Written by Peta Hardiman
At first glance Reddit.com seems like a bland and un-navigatable mess. It’s front page is a series of random links and to be honest, it looks a whole lot like a forum gone wrong. But if you’ve ever used Reddit, you know what an incredible tool it can be, and if you’re not using Reddit… well, that’s what this article is for, so go and give it a browse (once you’ve finished here, of course).
The Front Page of the Internet
If you’ve ever wanted to find out what’s been happening in world news, look at memes, get some free investment advice, or find cute animal videos, Reddit is the place to go.
Described by both itself, and its users as “The Front Page of the Internet”, Reddit is full of basically everything and anything you’ve ever wanted to find. At least, once you work out how to navigate it, that is.
So, that page that opens up when you type in the URL reddit.com (that one that I pointed out earlier that looks like a forum gone wrong), is actually comprised of thousands of posts that have been voted to the top of their various communities, or ‘subreddits’.
This voting system is the backbone of Reddit, and users have the choice to ‘upvote’ or ‘downvote’ any given post or comment, thus moving it up or down that particular communities feed. Once something hits a high enough number of upvotes, it ends up on Reddit’s homepage, and that’s what you’re viewing when you first get to the site.
Subreddits: Where The Magic Happens
If upvoting and downvoting is the backbone of Reddit, then Subreddit’s are what give it life. There is a subreddit for everything. Or just about everything.
If you have a particular hobby or interest, you’ll probably find the subreddit to match.
Like Brooklyn 99? Try r/brooklyn99
Enjoy memes? You’re well covered there with r/memes, r/historicalmemes, r/dankmemes… whatever kind of meme tickles your fancy.
There’s even sub’s for personal finance, investing, freelance workers, and both world and local news sources.
The Beginner’s Guide
Finding anything on Reddit is a simple matter of typing in “reddit.com/r/” followed by whatever community you’re looking for.
But if it’s your first time, a few that I’d recommend you giving a look are:
- r/askreddit: This guy is the biggie. AskReddit is an absolutely massive sub full of any and every question you can think of. It’s touted as “the place to ask and answer thought-provoking questions”, and the fact that you’re getting input from a global source gives you the opportunity to explore a lot of differing viewpoints (although, not all are serious or thought-provoking)
- r/aww: Get your cute fix here friends! Full of videos and gifs of animals (and people) being both cute AND derpy. Along the same vein, there are also subs like ‘animalsbeingderps’, and ‘animalsbeingbros’
- r/showerthoughts: Another massive one, this sub is dedicated to that random thought that pops into your head while you’re completing some other mundane task like showering, driving, etc.
- r/oddlysatisfying: Full of those gifs that you just love watching, for whatever reason. Think powerwashing, laser cutting…
- r/todayilearned: What interesting fact or new thing have you learned today that you want to share with the world? Or would you perhaps like to learn something new? Either way, have a look here.
- r/writingprompts: A place for writers and non-writers alike to post prompts and flex their writing muscles!
- r/foodporn: I think this one is pretty self-explanatory, and it’s also absolutely safe for work.
These are just a few of the (literally) thousands of subreddits out there, just waiting to be discovered and explored.
Some communities are much larger than others, boasting hundreds of thousands of subscribers, where others might be smaller, with only a few hundred. But it’s incredible (and almost heartwarming) to know that there are subreddits for almost every topic, and almost every city or country. And that there are other people out there who love Fortnite, or engineers, and Christmas, and DIY, and just about anything else you could possibly think up.
The beauty of Reddit is that it’s so many different communities, waiting for you to join in and explore. And it is definitely designed to be explored. One word of warning though! You can lose a lot of time on Reddit. But anyway, have fun!
