Reddit Removes Subreddit Subscriber Counts
▼ Summary
– Reddit has removed the visible subscriber count from subreddit pages to shift focus toward real-time engagement metrics.
– Two new metrics are now displayed: the number of visitors in the past seven days and the number of contributions made in that period.
– The change aims to better reflect active participation, as member counts did not fully capture true engagement due to lurking and non-member contributions.
– This update supports moderation improvements by limiting moderators to overseeing a maximum of five communities with over 100k visitors each.
– While moderators can still access subscriber data, regular users cannot, and the change has received criticism despite its intended benefits.
Reddit has made a significant change to how users gauge the popularity and activity of online communities by removing public subscriber counts from all subreddits. This move is designed to shift the focus from raw membership numbers toward more meaningful indicators of community engagement. Instead of displaying total subscribers, the platform now highlights two new metrics: the number of users who have visited a subreddit in the past week and the volume of contributions made during that same period.
The decision reflects Reddit’s belief that subscriber counts have never fully captured genuine interaction, since many people participate in communities without formally joining. By emphasizing recent activity, the platform aims to give both new and existing users a clearer sense of how lively and participatory a subreddit truly is. The new metrics are calculated using a rolling 28-day average and exclude any content that has been removed by moderators, offering a more transparent and real-time snapshot of community health.
According to Reddit, this update supports broader efforts to improve moderation across the site. The company noted that allowing moderators to oversee an unlimited number of large communities is not sustainable. Under the new system, moderators will be limited to managing a maximum of five subreddits that each attract over 100,000 weekly visitors. Communities with lower traffic will not count toward this cap, a change expected to affect only a small fraction, roughly 0.1%, of active moderators.
Although moderators retain access to full subscriber data through backend insights, general users will no longer see these figures. Initial reactions from the community, particularly in forums like r/modnews, have been mixed, with some criticizing the loss of transparency. Despite this, the new metrics may ultimately help users identify vibrant, discussion-rich communities based on actual participation rather than passive membership.
(Source: The Verge)
