// PC GAMER — GAMING
Reddit will switch to a 'logged-in only experience'
The exact details of the change are still being determined (and yep, this is about AI).
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.
Reddit will become a "logged-in only experience," and the company plans to move fast, beginning testing soon in regions outside the US before flipping the switch globally.
The popular community website—home to a great many official and unofficial gaming message boards—lost one million search engine referrals per week on average in October, CEO Steve Huffman said on an investor call today.
The culprit, of course, was AI. A Google search that once might have led someone to a 14-year-old Reddit thread containing the answer to a rare household cleaning problem is now likely to present that answer in an AI summary, no click required.
"Google has really shifted in their relationship with the rest of the internet," Huffman said during a Q&A.
The CEO emphasized, however, that most of Reddit's revenue (over 80%) comes from logged-in and app users, and said that the company will focus on establishing the site as "a direct daily habit" that doesn't rely on search traffic.
Efforts cited in that direction include algorithmic feeds, improved app design and performance, AI-powered moderation tools, and "new experiences like games and visual podcasts," the latter referring to, I believe, a feature that uses generative AI to turn posts into videos.
The switch to a logged-in only experience will also help "protect access to Reddit's extremely valuable corpus of data," Huffman said.
Keep up to date with the most important stories and the best deals, as picked by the PC Gamer team.