Social and VoIP platform Discord was launched in 2015 as a gamers-friendly communication platform, but it also acquired popularity among non-gaming audiences in recent years. The platform allows users to create or join thematic communities called servers, and as of April 2024, the Midjourney server was the most popular community on Discord, with over **** million members. Midjourney is an AI-powered text-to-image tool, which is accessible via a Discord bot on the official Discord server of the program. The second most popular Discord server was LimeWire, with *** million members. Not just a gamers’ space: Discord for communities While gaming servers are still among the most popular online spaces on the platform – with communities such as Valorant and the official Genshin Impact server amassing almost one million users respectively as of the beginning of 2023 – Discord is also a space for several different communities to come together. Educational servers, which have been growing on the platform since the outbreak of the global COVID-19 pandemic, range from language learning to hacking and programming, with the server “English” counting over *** thousand Discord users, and the server for Python counting ***** thousand users, respectively. Cross-platform communities include online spaces in which users share content from other social media, such as affiliated Reddit servers and TikTok-based communities. As of January 2023, TikTok videos and TikTok Zone were the most popular music servers on Discord, with *** thousand and *** thousand registered resharing content from the popular social video platform. Discord servers: the challenge of providing self-managed online spaces As Discord is composed by both public and private groups, moderating servers and enforcing the company’s Terms of Services represents a challenge. According to Discord, ** percent of the company’s employees are assigned to safety and moderation. However, servers on the platform are also moderated in their day-to-day activity by volunteer moderators. While Discord has repeatedly reported they do not have access to the four billion messages users exchange daily on the platform, in 2017 the company attracted global attention when it was revealed that it was used by alt-right groups in the United States to plan and organize the “Unite the Right 2.0” rally in Virginia, which culminated with a terroristic attack that left one dead and several wounded. Since then, Discord has engaged in several campaigns to remove servers classified as promulgating violent extremism: during the third quarter of 2022, *** servers were proactively removed from the platform due to violent extremism by the company’s safety and moderation team, while *** servers were reactively removed after users’ report.

Discord is a VoIP and communication platform that took off in 2015 among the gaming community first. As of April 2024, the most popular gaming community on the platform was the server for the popular Roblox game Blox Fruits with approximately 1.75 million members. The Discord server dedicated to Genshin Impact ranked second with 1.6 million members.

Discord was launched as a gamer-friendly communication platform, but this vibrant online environment has evolved to host much more than gaming. As of August 2024, Discord counted five distinct server categories, for a total of over 28,400 thousand servers. The largest number of servers on the platform were in gaming communities—approximately 21,000 thousand servers. Entertainment servers came in second, while education servers were around two thousand.

During the first half of 2024, the platform manipulation issue was the most prevalent community guideline violation on Discord, with over 15 million reports submitted by users on the platform. Reports related to harassment and bullying amounted to approximately 5.59 million. Discord users can send and receive files and images in private chats, but also post content on community boards called "servers" that can only be accessed by invitation.

As of February 2025, two billion users were accessing the WhatsApp messenger on a monthly basis. The app’s reach in usage penetration is particularly strong in markets outside the United States, and it is one of the most popular mobile social apps worldwide. WeChat amassed over 1.38 billion users, and Facebook Messenger amassed around 947 million users worldwide. Instant messaging is a type of online chat which offers real-time text transmission via internet. Since the appearance of the smartphone and the subsequent explosion of mobile apps, low-cost or free chat and social messaging apps have proven themselves as a cheap alternative to operator-based text messaging via SMS. Many messenger apps offer features such as group chats, the exchange of graphics, video and even audio messages as well as stickers or emoticons.

During the fourth quarter of 2023, accounts that received a ban due to child safety issues were approximately 116.21 thousand. Over 52 thousand accounts on the platform were banned due to the use of exploitative and unsolicited content. Additionally, the platform permanently deleted approximately 32.6 thousand accounts following reports of illegal activities