{"slug": "discord", "name": "Discord", "category": "communication", "category_name": "Email and chat", "description": "Proprietary chat platform with text channels, voice, video and community servers.", "recommenders": 13, "commenters": 59, "warners": 21, "score": -0.519, "rising": 3.71, "first": "2025-11-06", "latest": "2026-10-28", "why": "HN commenters like Discord for its high-quality voice chat and for hosting small, private communities of friends and hobbyists where many of the people they want to reach already are.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 13, "neutral": 23, "compare": 2, "warn": 21}, "spark": [0, 1, 2, 2, 2, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 6], "listed": true, "loved": ["Voice chat", "Private communities"], "caveat": "Unsearchable content", "short_quote": "Discord is by far my favorite communication platform across anything I used in my entire life, nothing else comes even close in terms of feature set.", "icon": true, "domain": "discord.com", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://discord.com", "pricing": "freemium", "aliases": ["Discord"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters like Discord for its high-quality voice chat", "cites": [{"id": 804294784, "item_id": 50268424, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50268424", "by": "NoPicklez", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it works better than anything else out there for what I use it for.", "excerpt": "As someone who hit the PC gaming world in around 2008 online, we started with TeamSpeak and Ventrilo which were hosted platforms that allowed you to voice chat with your friends. They had cost money and weren't that great on audio quality (from that time). Then we went to separate game specific voice chat platforms which were inconsistent, but meant you struggled to find a way to chat with mates outside of something ", "context": "PC gamer since around 2008", "use_case": "voice chat with gaming friends", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 800687937, "item_id": 50042996, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50042996", "by": "javier2", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Discord works way better and their voice chat is several leagues above.", "excerpt": "Slack is a very bad that is super slow no matter what time of day I use it. It completely locks up on a spotty network. Discord works way better and their voice chat is several leagues above.", "context": "", "use_case": "chat and voice", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}, {"id": 752859952, "item_id": 47053747, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47053747", "by": "jjice", "date": "2026-02-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "it blew the competition out of the water at the time. The audio was so much better.", "excerpt": "I don't think discord is going anywhere. Not that I like or support them, but the waves of people leaving anything are always overblown. Look at Reddit after the API switch up. The reason my friends and I moved to Discord in late 2015 or early 2016 was because it blew the competition out of the water at the time. The audio was so much better. I think screen share and face cams may not have been supported at the time,", "context": "", "use_case": "voice chat with friends", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord Rival Gets Overwhelmed by Exodus of Players Fleeing Age-Verification"}]}, {"text": " and for hosting small, private communities of friends and hobbyists where many of the people they want to reach already are.", "cites": [{"id": 804266576, "item_id": 50266661, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50266661", "by": "Morromist", "date": "2026-10-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Its primary use for me is having small, private communities of people who aren't entirely anonymous to eachother", "excerpt": "\"it's a disgrace how many communities have moved from the open internet into Discord\" Why? Its primary use for me is having small, private communities of people who aren't entirely anonymous to eachother and isn't scraped (too much), commodified and filtered through an algorithm like most of the open internet. I would hate it if suddenly it became like reddit or facebook. The open web really went down a bad path well", "context": "", "use_case": "small private communities", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 742916656, "item_id": 46432291, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46432291", "by": "Foorack", "date": "2025-12-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why me and my friend groups are staying on Discord. Becuase it \"just works\".", "excerpt": "Am I the only one who doesn't care about E2E encryption, and just want an EU alternative? I DON'T WANT my chats to be \"full E2E encrypted\" with a 6-digit pin, only for me to loose them when I get a new phone. I DON'T WANT having to use a special gateway instead of normal IMAP to access my Proton mail. It really feels like server-side encryption is being forced down my throat and I don't consent. FB Messenger, X Chat,", "context": "", "use_case": "group chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Bye Bye Big Tech: How I Migrated to an Almost All-EU Stack (and Saved 500\u20ac/Year)"}, {"id": 800709680, "item_id": 50044355, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50044355", "by": "Aozora7", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Discord is by far my favorite communication platform across anything I used in my entire life, nothing else comes even close in terms of feature set.", "excerpt": "Discord is by far my favorite communication platform across anything I used in my entire life, nothing else comes even close in terms of feature set. It also helps that almost everyone I like is there. I'm forced to have whatsapp and telegram to communicate with the general population and I wouldn't use them if I didn't have to.", "context": "", "use_case": "communication", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}, {"id": 753221537, "item_id": 47076346, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47076346", "by": "bor_real", "date": "2026-02-19", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The main reason I use Discord is the users on the platform.", "excerpt": "The main reason I use Discord is the users on the platform. I am locked into it via the network effect. I will say, I tried out Stoat when it was still called Revolt, and it seems to be good enough to replace Discord for many common use-cases. It could be worth it, but only if the people you talk to on Discord follow you.", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stoat: A Good Alternative to Discord?"}]}, {"text": " The most common complaint is that conversations are hard to search and are not indexed by search engines,", "cites": [{"id": 789448720, "item_id": 49340545, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49340545", "by": "kayson", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "unsearchable Discord servers (grr Discord)", "excerpt": "I love this idea. A lot of repair knowledge is buried in non-English forums or unsearchable Discord servers (grr Discord). We need to localize it and rebuild community expertise.", "context": "", "use_case": "community knowledge", "switched_from": "", "story": "Repair Cafe \u2013 Fix Your Broken Items"}, {"id": 759170016, "item_id": 47448126, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47448126", "by": "gck1", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "please, find an alternative to discord for your community.", "excerpt": "And please, find an alternative to discord for your community. It baffles me that everyone has collectively decided it's a great idea to have discussions on a platform which is not indexable, and has no usable search even when you're in it.", "context": "", "use_case": "community discussions", "switched_from": "", "story": "Have a Fucking Website"}, {"id": 804298976, "item_id": 50268686, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50268686", "by": "5555watch", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It was overall terrible for everyone yet everyone still loves it.", "excerpt": "Discord is very hard to understand for me. But the young people love it for some reason. Had to use it for some projects or hackatons, and it's still a mystery why it's so popular. No one found older links that were deeper in the chats, had to constantly tag people to see anything, random chats pushed the important information away. It was overall terrible for everyone yet everyone still loves it. And weirdly, I then", "context": "", "use_case": "project and hackathon chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 751191056, "item_id": 46949441, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46949441", "by": "Venn1", "date": "2026-02-09", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Discord