The private messaging feature works like an internal site email similar to the Inbox in Facebook and Ning.

Each member has their own individual Inbox, Sentbox, and Compose page.

They are notified of new messages by the Notifications tab in their admin bar as well as by email notification (if enabled).

The biggest difference between BuddyPress and other social networks (such as Facebook and Ning) is you don’t have to be a friend to send a private message; provided you know a member’s username you can send a message to any person on the network.

However being friends makes the process easier since like in Facebook, it automatically brings up your friend’s details as  you type their name in Send To.  And like Facebook, you can send messages to multiple friends.

Site admin users have extra messaging features:

See Next: Making Friends