For years, Imgur has been the go-to service Redditors use to upload images when opening threads on the website, but this might be about to change soon.
Starting today, Reddit is launching its own in-house image uploading tool on the Web that will let users quickly and easily post pics when sharing links.
The feature allows Redditors to upload images and GIFs – up to 20MB and 100MB respectively – directly to the website when posting a new thread.
In contrast to pics uploaded to Imgur, when opening Reddit-hosted images from any listing – like a front page, a user page or a subreddit – users will be directed straight to the conversation and comments about that image.
For now, Reddit is rolling out the new tool only to a small number – 16 in total – of selected communities, but there are plans to expand the service to 50 other subreddits starting from next week.
At present, you can test Reddit’s native image uploading service in one of these communities: GetMotivated, EarthPorn, Gaming, Space, OldSchoolCool, Sports, Art, Aww, Dataisbeautiful, Food, Funny, Gifs, mildlyinteresting, movies, photoshopbattles or pics.
The first iteration of the feature will support only single image and GIF uploads and it will look like this.
Despite the new tool, the website will continue to allow users to share images hosted on third-party uploading services.
“For a long time, other image hosting services have been an integral part of how content is shared on Reddit — we’re grateful to those teams, but are looking forward to bringing you a more seamless experience with this new feature,” a member of Reddit’s product team said.
It is not yet clear how the new feature will influence Reddit’s content policy, but TechCrunch has speculated that the same rules will apply to images hosted with the native tool. This means that Reddit will also have to oversee the service for illegal or offensive material.
Get the TNW newsletter
Get the most important tech news in your inbox each week.