for chat and voice calls since that is what I expect from a chat app", "excerpt": "I set up a forum when I started my site for Linux content creation. Discord had become a black hole for technical know-how on a scale IRC could never dream of, and finding answers to common questions was nigh impossible since the technology has changed and the modern way to solve problem X was never asked in a forum and never indexed by a search engine. Granted, Reddit provided a bit of a stopgap over the last decade", "context": "runs a Linux content creation site", "use_case": "chat and voice calls", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month"}]}, {"text": " and many dislike open source projects moving onto a proprietary, walled-garden platform.", "cites": [{"id": 799588369, "item_id": 49974273, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49974273", "by": "Imustaskforhelp", "date": "2026-10-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the community of open source or communities in general moving to discord does feel like moving to a walled garden", "excerpt": "I do dislike the fact that they nowadays use Discord though, there are better alternatives like fluxer.gg available, though I do understand that most/some people are already on discord and it has become more normal to create a discord server than other alternatives if one wants to which requires having members which is much easier on discord. As compared to the friction of another app even though they might be really", "context": "", "use_case": "community chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open Source as We Know It Is Dead"}, {"id": 751953680, "item_id": 46997105, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46997105", "by": "carefree-bob", "date": "2026-02-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It really bothered me that so many important projects were relying on a proprietary chat technology", "excerpt": "I used to use discord for games a long time ago, but then I noticed it was being used for more serious stuff. For example, LLVM moved their chats from mailinglists to discord, as did a lot of open source projects. These are big, important projects, and now their chats are not discoverable and will soon be behind ID checks. It really bothered me that so many important projects were relying on a proprietary chat techno", "context": "former Discord user for games", "use_case": "open source project chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord Just Killed Anonymity"}, {"id": 800879441, "item_id": 50054965, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50054965", "by": "opan", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "You could put a gun to my head and I still wouldn't use Discord.", "excerpt": "I love Mumble and IRC. You could put a gun to my head and I still wouldn't use Discord. When all these proprietary chats are dead and the kids have moved on to something else, Mumble and IRC will still work. They are eternal. Anything proprietary and centralized can't compete with that. IRC outlived AIM and MSN and so on.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Voice chat", "summary": "Voice and audio quality are described as better than older tools and better than Slack.", "quotes": [{"id": 804294784, "item_id": 50268424, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50268424", "by": "NoPicklez", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it works better than anything else out there for what I use it for.", "excerpt": "As someone who hit the PC gaming world in around 2008 online, we started with TeamSpeak and Ventrilo which were hosted platforms that allowed you to voice chat with your friends. They had cost money and weren't that great on audio quality (from that time). Then we went to separate game specific voice chat platforms which were inconsistent, but meant you struggled to find a way to chat with mates outside of something ", "context": "PC gamer since around 2008", "use_case": "voice chat with gaming friends", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 800687937, "item_id": 50042996, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50042996", "by": "javier2", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Discord works way better and their voice chat is several leagues above.", "excerpt": "Slack is a very bad that is super slow no matter what time of day I use it. It completely locks up on a spotty network. Discord works way better and their voice chat is several leagues above.", "context": "", "use_case": "chat and voice", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}, {"id": 752859952, "item_id": 47053747, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47053747", "by": "jjice", "date": "2026-02-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "it blew the competition out of the water at the time. The audio was so much better.", "excerpt": "I don't think discord is going anywhere. Not that I like or support them, but the waves of people leaving anything are always overblown. Look at Reddit after the API switch up. The reason my friends and I moved to Discord in late 2015 or early 2016 was because it blew the competition out of the water at the time. The audio was so much better. I think screen share and face cams may not have been supported at the time,", "context": "", "use_case": "voice chat with friends", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord Rival Gets Overwhelmed by Exodus of Players Fleeing Age-Verification"}]}, {"label": "Private communities", "summary": "Commenters value it for small, private servers of friends and hobby groups that feel removed from the algorithmic open web.", "quotes": [{"id": 804266576, "item_id": 50266661, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50266661", "by": "Morromist", "date": "2026-10-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Its primary use for me is having small, private communities of people who aren't entirely anonymous to eachother", "excerpt": "\"it's a disgrace how many communities have moved from the open internet into Discord\" Why? Its primary use for me is having small, private communities of people who aren't entirely anonymous to eachother and isn't scraped (too much), commodified and filtered through an algorithm like most of the open internet. I would hate it if suddenly it became like reddit or facebook. The open web really went down a bad path well", "context": "", "use_case": "small private communities", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 746217552, "item_id": 46638597, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46638597", "by": "riversflow", "date": "2026-01-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I often would rather chill in Discord than go and hang out in-person.", "excerpt": "on the topic of platonic friendship, I couldn\u2019t disagree more with a lot of the comments. I have plenty of friends yet I don\u2019t do clubs and will never, ever do organized religion. People advising it are religious freaks in my opinion. Some of my best friends took this advice to go to church and bible study. They complain every time I see them about the people in their church. Meanwhile I\u2019ve made more and better frien", "context": "", "use_case": "making friends, gaming communities", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How can we solve the loneliness epidemic?"}, {"id": 794304131, "item_id": 49644008, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49644008", "by": "beej71", "date": "2026-09-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "quiet local (geographically) or private Discord servers", "excerpt": "I still find the old Internet in a few ways. Mastodon, Signal group chats, quiet local (geographically) or private Discord servers, RSS, email, XMPP or IRC if I feel like it. Definitely use uBO. I sometimes even surf Neocities. Stay away from \"algorithmic\" social media and all 24-hour news\u2014if something important happens, it'll show up on the HN RSS feed. If you want to stay politically active and informed, subscribe ", "context": "", "use_case": "private communities", "switched_from": "", "story": "I think I hate the internet"}]}, {"label": "Network effect", "summary": "Many people use it because their friends and communities are already there.", "quotes": [{"id": 800709680, "item_id": 50044355, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50044355", "by": "Aozora7", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Discord is by far my favorite communication platform across anything I used in my entire life, nothing else comes even close in terms of feature set.", "excerpt": "Discord is by far my favorite communication platform across anything I used in my entire life, nothing else comes even close in terms of feature set. It also helps that almost everyone I like is there. I'm forced to have whatsapp and telegram to communicate with the general population and I wouldn't use them if I didn't have to.", "context": "", "use_case": "communication", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}, {"id": 753221537, "item_id": 47076346, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47076346", "by": "bor_real", "date": "2026-02-19", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The main reason I use Discord is the users on the platform.", "excerpt": "The main reason I use Discord is the users on the platform. I am locked into it via the network effect. I will say, I tried out Stoat when it was still called Revolt, and it seems to be good enough to replace Discord for many common use-cases. It could be worth it, but only if the people you talk to on Discord follow you.", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stoat: A Good Alternative to Discord?"