connection groups do not grant access. Invitees receive an email and in-app notification and can accept or decline from the squad page.

The organiser can add or withdraw invitations before the shoot. A private invitation does not appear in public search, club or home request counts, Following, or the sitemap. Before the shoot starts, the organiser can make an open or filled private squad public even when invitations still await answers. It cannot be changed back to private.

Making it public starts a new public conversation and closes unanswered invitations. Accepted members must confirm before appearing in the public roster. Their places stay reserved until they confirm, decline, are removed, or the shoot starts. My Squads shows this confirmation under Needs your attention and under Needs your response in Invitations & requests.

Choosing a club

The club picker starts with clubs you follow and up to five suggestions from your saved region or country. Enter at least two characters to search active clubs by name or city. After you choose a club, the picker shows its full location until you select Change.

Status

Every request has a status that shows where it is:

• Open — actively looking for shooters
• Filled — no longer accepting join requests
• Cancelled — the shoot is off
• Completed — the scheduled squad formed and the reply window has closed
• Expired — no other confirmed shooter remained when the shoot started

Before the shoot, the organiser can edit the club, time, capacity, preference, tags, notes, and badge style. The shoot date may be today or later in the club's timezone, even when the chosen start time has passed. Accepted and pending shooters are notified and must confirm schedule changes; the organiser sees New time confirmed or Confirmation needed beside each one. The request becomes read-only when it is cancelled, completed, or expired.

Managing your squads

My Squads puts private invitations, join applications, public-roster confirmations, and schedule confirmations that need your action at the top. Organising and Joined each have an Active or History choice. Invitations & requests separates decisions you need to make from requests and invitations waiting on someone else, with recent outcomes below. Conversations shows one entry for each accessible squad thread you have replied to.

Replying

Use the reply box on the squad detail page to coordinate. Replies on public requests are public. Replies on private invitations are visible only to people who can view that invitation. You need an account to post a reply. Replies stay open until 48 hours after the shoot ends, although the organiser can finish the request sooner once the shoot is over. Use the separate join request to ask for a place on a public roster.

While you have a squad page open, new replies, status changes, and private roster check-ins appear on their own. You do not need to reload the page.

When a member joins, leaves, or is removed, the squad page shows a private roster update. The organiser and current accepted members can see it, and the member named in an update can still see and delete their own update after leaving. Join and leave notes appear only there. A removal looks like a neutral leave to the remaining squad, while the affected member receives a direct private notice.

Two squads on one day

Your own requests, your pending join requests, and the squads you were accepted for are your commitments for a day. When a new squad overlaps one of them, or sits within half an hour of one with exact times, ClaySquad tells you. It never stops you. Creating a request asks you to confirm once, and the join box lists the clash before you send the request.

While both squads are open or filled, each squad page shows you a notice naming the other one, with a link to it. Only you see that notice, and organisers are never prevented from accepting you because of your other plans.

Finding the right squad

On mobile, keep By name visible and open Filters for location, preference, dates, times, Gauge, Discipline, and Targets. On desktop, location, By name, dates, times, and the searchable tag choices all stay visible together. Date from and Date to are optional and inclusive, and each date means the date at the squad's club.

Morning means 7am–noon and Afternoon means noon–6pm. You can select either or both. Flexible and older Any time requests match either period. An exact-time request matches when any part of its stored time range overlaps a selected period.

Selected tag values appear as removable pills. Several choices in one group match any of them; choices in different groups require a squad to match each group.

Squad cards show whether you organise the squad, requested to join it, or already joined it.

Arrival check-ins

On the shoot date in the club timezone, the organiser and accepted members use Check in on their own roster row. The modal accepts an optional location note. Other roster members can see the status and receive email and in-app notifications when someone checks in, changes their note, or undoes a check-in.

Update note opens the modal with your current note. Saving keeps the original check-in time. Undo check-in removes the current status, and you can check in again later that day. Check-in closes at 11:59:59pm club time. Afterward, the final status and activity stay visible only to that squad roster.

Check-ins are self-reported. ClaySquad does not collect your browser location or treat a check-in as proof that you attended.

