Reddit to force mandatory login as Google traffic drops
Reddit will no longer be viewable without an account, thanks to Google's AI overviews.
Reddit has announced plans to force all users to log in to a Reddit account in order to view the entire website, according to the company's third-quarter earnings report. This change, which would mark a significant shift from the current setup, is a result of Google's introduction of AI Overviews and the subsequent decline in search referral traffic.
Google's AI Overviews have caused devastating drops in traffic for many websites, including Reddit, as users are directed to the AI-generated summaries instead of the full content. Reddit CEO Steve Huffman stated that this change is aimed at focusing on the core users who come to the platform directly, rather than relying on search referrals.
In a letter to shareholders, Reddit revealed that search referral traffic dropped significantly in Q3, with the decline accelerating in the latter part of the quarter. During October, search traffic dropped by more than 1 million referrals on average per week. Reddit intends to prioritize direct traffic, which consists of users who actively choose to visit the site every day.
The exact timeline for implementing this change has not been disclosed, but testing is expected to begin outside the United States in the fourth quarter of the year.
Written by urgent.news from Mashable's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