}, {"id": 751332064, "item_id": 46958254, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46958254", "by": "em-bee", "date": "2026-02-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "many FOSS projects are on discord because the people are already there.", "excerpt": "we need to differentiate two things here: using discord as the only way to reach a project and find documentation about it. the author mentions sending private messages right after joining. i would not have joined discord to do that, i'd have searched for their emails. if they or other ways to reach the developers can't be found then that is where the problem lies. the author doesn't mention if he tried that, and he ", "context": "", "use_case": "FOSS community chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord Is Not an Acceptable Choice for Free Software Projects (2020)"}]}, {"label": "Just works", "summary": "Some commenters say it is easy to use and does what they need without hassle.", "quotes": [{"id": 742916656, "item_id": 46432291, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46432291", "by": "Foorack", "date": "2025-12-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why me and my friend groups are staying on Discord. Becuase it \"just works\".", "excerpt": "Am I the only one who doesn't care about E2E encryption, and just want an EU alternative? I DON'T WANT my chats to be \"full E2E encrypted\" with a 6-digit pin, only for me to loose them when I get a new phone. I DON'T WANT having to use a special gateway instead of normal IMAP to access my Proton mail. It really feels like server-side encryption is being forced down my throat and I don't consent. FB Messenger, X Chat,", "context": "", "use_case": "group chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Bye Bye Big Tech: How I Migrated to an Almost All-EU Stack (and Saved 500\u20ac/Year)"}, {"id": 744334784, "item_id": 46520924, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46520924", "by": "johnneville", "date": "2026-01-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "overall it's a great product which i use everyday", "excerpt": "i'm worried they'll start making user unfriendly changes, like more ads, to meet investor demands for increased profits. overall it's a great product which i use everyday and i'm happy for them.", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord to File Confidentially for IPO"}, {"id": 804294784, "item_id": 50268424, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50268424", "by": "NoPicklez", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it works better than anything else out there for what I use it for.", "excerpt": "As someone who hit the PC gaming world in around 2008 online, we started with TeamSpeak and Ventrilo which were hosted platforms that allowed you to voice chat with your friends. They had cost money and weren't that great on audio quality (from that time). Then we went to separate game specific voice chat platforms which were inconsistent, but meant you struggled to find a way to chat with mates outside of something ", "context": "PC gamer since around 2008", "use_case": "voice chat with gaming friends", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}]}, {"label": "Free history", "summary": "One team says free unlimited message history and persistent voice channels made it preferable to Slack.", "quotes": [{"id": 757773136, "item_id": 47360821, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47360821", "by": "Gurkunwar", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "we now prefer it to Slack. The pricing problem is entirely resolved by the free unlimited message history", "excerpt": "Hello Poomba, our development team actually made this switch some time ago, and to be honest, we now prefer it to Slack. The pricing problem is entirely resolved by the free unlimited message history, and it's much easier to start a persistent voice channel than to set up Slack Huddles. You will undoubtedly miss the strict threading because you are coming from Zulip. My main recommendation is to make the most of Disc", "context": "development team", "use_case": "team work chat", "switched_from": "Slack", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Unsearchable content", "summary": "Knowledge gets buried because servers are not indexed and in-app search is weak.", "quotes": [{"id": 759170016, "item_id": 47448126, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47448126", "by": "gck1", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "please, find an alternative to discord for your community.", "excerpt": "And please, find an alternative to discord for your community. It baffles me that everyone has collectively decided it's a great idea to have discussions on a platform which is not indexable, and has no usable search even when you're in it.", "context": "", "use_case": "community discussions", "switched_from": "", "story": "Have a Fucking Website"}, {"id": 789448720, "item_id": 49340545, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49340545", "by": "kayson", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "unsearchable Discord servers (grr Discord)", "excerpt": "I love this idea. A lot of repair knowledge is buried in non-English forums or unsearchable Discord servers (grr Discord). We need to localize it and rebuild community expertise.", "context": "", "use_case": "community knowledge", "switched_from": "", "story": "Repair Cafe \u2013 Fix Your Broken Items"}, {"id": 751191056, "item_id": 46949441, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46949441", "by": "Venn1", "date": "2026-02-09", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Discord for chat and voice calls since that is what I expect from a chat app", "excerpt": "I set up a forum when I started my site for Linux content creation. Discord had become a black hole for technical know-how on a scale IRC could never dream of, and finding answers to common questions was nigh impossible since the technology has changed and the modern way to solve problem X was never asked in a forum and never indexed by a search engine. Granted, Reddit provided a bit of a stopgap over the last decade", "context": "runs a Linux content creation site", "use_case": "chat and voice calls", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month"}]}, {"label": "Walled garden", "summary": "Commenters object to communities and open source projects relying on a proprietary, centralized chat service.", "quotes": [{"id": 799588369, "item_id": 49974273, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49974273", "by": "Imustaskforhelp", "date": "2026-10-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the community of open source or communities in general moving to discord does feel like moving to a walled garden", "excerpt": "I do dislike the fact that they nowadays use Discord though, there are better alternatives like fluxer.gg available, though I do understand that most/some people are already on discord and it has become more normal to create a discord server than other alternatives if one wants to which requires having members which is much easier on discord. As compared to the friction of another app even though they might be really", "context": "", "use_case": "community chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open Source as We Know It Is Dead"}, {"id": 751953680, "item_id": 46997105, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46997105", "by": "carefree-bob", "date": "2026-02-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It really bothered me that so many important projects were relying on a proprietary chat technology", "excerpt": "I used to use discord for games a long time ago, but then I noticed it was being used for more serious stuff. For example, LLVM moved their chats from mailinglists to discord, as did a lot of open source projects. These are big, important projects, and now their chats are not discoverable and will soon be behind ID checks. It really bothered me that so many important projects were relying on a proprietary chat techno", "context": "former Discord user for games", "use_case": "open source project chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord Just Killed Anonymity"}, {"id": 800879441, "item_id": 50054965, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50054965", "by": "opan", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "You could put a gun to my head and I still wouldn't use Discord.", "excerpt": "I love Mumble and IRC. You could put a gun to my head and I still wouldn't use Discord. When all these proprietary chats are dead and the kids have moved on to something else, Mumble and IRC will still work. They are eternal. Anything proprietary and centralized can't compete with that. IRC outlived AIM and MSN and so on.