Zulip lets you mute topics and streams to avoid receiving notifications messages
you are not interested in. Muting a stream effectively mutes all topics in
that stream. You can also manually **mute** a topic in an unmuted stream, or
**unmute** a topic in a muted stream.

Muting has the following effects:

- Messages in muted topics do not generate notifications (including [alert
  word](/help/dm-mention-alert-notifications#alert-words) notifications), unless
  you are [mentioned](/help/mention-a-user-or-group).
- Messages in muted topics do not appear in the [**All messages**
  view](/help/all-messages).
- Muted topics appear in the [**Recent conversations**
  view](/help/recent-conversations) only if the **Include muted** filter is
  enabled.
- Unread messages in muted topics do not contribute to stream unread counts.
- In the left sidebar, muted topics and streams are grayed out. They are also
  sorted to the bottom of their stream (for topics) or stream section (for
  streams).

!!! warn ""

    **Note**: Some parts of the Zulip experience may start to degrade
    if you receive more than a few hundred muted messages a day.