The basic settings of BuddyPress can seem hazy and difficult. In outline BuddyPress is composed of these key components:
- Community Members: Members directory and members profile.
- Extended Profiles: customize user profiles and configure the available fields.
- Account Settings: let your users edit their account settings.
- Friend Connections: let users make connections with each other.
- Private Messaging: Let users send each other private messages.
- User Groups: allow the creation of user groups for people to create their own networks in your community.
- Activity Streams: display streams of activity on the site with direct posting to the front-end, threaded commenting, mentions and email notification.
- Notifications: select this and your members will receive notifications of recent activity in the way that they select.
We recommend you refer to this article to learn more : https://premium.wpmudev.org/blog/buddypress-guide/