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}]}, {"label": "Privacy concerns", "summary": "Commenters raise concerns about age verification, phone number requirements and the lack of end-to-end encryption.", "quotes": [{"id": 774268385, "item_id": 48391774, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48391774", "by": "hampus", "date": "2026-06-03", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Discord, on the other hand, wants to implement global age verification, despite there being no legal requirement to do so in most jurisdictions.", "excerpt": "Fluxer's hosted service also needs to comply with laws around the world. However, we're clear that we'd rather exit a region than implement age verification. We don't have age verification. For example, to comply with the Online Safety Act, we block NSFW content for users on a UK IP address, rather than implementing invasive age verification. The same goes for Brazil. And we don't allow users in Mississippi to create", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Roadmap 2026 \u2013 Fluxer"}, {"id": 751710706, "item_id": 46981919, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46981919", "by": "iwontberude", "date": "2026-02-11", "stance": "warn", "quote": "we were expecting draconian policy which would attempt to unmask and chronicle our members identities and sentiments.", "excerpt": "My community (30 members or so) of hackers switched to Matrix last October because we were expecting draconian policy which would attempt to unmask and chronicle our members identities and sentiments. We now spend more than we did with Discord but the data sovereignty is worth it. Not a plug per se, but we host our international community members content out of Germany using federated.computer. In recent days people ", "context": "runs a community of about 30 hackers", "use_case": "community chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord Alternatives"}, {"id": 751256608, "item_id": 46953538, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46953538", "by": "Peacefulz", "date": "2026-02-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "nothing is encrypted in transit on their application", "excerpt": "The writing has been on the wall for a while. I moved off of Discord about a year and a half ago, after they started gating long-time free features behind Nitro. Then later, I find out that nothing is encrypted in transit on their application. I haven't had much luck moving friends off of the platform and on to things like Matrix, or Signal yet... but I'm trying all the time.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month"}]}, {"label": "Ads and nags", "summary": "Some commenters complain about ads, Nitro upsells and tooltips that cover the screen.", "quotes": [{"id": 765221152, "item_id": 47826322, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47826322", "by": "hmokiguess", "date": "2026-04-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the product is so full of ads that is insane to me", "excerpt": "I have been using discord for work these days, new gen workers are sort of prevalent there, and Slack is dying. I think they feel it\u2019s more counterculture and cool. While I appreciate the move away from Slack, I wish someone brought IRC back. I cannot understand how people spend money on Discord, and a lot of it. There is so much personalization and fluff going on there as a monetized feature and the product is so fu", "context": "uses Discord for work", "use_case": "work chat", "switched_from": "Slack", "story": "Discord Read Receipts Exploit: When, How Often, How Long"}, {"id": 768485760, "item_id": 48030360, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48030360", "by": "amatecha", "date": "2026-05-05", "stance": "warn", "quote": "constant tooltips covering the screen to harass me", "excerpt": "Any kind of tour/nag tooltip on any app/site I use stays up forever, until they hopefully finally realize I am never going to interact with their cognitive-energy-wasting noise that should never have been shown to begin with. I've had the \"try out dark mode\" tooltip showing on JIRA for months. Just don't show these. Don't waste people's time. There are sites I close and never come back to because they start with an u", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Why Most Product Tours Get Skipped"}, {"id": 751256608, "item_id": 46953538, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46953538", "by": "Peacefulz", "date": "2026-02-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "nothing is encrypted in transit on their application", "excerpt": "The writing has been on the wall for a while. I moved off of Discord about a year and a half ago, after they started gating long-time free features behind Nitro. Then later, I find out that nothing is encrypted in transit on their application. I haven't had much luck moving friends off of the platform and on to things like Matrix, or Signal yet... but I'm trying all the time.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month"}]}, {"label": "Weak for work", "summary": "Some commenters say it lacks structured threads and searchable history and is seen as unprofessional for workplace use.", "quotes": [{"id": 757785920, "item_id": 47361620, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47361620", "by": "allinonetools_", "date": "2026-03-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the lack of structured threads and searchable history can make work discussions harder to track.", "excerpt": "I have seen a few small teams try Discord for internal chat. It works fine for quick conversations, but over time the lack of structured threads and searchable history can make work discussions harder to track. It tends to feel more like a community space than a workplace tool.", "context": "", "use_case": "internal team chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}, {"id": 757964033, "item_id": 47372752, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47372752", "by": "muzani", "date": "2026-03-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Discord potentially could, but it doesn't seem to built for this use case.", "excerpt": "We considered it before in a past job when cost cutting. But nobody wants the boss to know when they're playing DOTA. More seriously though, Slack was one of those tools that just held context of everything. All the engineering decisions and past error messages. Discord potentially could, but it doesn't seem to built for this use case. Can it handle a thousand channels? It sounds ridiculous, but companies scale, and ", "context": "", "use_case": "work chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}, {"id": 757932785, "item_id": 47370799, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47370799", "by": "AznHisoka", "date": "2026-03-13", "stance": "compare", "quote": "It has the perception of being \"fun\" and not serious/professional.", "excerpt": "There's loads of companies that use Discord, but they all seem to be blockchain/gaming companies [1] I think Discord has the same problem that FB faced when it tried to launch their FB Workplace product. It has the perception of being \"fun\" and not serious/professional. If I were you, I'd pay the $$$ for Slack. The ability to search past conversations has saved me hours of productivity and well worth it [1] https://b", "context": "", "use_case": "work chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}]}, {"label": "UI lag", "summary": "One commenter notes UI rendering lag when switching channels.", "quotes": [{"id": 790424817, "item_id": 49401551, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49401551", "by": "hylaride", "date": "2026-08-22", "stance": "warn", "quote": "When I use slack and discord, I sigh when I start seeing UI rendering lag", "excerpt": "I have mixed feelings in this debate, too. The big issue with GUIs is that they\u2019ve become so bloated, especially as the default framework is now often electron apps. Web based frameworks tend to start keeling when large amounts of data need to be handled in the DOM, etc. When I use slack and discord, I sigh when I start seeing UI rendering lag when I switch channels and projects. Though there\u2019s been some recent progr", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stop Making TUIs"}]}], "who": [{"by": "NoPicklez", "context": "PC gamer since around 