Squad preferences (gender)

When posting a squad, organisers choose who can join with Accept Males, Accept Females, and Accept Prefer not to say. Their own gender is always accepted. Find a Squad can filter by Mixed Group, Females Only, or Males Only based on that selection. If your saved gender is not accepted, ClaySquad shows a warning before you reply or ask to join. It does not block you. Your choice to proceed is recorded for the organiser to see.

People and clubs

Search for a member under People to add a known name and a note about them — no shared squad is required. Clubs works the same way, with one note per club. A lock icon on a member's squad row or a club page links straight to your existing note about them without showing its contents or whether it is locked.

Shoot logs

Shoot Logs record a club, a date, and whatever you want to remember: conditions, target types, course or stations, guns and chokes, ammunition, score, total targets, what went wrong, and what to focus on next time. You can log more than one round at the same club on the same date, and optionally link a log to a squad you shot on — useful for finding it again later. The link can be added, changed, or removed at any time.

Encryption and locking

Every note is encrypted with ClaySquad's application key. You may add a personal passphrase lock to any note for another encryption layer. ClaySquad cannot recover a lost passphrase, but you can delete a locked note without it. Account deletion removes live note data authored by or about you; deleted data remains only in encrypted backups until normal backup expiry.

Join reminders

"Remind me before joining" on a person's note is a separate setting that survives deleting the note. Before your join request is sent, ClaySquad lists any organiser or accepted member you asked to be reminded about. The warning describes only your setting and does not stop you from continuing.

When someone joins a squad you already accepted, you always receive an in-app notification. You can turn the email copy off in Profile. A notification may say that you have a note or reminder about them, but never includes its contents.

What a listing means

An administrator reviews each new listing for completeness and appropriate content before it becomes public. Later complete changes publish immediately and show Recent changes awaiting review on the public profile until an administrator reviews the current version. ClaySquad does not verify identity, NSCA credentials, teaching quality, safety, prices, or club affiliation. Clubs and NSCA details are self-reported. Appearing here does not mean the club endorses the listing. ClaySquad is not a party to lessons or payments.

Public profiles show approved professional details and contact information. They do not show the member's account name, member avatar, students, student count, private classifications, or relationships. Signed-in members may open the separate member profile for instructor–student relationship actions.

Creating and managing a listing

Instructor listings are free until 1 January 2028. After registration, choose Create instructor listing on Profile. Supply a public name, person photo, description, teaching focus, public contact method, at least one active teaching club, and confirm that the listing will be public and searchable. Business details, rates, availability, and paired NSCA number and designation are optional.

Position and zoom the square photo crop before saving.

Save draft keeps every part of the listing private, including teaching clubs. Submit for approval locks the first complete listing until it is approved or rejected. After approval, Publish changes applies every complete field, photo, URL name, consent choice, and teaching club together.

Unpublish hides the listing and keeps its approved data and instructor role so it can be republished when eligible. Stop being an instructor is permanent: it removes the public listing, listing photos, old URLs, and instructor–student relationships after a detailed confirmation. Private evidence already attached to moderation reports is retained.

Reporting a listing

Signed-in members who do not own the listing may report misrepresentation, a false credential or club affiliation, spam, inappropriate content, a safety concern, or another issue from the profile Actions menu. You may report the same listing again; earlier outcomes remain visible for context. Each member may submit ten reports per day. Use Contact us for systemic or widespread abuse after reaching that limit.

A pending report does not hide the listing. Each report keeps a private copy of the reported listing and photo as permanent moderation evidence. An administrator reviews it, and every reporter and the instructor receive the decision.

Finding and sharing profiles

The member search on Connections searches anywhere in usernames after you enter at least three characters. Matches appear alphabetically without regard to capitalization. The search is available only to signed-in members, so someone can tell you their username and you can send a connection request directly.

Selecting a member name in squads, replies, Connections, or instructor and student lists opens a quick view without leaving the current page. Use Open full profile when you need the complete signed-in member page.

