Discord is working on repositioning itself as a chat platform, rather than a gaming messaging platform.
As millions of people have been sheltering in place, working from home and relying on communication tools to keep in touch, chat and video conferencing apps have become all the rage. While Discord started out as a messaging platform for gamers, it would appear it is growing far beyond that and moving into the general communication space.
In a blog post, CEO Jason Citron said the company has spent the last year finding out what mattered most to its users. Based on that information, it quickly became apparent that many individuals were using Discord to be part of an online community, engage in meaningful conversation and have a place to belong.
“You came to us and said Discord was this place. And for millions of you, it already felt like a home,” writes Citron.
“Today, many of you use Discord for day-to-day communication. You’re sharing thoughts about books, music, and art, creating servers to just be yourself and share moments with friends. Since we launched in 2015, Discord has grown to more than 100 million monthly active users. You spend 4 billion minutes in conversation daily across 6.7 million active servers. On a weekly basis, that’s 26 billion server conversation minutes across 13.5 million active servers.”
Citron then goes on to highlight the changes Discord is making to keep up with the way people are using it. These changes include improving the branding to focus on chat, making Discord “hostile to hate” and improving the onboarding experience.
It’s a safe bet that Discord will probably continue to grow and benefit from this move, especially as digital communication is more important than ever.