2008", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50268424", "date": "2026-10-28"}, {"by": "badsectoracula", "context": "retro game dev making an Xbox game engine", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50042518", "date": "2026-10-11"}, {"by": "trissylegs", "context": "gamer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49636371", "date": "2026-09-10"}, {"by": "donatj", "context": "40-year-old non-gamer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48756515", "date": "2026-07-01"}, {"by": "Gurkunwar", "context": "development team", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47360821", "date": "2026-03-12"}, {"by": "PsycoRobot", "context": "daily Discord user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46959712", "date": "2026-02-10"}, {"by": "storus", "context": "talks to CS university students", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46950502", "date": "2026-02-09"}, {"by": "Venn1", "context": "runs a Linux content creation site", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46949441", "date": "2026-02-09"}], "tags": ["for gaming groups", "for friend groups", "for interest communities", "for small dev teams"], "use_cases": ["chat", "community chat", "work chat", "chatting with friends", "product support communities", "project and hackathon chat"], "compared": [{"slug": "matrix", "name": "Matrix", "co": 13, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 2}, {"slug": "slack", "name": "Slack", "co": 13, "switched_from": 2, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "whatsapp", "name": "WhatsApp", "co": 11, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "signal", "name": "Signal", "co": 7, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "fluxer", "name": "Fluxer", "co": 8, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "zulip", "name": "Zulip", "co": 6, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "telegram", "name": "Telegram", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "stoat", "name": "Stoat", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47360676", "title": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?", "mentions": 6}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50263854", "title": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google", "mentions": 5}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50041540", "title": "IRCv3", "mentions": 5}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46945663", "title": "Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47050376", "title": "Discord Rival Gets Overwhelmed by Exodus of Players Fleeing Age-Verification", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49630253", "title": "AirPods 5", "mentions": 2}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"warn": 2, "neutral": 2, "compare": 1}, "2025-12": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-02": {"neutral": 7, "warn": 4, "recommend": 2}, "2026-03": {"warn": 4, "recommend": 2, "compare": 1}, "2026-04": {"neutral": 1, "warn": 1}, "2026-05": {"warn": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-06": {"warn": 1}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 6, "warn": 1}, "2026-08": {"warn": 2, "neutral": 1}, "2026-09": {"neutral": 3}, "2026-10": {"neutral": 2, "warn": 5, "recommend": 6}}, "quotes": [{"id": 804322848, "item_id": 50270178, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50270178", "by": "mastermage", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "warn", "quote": "if now instead of a forum you have to join five trillion discord servers just to get help with your one issue", "excerpt": "It however brings disadvantages with it. Specifically if now instead of a forum you have to join five trillion discord servers just to get help with your one issue on \"this niche product i use\".", "context": "", "use_case": "product support communities", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 804298976, "item_id": 50268686, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50268686", "by": "5555watch", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It was overall terrible for everyone yet everyone still loves it.", "excerpt": "Discord is very hard to understand for me. But the young people love it for some reason. Had to use it for some projects or hackatons, and it's still a mystery why it's so popular. No one found older links that were deeper in the chats, had to constantly tag people to see anything, random chats pushed the important information away. It was overall terrible for everyone yet everyone still loves it. And weirdly, I then", "context": "", "use_case": "project and hackathon chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 804294784, "item_id": 50268424, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50268424", "by": "NoPicklez", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it works better than anything else out there for what I use it for.", "excerpt": "As someone who hit the PC gaming world in around 2008 online, we started with TeamSpeak and Ventrilo which were hosted platforms that allowed you to voice chat with your friends. They had cost money and weren't that great on audio quality (from that time). Then we went to separate game specific voice chat platforms which were inconsistent, but meant you struggled to find a way to chat with mates outside of something ", "context": "PC gamer since around 2008", "use_case": "voice chat with gaming friends", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 804266576, "item_id": 50266661, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50266661", "by": "Morromist", "date": "2026-10-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Its primary use for me is having small, private communities of people who aren't entirely anonymous to eachother", "excerpt": "\"it's a disgrace how many communities have moved from the open internet into Discord\" Why? Its primary use for me is having small, private communities of people who aren't entirely anonymous to eachother and isn't scraped (too much), commodified and filtered through an algorithm like most of the open internet. I would hate it if suddenly it became like reddit or facebook. The open web really went down a bad path well", "context": "", "use_case": "small private communities", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 804241072, "item_id": 50265067, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50265067", "by": "ganoushoreilly", "date": "2026-10-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It's substantially popular with gaming communities. It's also very popular with non gaming communities", "excerpt": "Your response is the \"Chef's kiss\". It's exactly these kind of policing actions that drives content away from the masses. No one said discord wasn't popular. It's substantially popular with gaming communities. It's also very popular with non gaming communities, many of which found it an an alternative to Reddit and others.", "context": "", "use_case": "community chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will soon let anyone find public server messages through Google"}, {"id": 802917058, "item_id": 50182316, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50182316", "by": "MisterTea", "date": "2026-10-21", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use signal, whatsapp, discord, irc, google chat, email and messenger without complaint.", "excerpt": "I don't understand why having more than one chat app is too much for some people. I use signal, whatsapp, discord, irc, google chat, email and messenger without complaint. I can't force people to use my platform of choice so I have to compromise and use what they do with little to no notice on my end. Sure, I am not happy with this situation but I accept it and move on while keeping an eye out for alternatives.", "context": "", "use_case": "messaging", "switched_from": "", "story": "The No Kings Takedown Is Why You Shouldn't Rent Your Megaphone from Zuck"}, {"id": 800879441, "item_id": 50054965, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50054965", "by": "opan", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "You could put a gun to my head and I still wouldn't use Discord.", "excerpt": "I love Mumble and IRC. You could put a gun to my head and I still wouldn't use Discord. When all these proprietary chats are dead and the kids have moved on to something else, Mumble and IRC will still work. They are eternal. Anything proprietary and centralized can't compete with that. IRC outlived AIM and MSN and so on.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}, {"id": 800755056, "item_id": 50047191, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047191", "by": "RunSet", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It's just yahoo groups that requires your phone number.", "excerpt": "> Discord is by far my favorite communication platform across anything I used in my entire life, nothing else comes even close in terms of feature set. It's just yahoo groups that requires your phone number.