If you’re trying to make your Reddit account more private, you’ll find there is no single setting that completely hides your activity or profile. However, you can significantly limit what others see and how they interact with you by adjusting key privacy and safety settings, being selective about what and where you post, and controlling what appears on your profile. In practice, these measures reduce the amount of information strangers can learn about you and help you manage your visibility on the platform.
What “Private” Really Means on Reddit
On Reddit, “private” doesn’t mean your profile disappears. Instead, it limits how easily other users can view your activity. Reddit doesn’t provide a fully private account option, so anyone can still open your profile and see whatever isn’t explicitly hidden.
You can hide individual posts and comments from your profile and prevent your content from appearing on r/all, which reduces its overall visibility.
You can also hide your follower count and the list of communities you’re active in, which shares less information about your activity patterns. However, moderators can still access your recent posts and comments for up to 28 days for the purpose of enforcing subreddit rules. This is also why businesses use Reddit strategically to tap into niche communities where their ideal customers are already active and engaged.
Essential Privacy Settings to Change First
Once you understand what “private” means on Reddit, you can review and adjust specific settings that affect how visible your activity is to others.
Start by going to Privacy & Security and turning off “Show upvotes on my profile” so that other users can’t see which posts and comments you have upvoted.
Then, open your Profile settings and disable “Allow people to follow you”. This hides your follower list and stops new users from following your account.
If you use the mobile app, you can also turn off “Show Active Communities” so that visitors can’t see which subreddits you participate in.
Finally, consider using a randomly generated username, especially if you want to separate your Reddit activity from your offline identity.
Keep in mind that you can’t change your username after 30 days.
Hiding Your Profile From Search and R/All
You can’t make a Reddit account completely invisible, but you can limit how often it appears in public areas such as search results and r/all.
In your account settings, open the Privacy section and turn off “Show up in search results” to prevent your profile from being indexed by Reddit’s internal search and, in some cases, external search engines.
Then, go to your profile settings and disable the Content Visibility option to reduce the chance that your posts will appear on r/all.
You can also turn off “Show Active Communities” so that the subreddits you have joined aren’t listed on your profile. On the mobile app, these options are available under Edit Profile.
Even with these settings adjusted, your username, posts, and comments in public subreddits can still be visible to others, especially if they navigate directly to your profile or content.
Controlling Who Can See Your Posts and Comments
Even though Reddit doesn’t offer a fully private account option, there are several settings you can use to limit how visible your activity is. You can hide your posts from r/all to reduce their exposure to users who browse that feed.
In your profile settings, you can disable “Show Active Communities” so other users can’t easily see where you post most often.
Under Content and Activity settings, you may be able to hide some or all public posts and comments from appearing directly on your profile, though they’ll usually remain visible in the original communities unless removed or restricted there.
For discussions on sensitive topics, it’s advisable to use separate throwaway accounts and avoid sharing identifying or personal information.
You can also hide your follower count to reduce the amount of information other users can see about your account.
Limiting Who Can Message or Chat With You
While you can’t make your Reddit account fully private, you can reduce unwanted contact by adjusting your messaging and chat settings.
Open your profile menu and locate the messaging and chat permissions sections.
These settings don’t allow you to block specific groups, but you can control who’s allowed to contact you. For stricter filtering, you can require that only accounts that are at least 30 days old may send you chat requests, which helps limit contact from spam or newly created accounts.
For the highest level of restriction, you can set chat permissions to “Nobody,” which prevents all new messages and chat requests.
It’s advisable to review these settings periodically to ensure they still match your preferences.
Making Your Voting and Follower Activity Less Visible
As you increase your privacy on Reddit, you can also limit how visible your voting and follower activity is.
On desktop, open your profile settings, go to the Privacy & Security section, and turn off “Show upvotes on my profile.” This prevents other users from viewing a list of posts and comments you have upvoted when they visit your profile.
Then, go to User Settings and disable “Allow people to follow you.” This reduces visibility into your social connections on Reddit by hiding your follower list and preventing others from following you in the future.
However, your existing posts, comments, and username will still be visible according to the communities’ and Reddit’s overall visibility settings.
If you’re concerned about linking sensitive activity to your primary account, it may be more appropriate to use a separate throwaway account for that purpose.
Hiding Active Communities and Sensitive Subreddits
You can also adjust how visible your community activity is.
On desktop, open your profile, go to Settings, then select the Profile tab, and switch off “Show active communities.”
When this is disabled, other users can’t see which subreddits you’re active in, but your ability to post and comment in those communities remains unchanged.
This setting can help reduce exposure of your interests or habits on the platform while preserving normal functionality.
Using Alternate Accounts and Anonymous Browsing
If you want to keep certain activity separate from your main Reddit account, using alternate accounts and anonymous browsing can reduce how much information is tied to a single identity.
Creating a secondary or “throwaway” account allows you to post or comment on topics without linking them to your primary profile. To make this separation more effective, choose a randomly generated username and avoid reusing the same or similar names across different accounts or platforms, as consistent identifiers can make it easier for others to connect your accounts.
For browsing without leaving as many local traces, you can use Anonymous Browsing in the Reddit mobile app. This limits how your activity is associated with your account on that device.
On desktop, you can open Reddit in your browser’s private or incognito mode to reduce the storage of browsing history, cookies, and other local data. Note that these measures mainly affect what’s stored on your device and how activity is linked to your account; they don’t make you fully anonymous to Reddit or your internet service provider.
Reducing Tracking, Ads, and Off-Reddit Visibility
Setting your profile to private limits what other users can see, but it doesn’t stop Reddit or third parties from tracking your activity. To reduce this tracking, open Settings ► Privacy & Security and disable personalized ads based on your Reddit activity and partner data.
You can also turn off “Allow Reddit to use your activity for research” to limit additional data collection.
Next, go to your profile settings. Toggle off “Show up in search results” to reduce the chance that search engines will index your profile. You can also disable “Show active communities” to hide the list of subreddits you participate in from other users.
If you want to add another layer of privacy, consider browsing through a reputable VPN service that has a clear privacy policy and doesn’t log user activity.
Ongoing Habits to Stay Low-Profile on Reddit
While one-time privacy adjustments are useful, you’ll remain more difficult to track on Reddit by turning low-profile behaviors into routine habits.
Use a randomly generated username that doesn’t resemble your real name, email address, or usernames on other platforms, and avoid reusing it elsewhere.
For posts involving sensitive or identifying information, use a separate throwaway account so your main profile contains fewer potential clues about your identity.
Periodically delete older posts and comments to reduce the amount of historical data associated with your account.
In your settings, hide your followers, block new followers if possible, and turn off your online status.
You can also disable chat or restrict it to approved users to limit unsolicited contact.
Conclusion
You cannot make a Reddit account completely invisible, but you can reduce its visibility and the amount of data exposed. Adjusting privacy and safety settings, hiding or limiting your public activity, restricting who can contact you, and using separate throwaway accounts for sensitive topics all help lower your profile. Regularly reviewing new settings and policy changes is useful, since Reddit updates its features over time. By assuming everything you post could be public and sharing only what you are comfortable attaching to your account, you can use Reddit with a higher degree of privacy and lower exposure.
