Reddit Announces Discord-Like Chat Channels Again

Reddit has re-introduced the chat rooms feature on the platform, and this time it looks serious. Chat channels are aimed to be a new way of messaging within a specific subreddit. The basic idea is that the chat channel is a space like Discord or Telegram and you can chat with subreddit members in real time.

Reddit already has a feature called Live Chat, with this feature anyone can create a new post and then chat in it. Chat channels are a little different. According to the platform’s announcement, chat channels Persistent fields in subreddit It is intended to be a one-time chat room.

How will chat channels work?

Chat channels are only available on mobile for now and only on certain subreddits. Reddit currently has chats with less than 100,000 members 25 small and medium sized communities He says he’s testing it out with, but over time plans to expand chat channels to other subreddits as well. Reddit did not list the 25 channels that received the new feature, but said that chat channels will gradually come to other subreddits.

This isn’t the first time Reddit has attempted to add a chat feature to the platform. The company first launched the community chat room feature in 2018, but pulled it back because it was unpopular. Tried adding built-in chat rooms again in 2020 but had taken the feature offline just a day later. This was due to a bug that caused the Start Chat icon to appear on every subreddit. At the time, Reddit said it made a few mistakes in rolling out the feature and angered the mods for not being able to control chats.

Reddit says things are different this time around. The company says it takes a moderator-first approach based on its past experience. This means giving mods their own chat channels and a set of tools they can use to moderate chats. Let see how is it going to be?