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}, {"id": 800709680, "item_id": 50044355, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50044355", "by": "Aozora7", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Discord is by far my favorite communication platform across anything I used in my entire life, nothing else comes even close in terms of feature set.", "excerpt": "Discord is by far my favorite communication platform across anything I used in my entire life, nothing else comes even close in terms of feature set. It also helps that almost everyone I like is there. I'm forced to have whatsapp and telegram to communicate with the general population and I wouldn't use them if I didn't have to.", "context": "", "use_case": "communication", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}, {"id": 800687937, "item_id": 50042996, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50042996", "by": "javier2", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Discord works way better and their voice chat is several leagues above.", "excerpt": "Slack is a very bad that is super slow no matter what time of day I use it. It completely locks up on a spotty network. Discord works way better and their voice chat is several leagues above.", "context": "", "use_case": "chat and voice", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}, {"id": 800680288, "item_id": 50042518, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50042518", "by": "badsectoracula", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Meanwhile i can now connect to a new Discord community and not only not worry about losing any messages", "excerpt": "Just yesterday i was working on my game engine for the original Xbox using the open source NXDK kit (which is much lower level than the official XDK) and i finally, after literal years, managed to find and fix a couple of bugs that caused flickering (much more obscure than you'd expect and didn't show up even in the emulator). So i decided to share it with a couple friends and retro enthusiast communities on Discord.", "context": "retro game dev making an Xbox game engine", "use_case": "community chat with media and history", "switched_from": "", "story": "IRCv3"}, {"id": 799588369, "item_id": 49974273, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49974273", "by": "Imustaskforhelp", "date": "2026-10-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the community of open source or communities in general moving to discord does feel like moving to a walled garden", "excerpt": "I do dislike the fact that they nowadays use Discord though, there are better alternatives like fluxer.gg available, though I do understand that most/some people are already on discord and it has become more normal to create a discord server than other alternatives if one wants to which requires having members which is much easier on discord. As compared to the friction of another app even though they might be really", "context": "", "use_case": "community chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Open Source as We Know It Is Dead"}, {"id": 799036768, "item_id": 49939798, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49939798", "by": "orwin", "date": "2026-10-02", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "often on discord, sometimes on whatsapp/signal", "excerpt": "Yeah, i think it's not only social media platform. I used to read a lot of bad fiction on internet (sometimes it was _really_ good, but most of the time, not), and it took a large part of my time (easily 2 hours a day, plus one hour of reading paper book to help me fall asleep). Nowadays i have the impression almost everything is AI-enhanced. Shorter sentences, quips for no reason, lack of details. It makes dialogs a", "context": "", "use_case": "small communities", "switched_from": "", "story": "Everyone's Packing Up"}, {"id": 794304131, "item_id": 49644008, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49644008", "by": "beej71", "date": "2026-09-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "quiet local (geographically) or private Discord servers", "excerpt": "I still find the old Internet in a few ways. Mastodon, Signal group chats, quiet local (geographically) or private Discord servers, RSS, email, XMPP or IRC if I feel like it. Definitely use uBO. I sometimes even surf Neocities. Stay away from \"algorithmic\" social media and all 24-hour news\u2014if something important happens, it'll show up on the HN RSS feed. If you want to stay politically active and informed, subscribe ", "context": "", "use_case": "private communities", "switched_from": "", "story": "I think I hate the internet"}, {"id": 794181936, "item_id": 49636371, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49636371", "by": "trissylegs", "date": "2026-09-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I often play games while on discord voice chat. The audio quality of my game suffers.", "excerpt": "I often play games while on discord voice chat. The audio quality of my game suffers. Unless I use a separate mike. (Which is how I solve it)", "context": "gamer", "use_case": "voice chat while gaming", "switched_from": "", "story": "AirPods 5"}, {"id": 794178880, "item_id": 49636180, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49636180", "by": "agentdev001", "date": "2026-09-09", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I actively avoid using discord to join calls on my phone- because Bluetooth absolutely destroys quality.", "excerpt": "Your comment frustrates me! With that said, how about Discord? I have high speed internet 90% of my waking life, high enough for Discord to be high fidelity. I actively avoid using discord to join calls on my phone- because Bluetooth absolutely destroys quality. I use the same pair of headphones to use discord on my PC, with a separate mic, no problemo.", "context": "", "use_case": "voice calls on PC", "switched_from": "", "story": "AirPods 5"}, {"id": 791866049, "item_id": 49491628, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49491628", "by": "porridgeraisin", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "forwards it to a discord server", "excerpt": "I use whatsapp primarily, so no tethering needed, but SMS of course for one-time passwords and the like. I didn't want to open my phone for that. So I had a coding agent write an android background app for me that listens for SMS and forwards it to a discord server, and side loaded it. So now I get a discord notif on my laptop with the OTP.", "context": "", "use_case": "receiving forwarded OTP notifications", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 790424817, "item_id": 49401551, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49401551", "by": "hylaride", "date": "2026-08-22", "stance": "warn", "quote": "When I use slack and discord, I sigh when I start seeing UI rendering lag", "excerpt": "I have mixed feelings in this debate, too. The big issue with GUIs is that they\u2019ve become so bloated, especially as the default framework is now often electron apps. Web based frameworks tend to start keeling when large amounts of data need to be handled in the DOM, etc. When I use slack and discord, I sigh when I start seeing UI rendering lag when I switch channels and projects. Though there\u2019s been some recent progr", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stop Making TUIs"}, {"id": 789448720, "item_id": 49340545, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49340545", "by": "kayson", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "unsearchable Discord servers (grr Discord)", "excerpt": "I love this idea. A lot of repair knowledge is buried in non-English forums or unsearchable Discord servers (grr Discord). We need to localize it and rebuild community expertise.", "context": "", "use_case": "community knowledge", "switched_from": "", "story": "Repair Cafe \u2013 Fix Your Broken Items"}, {"id": 785266432, "item_id": 49079152, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49079152", "by": "xboxnolifes", "date": "2026-07-27", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Interesting, I almost never see any of that stuff when I use discord", "excerpt": "Interesting, I almost never see any of that stuff when I use discord, but I realize that's because I almost never use DMs.", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "A Discord Alternative \u2013 Echoed"}, {"id": 784252850, "item_id": 49015803, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49015803", "by": "Marsymars", "date": "2026-07-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "the sum total of Electron apps I use are Teams (I guess not quite Electron now, but close enough)/Slack/Discord/Android Messages/VS Code", "excerpt": "> Just like in the native vs electron debate it's not \"Beautiful hand-crafted native app\" or \"Electron wasteful trash\", it's \"Electron or nothing\". The