Reddit shuts down RSS feeds and sets 2027 end date for public API access

Reddit is shutting down RSS feeds, the web feed format that lets apps pull in new posts automatically, starting November 13. The company also set March 2027 as the end date for its public API, the programmatic channel outside developers and researchers have used to pull Reddit data into other tools. Reddit announced both changes Wednesday alongside a batch of updates for moderators and developers.

Reddit said RSS has become a “common surface for large-scale scraping and automated abuse.” In the same announcement, the company wrote: “We know RSS has been a beloved part of the open web for a long time, and we’re grateful to everyone who used it to stay connected to Reddit.”

RSS, short for Really Simple Syndication, is a format for subscribing to a site’s new posts without visiting it directly, and it became common during the blogging era. Google ran the most widely used version, Google Reader, until shutting it down in 2013, leaving the market to apps such as Feedly.

The shutdown follows Reddit turning its user-generated content into a growing revenue stream through AI licensing deals. Reddit said its “other revenue,” which sits apart from advertising, grew 24% year-over-year to $43 million in its second quarter. Cutting off free RSS access and public API access limits how much of that content AI companies can collect without paying Reddit directly for it.

The changes land differently depending on who’s using them. Reddit is directing moderators who relied on RSS for community alerts to switch to the Discord Relay Devvit app, though it said there’s no replacement for RSS feeds that pulled in content from outside a moderator’s own community. Moderators have said the shift could make their subreddits harder to manage. Developers building approved third-party apps and bots must register them with Reddit by January 12, 2027, or lose API access after that date, and AI assistants that currently answer questions using Reddit data will need commercial agreements with the company once public API access closes in March 2027.

Old Reddit access also narrows

Reddit is also tightening access to its classic, text-heavy Old Reddit version, citing the same “abusive scraping and automated traffic.” It plans to limit logged-in access to moderators and users who have visited Old Reddit within the past 6 months, widened from the 90-day window the company had initially shared with TechCrunch before publication. The RSS shutdown takes effect November 13. Developers have until January 12, 2027, to register third-party apps and bots, and the public API closes fully by March 2027, the point at which AI products built on free Reddit access will need paid deals to keep pulling from the site.