To share your own profile in person, choose Share profile on Profile. The QR code and displayed link open your ClaySquad member profile after the other person signs in. They contain no email address or private account information.

Display name

By default, other members see only your username. On Profile, you may optionally add a display name and choose who can see it: Hidden, Connections, or Signed-in members. When shown, it appears as Display name · username across the signed-in app. It is not shown in email or in-app notifications and cannot be searched.

ClaySquad asks you to confirm before sharing starts or before you broaden visibility or change the name while it is shared. The account name from sign-in is used only for email and is never shown to other members.

Who can you connect with?

You can send a connection request to another signed-in member from their profile or after finding the username they shared with you. You do not need to have shared a squad. The recipient can turn off incoming connection requests.

You can turn off incoming connection requests in Profile. This does not affect instructor–student requests.

Request stages

• A pending request expires after 14 days with no response
• The recipient can accept it or quietly ignore it. The ignore confirmation shows the exact expiry date and explains that the sender is not told
• You can send another request after the current one expires
• Either party can withdraw a pending request or disconnect an existing connection at any time. Ending a connection does not notify anyone

Visible students in an instructor's list are labelled Public or Instructor network. Hidden relationships are never listed.

Connection count

Your profile shows how many connections you have, but never who they are. You can hide this count from others in Profile; you can always see your own. The count is not a score and is not used to rank or filter anyone.

Connection groups

From the Connections page you can create named private groups (e.g. "Thursday Regulars") and assign your connections to them. Groups are only visible to you. When you post a squad request, a group notifies everyone in it at once, and you can still pick people individually. Use View members on that form to see who is in a group.

Instructor–student relationships

An instructor and a student can confirm their relationship. Either person sends the request and the other accepts it. The person named as the instructor must have created an instructor listing, which enables the instructor role. The listing may be unpublished.

When you send the request you choose who can see the relationship:

• Hidden — only the two of you
• Instructor network — the instructor's other students whose relationships are also Instructor network or Public
• Public — shown on both profiles and in the instructor's student list

This confirms only that you both acknowledge the relationship. It is not a vouch and does not imply competence, safety or endorsement. It is separate from a personal connection and does not count towards your connection total. Either party can end it at any time, and the other person receives an in-app notification. Manage these from the Connections page.

Email invites

Enter their email address and, if you want, a short personal message. The message appears in the invite email so it is clear who is inviting them. Each address can only be invited once across the whole site. If that address has already been invited, already belongs to a member, or has asked not to receive invites, ClaySquad shows the same message: the address has already been invited. You are not told whether they joined.

Share link and QR code

The same page shows a personal join link and QR code. Anyone who opens it and signs up is recorded as joining from your invite. Show the code in person or copy the URL.

Decline further invites

Every invite email includes a link to stop further ClaySquad invites to that address. Declining does not tell the person who sent the invite, and it does not stop that person creating an account on their own later.

After someone joins

Clicking the join link in an email invite verifies their address and takes them straight to profile setup — no second verification code. The new member may then see a prompt on Home to send you a connection request. You are not told they joined unless they choose to connect.

Following a club

Click Follow on a club card or detail page. Following changes to Following everywhere. You will receive an email with the new squad's date and time window, formatted with your saved preferences (subject to your email notification settings in Profile).

Following a squad request

Replying to a squad request automatically adds you as a follower. You can also follow any squad manually from its detail page. Follow changes to Following everywhere; choosing Following asks you to confirm that you want to stop following. Followers receive an in-app notification (and optional email) when a new reply is posted to that thread.

On desktop, the Notifications destination and relevant sidebar badges update as soon as something arrives. Following cards show the exact number of new replies or new squad requests. Use View new requests on a followed club to see only those requests. On mobile, the bell in the header shows the unread notification count and opens the same Notifications page.

Your own active squad requests are always followed. Replies from members you blocked do not add an unread marker or notification. If you reveal a collapsed blocked reply, Hide collapses it again without unblocking its author.

Managing Following

Visit Following from the sidebar to see all your followed clubs and squad requests with unfollow controls. Active requests you organise are labelled Automatically followed.