overwhelming majority of the total uses of Electron apps are going to be the same pile of apps from various megacorps that could fund native apps with change from their couch cushions. e.g. the sum total of Electron apps I use are Teams (I guess not quite Electron now", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns"}, {"id": 784178304, "item_id": 49011144, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49011144", "by": "voxic11", "date": "2026-07-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use a passkey with discord on my phone.", "excerpt": "I use a passkey with discord on my phone. If I want to log in to discord on a computer it shows a QR code on the page/desktop app and I scan it with my phone to log in. I could see this become a pretty common pattern. I like it because I can use discord on even a pretty untrusted computer without providing it any credentials or access to my passkey, and then later when I'm done I can revoke the session.", "context": "", "use_case": "passkey login via QR code", "switched_from": "", "story": "Passkeys were invented by engineers with zero understanding of consumer brain"}, {"id": 784160448, "item_id": 49010028, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49010028", "by": "Varelion", "date": "2026-07-22", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Discord, being the imperfect text platform, limits the text and leaves most interaction limited by awkward formatting.", "excerpt": "A little irrelevant, but I need to vent about something MUD adjacent. I really wish MUDs were still a thing. The text-based roleplaying communities were largely swallowed by Discord, where as before they existed scattered over proboards, jcink, and a few others. Discord, being the imperfect text platform, limits the text and leaves most interaction limited by awkward formatting. To boot, even when a better ecosystem ", "context": "text roleplaying fan", "use_case": "text roleplaying communities", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can a MUD evaluate LLMs? A $99 proof of concept"}, {"id": 782152146, "item_id": 48884509, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48884509", "by": "wolvoleo", "date": "2026-07-12", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use discord for global reach interest groups.", "excerpt": "WhatsApp is paramount here in Spain. Telegram a strong second. The rest non-existent. Though I use discord for global reach interest groups. Never for local communities. Small ones are always on WhatsApp. Big ones usually telegram.", "context": "", "use_case": "global interest groups", "switched_from": "", "story": "Death of the Status Update: Why 55% of Americans Stopped Posting on Social Media"}, {"id": 781355552, "item_id": 48834722, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48834722", "by": "FumblingBear", "date": "2026-07-08", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "a time to meet weekly on discord and then discuss", "excerpt": "One thing that helped my friends and I really enjoy reading again is book clubs! Since the start of Covid, I've personally run ~3 books clubs with different people where we all vote on a book together, set a pace (usually a few chapters a week), and a time to meet weekly on discord and then discuss. It's been a great way to solidify friendships, broaden my interests (Not every book that's been voted on was one I'd ha", "context": "", "use_case": "book club meetings", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Age of Reading Is Over"}, {"id": 780104242, "item_id": 48756515, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48756515", "by": "donatj", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I think the kids are using discord for this, but as a 40-year-old non-gamer, I'm not going to get my friends to use discord.", "excerpt": "Does this hold true in the modern age though? I haven't seen a single thing I wanted to see on social media basically since COVID. It's all famous people, posturing, and things I never followed. Entirely crap I don't care about. At this point I open Facebook like once a day. I used to go on Instagram to see my friend's pictures, now there's nothing of my friends on there and I'll just spam and AI slop... All I want i", "context": "40-year-old non-gamer", "use_case": "social networking with friends", "switched_from": "", "story": "Bring Back Crappy Forums"}, {"id": 774268385, "item_id": 48391774, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48391774", "by": "hampus", "date": "2026-06-03", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Discord, on the other hand, wants to implement global age verification, despite there being no legal requirement to do so in most jurisdictions.", "excerpt": "Fluxer's hosted service also needs to comply with laws around the world. However, we're clear that we'd rather exit a region than implement age verification. We don't have age verification. For example, to comply with the Online Safety Act, we block NSFW content for users on a UK IP address, rather than implementing invasive age verification. The same goes for Brazil. And we don't allow users in Mississippi to create", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Roadmap 2026 \u2013 Fluxer"}, {"id": 770790146, "item_id": 48174384, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48174384", "by": "christoph", "date": "2026-05-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use telegram & discord daily.", "excerpt": "Honestly, my opinion, our lives were fundamentally better before some tech came along - touchscren phones & \u201csocial\u201d networks being the main two. We still haven\u2019t caught up with the carnage this has caused. Kids social media bans are only now becoming a thing in some countries and we\u2019re left with a deep sense of unease it\u2019s really not to protect the kids at all. It\u2019s lead to plenty of good as well, a luddite I am not", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "An AI Hate Wave Is Here"}, {"id": 768485760, "item_id": 48030360, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48030360", "by": "amatecha", "date": "2026-05-05", "stance": "warn", "quote": "constant tooltips covering the screen to harass me", "excerpt": "Any kind of tour/nag tooltip on any app/site I use stays up forever, until they hopefully finally realize I am never going to interact with their cognitive-energy-wasting noise that should never have been shown to begin with. I've had the \"try out dark mode\" tooltip showing on JIRA for months. Just don't show these. Don't waste people's time. There are sites I close and never come back to because they start with an u", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Why Most Product Tours Get Skipped"}, {"id": 765221152, "item_id": 47826322, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47826322", "by": "hmokiguess", "date": "2026-04-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the product is so full of ads that is insane to me", "excerpt": "I have been using discord for work these days, new gen workers are sort of prevalent there, and Slack is dying. I think they feel it\u2019s more counterculture and cool. While I appreciate the move away from Slack, I wish someone brought IRC back. I cannot understand how people spend money on Discord, and a lot of it. There is so much personalization and fluff going on there as a monetized feature and the product is so fu", "context": "uses Discord for work", "use_case": "work chat", "switched_from": "Slack", "story": "Discord Read Receipts Exploit: When, How Often, How Long"}, {"id": 764555314, "item_id": 47784707, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47784707", "by": "ryanmcgarvey", "date": "2026-04-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I have a dedicated Discord server I use to communicate with it.", "excerpt": "Yes. I had a spare M1 Mini so I decided to set it up. YOLOed the entire thing and connected all the integrations, though I only ever use Opus/Sonnet. I have a dedicated Discord server I use to communicate with it. It really is eye-opening how powerful it is once you connect your life to it. The biggest improvement is actually the trivial stuff \u2014 emailing contractors, accountants, etc. I no longer need to open another", "context": "", "use_case": "interface to agent", "switched_from": "", "story": "Is anyone actually using OpenClaw?"