Hajra Naz
Reddit recently shared big plans for its platform. The company said it would bring most viral stories to life. This will happen through a new “video Reddit” experience. The goal is simple. Users will be able to listen to Reddit posts in the background. This works while doing other tasks or activities. Reddit will begin testing this on Monday. The initial version includes both video and audio posts. These will roll out across select communities. Reddit wants to see which post types resonate most. It’s also testing what has real potential to scale.
Reddit first announced these plans during its second-quarter earnings call in July. CEO Steve Huffman spoke directly to analysts at the time. He explained that people were already consuming Reddit content this way. But they were doing it on other platforms entirely.
Huffman was referring to a specific trend. Other social media platforms already feature Reddit content heavily. That includes TikTok. It also includes Meta’s Reels. Popular Reddit stories often get narrated there. Sometimes a text-to-speech feature reads them aloud. Other times, creators read the stories themselves. Some of these videos display text on screen as it’s read. Others pair the audio with unrelated footage. That footage might include video game gameplay. It could also include cooking content playing in the background.
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Huffman addressed this trend directly on the earnings call. He said there’s an emerging content format elsewhere online. Essentially, it functions like podcasts. People read Reddit content aloud in that format. He added his own perspective too. He believes this listened-to version of Reddit could be genuinely engaging as well.
Reddit shared more context with about these early tests. The company said these are early, limited experiments for now. The goal is understanding how these formats can help users. Reddit also wants to know if this can feel authentic to the platform itself. Users will have a choice once the feature is available. They can select whether to “read” or “play” a given post.
This test has some clear limits for now. It will focus only on select English-language posts. It will be accessible through Reddit’s iOS and Android apps.
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Reddit made one thing clear. These new formats won’t replace the original, text-only post. Both the original post and its comments will remain fully accessible. Users can still view and engage with them as before. Instead, Reddit sees this as an added option. Some people may want to listen to Reddit audio while exercising. Others might prefer it while walking or running errands. Meanwhile, some users may want to watch written conversations come alive. That would happen through combined video and audio.
This isn’t Reddit’s first experiment with video content. The company rolled out native video hosting years ago. It also tested various versions of a TikTok-style video feed over time. More recently, Reddit launched support for video in comments. According to the company, that feature now accounts for more than 10% of all video posts on the platform.