}, {"id": 759170016, "item_id": 47448126, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47448126", "by": "gck1", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "please, find an alternative to discord for your community.", "excerpt": "And please, find an alternative to discord for your community. It baffles me that everyone has collectively decided it's a great idea to have discussions on a platform which is not indexable, and has no usable search even when you're in it.", "context": "", "use_case": "community discussions", "switched_from": "", "story": "Have a Fucking Website"}, {"id": 757964033, "item_id": 47372752, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47372752", "by": "muzani", "date": "2026-03-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Discord potentially could, but it doesn't seem to built for this use case.", "excerpt": "We considered it before in a past job when cost cutting. But nobody wants the boss to know when they're playing DOTA. More seriously though, Slack was one of those tools that just held context of everything. All the engineering decisions and past error messages. Discord potentially could, but it doesn't seem to built for this use case. Can it handle a thousand channels? It sounds ridiculous, but companies scale, and ", "context": "", "use_case": "work chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}, {"id": 757932785, "item_id": 47370799, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47370799", "by": "AznHisoka", "date": "2026-03-13", "stance": "compare", "quote": "It has the perception of being \"fun\" and not serious/professional.", "excerpt": "There's loads of companies that use Discord, but they all seem to be blockchain/gaming companies [1] I think Discord has the same problem that FB faced when it tried to launch their FB Workplace product. It has the perception of being \"fun\" and not serious/professional. If I were you, I'd pay the $$$ for Slack. The ability to search past conversations has saved me hours of productivity and well worth it [1] https://b", "context": "", "use_case": "work chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}, {"id": 757785920, "item_id": 47361620, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47361620", "by": "allinonetools_", "date": "2026-03-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the lack of structured threads and searchable history can make work discussions harder to track.", "excerpt": "I have seen a few small teams try Discord for internal chat. It works fine for quick conversations, but over time the lack of structured threads and searchable history can make work discussions harder to track. It tends to feel more like a community space than a workplace tool.", "context": "", "use_case": "internal team chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}, {"id": 757773136, "item_id": 47360821, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47360821", "by": "Gurkunwar", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "we now prefer it to Slack. The pricing problem is entirely resolved by the free unlimited message history", "excerpt": "Hello Poomba, our development team actually made this switch some time ago, and to be honest, we now prefer it to Slack. The pricing problem is entirely resolved by the free unlimited message history, and it's much easier to start a persistent voice channel than to set up Slack Huddles. You will undoubtedly miss the strict threading because you are coming from Zulip. My main recommendation is to make the most of Disc", "context": "development team", "use_case": "team work chat", "switched_from": "Slack", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}, {"id": 757772000, "item_id": 47360750, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47360750", "by": "XR843", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it feels pretty good", "excerpt": "Yes, I've been using it recently with OpenClaw and it feels pretty good.", "context": "", "use_case": "work chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}, {"id": 757771778, "item_id": 47360736, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47360736", "by": "Zambyte", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I would never trust my essential comms with Discord personally", "excerpt": "Can I ask what's wrong with Zulip? I have pretty minimal experience with it, but I've mostly heard positive things. I'm curious what your team has found limiting. If you like the communication flow of Discord, Fluxer is also worth keeping on your radar. I would never trust my essential comms with Discord personally, and Fluxer is looking to be a great option.", "context": "", "use_case": "team chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Does anyone here use Discord as their work chat tool?"}, {"id": 753221537, "item_id": 47076346, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47076346", "by": "bor_real", "date": "2026-02-19", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The main reason I use Discord is the users on the platform.", "excerpt": "The main reason I use Discord is the users on the platform. I am locked into it via the network effect. I will say, I tried out Stoat when it was still called Revolt, and it seems to be good enough to replace Discord for many common use-cases. It could be worth it, but only if the people you talk to on Discord follow you.", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stoat: A Good Alternative to Discord?"}, {"id": 752980224, "item_id": 47061264, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47061264", "by": "m3kw9", "date": "2026-02-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Every time i use discord, it won't let me use my username, wtf?", "excerpt": "i still don't understand how discord works with the infamous \"claim your account\" bs. Every time i use discord, it won't let me use my username, wtf?", "context": "", "use_case": "chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord Rival Gets Overwhelmed by Exodus of Players Fleeing Age-Verification"}, {"id": 752859952, "item_id": 47053747, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47053747", "by": "jjice", "date": "2026-02-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "it blew the competition out of the water at the time. The audio was so much better.", "excerpt": "I don't think discord is going anywhere. Not that I like or support them, but the waves of people leaving anything are always overblown. Look at Reddit after the API switch up. The reason my friends and I moved to Discord in late 2015 or early 2016 was because it blew the competition out of the water at the time. The audio was so much better. I think screen share and face cams may not have been supported at the time,", "context": "", "use_case": "voice chat with friends", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord Rival Gets Overwhelmed by Exodus of Players Fleeing Age-Verification"}, {"id": 751953680, "item_id": 46997105, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46997105", "by": "carefree-bob", "date": "2026-02-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It really bothered me that so many important projects were relying on a proprietary chat technology", "excerpt": "I used to use discord for games a long time ago, but then I noticed it was being used for more serious stuff. For example, LLVM moved their chats from mailinglists to discord, as did a lot of open source projects. These are big, important projects, and now their chats are not discoverable and will soon be behind ID checks. It really bothered me that so many important projects were relying on a proprietary chat techno", "context": "former Discord user for games", "use_case": "open source project chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord Just Killed Anonymity"}, {"id": 751191056, "item_id": 46949441, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46949441", "by": "Venn1", "date": "2026-02-09", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Discord for chat and voice calls since that is what I expect from a chat app", "excerpt": "I set up a forum when I started my site for Linux content creation. Discord had become a black hole for technical know-how on a scale IRC could never dream of, and finding answers to common questions was nigh impossible since the technology has changed and the modern way to solve problem X was never asked in a forum and never indexed by a search engine. Granted, Reddit provided a bit of a stopgap over the last decade", "context": "runs a Linux content creation site", "use_case": "chat and voice calls", "switched_from": "", "story": "Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month"}, {"id": 742916656, "item_id": 46432291, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46432291", "by": "Foorack", "date": "2025-12-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why me and my friend groups are staying on Discord. Becuase it \"just works\".", "excerpt": "Am I the only one who doesn't care about E2E encryption, and just want an EU alternative? I DON'T WANT my chats to be \"full E2E encrypted\" with a 6-digit pin, only for me to loose them when I get a new phone. I DON'T WANT having to use a special gateway instead of normal IMAP to access my Proton mail. It really feels like server-side encryption is being forced down my throat and I don't consent. FB Messenger, X Chat,", "context": "", "use_case": "group chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Bye Bye Big Tech: How I Migrated to an Almost All-EU Stack (and Saved 500\u20ac/Year)"}]}