This article was published on April 10, 2015

So, what’s up with that Reddit button that’s driving the internet bonkers?


So, what’s up with that Reddit button that’s driving the internet bonkers?

On April Fools’ Day this year, many tech companies came out with their own pranks and easter eggs, from Google Pac-Maps to Imgur’s GIF collaboration experiment. Reddit didn’t show off anything extravagant: Just a locked blue button with a 60-second timer next to it.

r/thebutton has since been driving Redditors nuts. You’re only allowed to push the button once, but there’s no telling what happens after you push it.

As it turns out, nothing happens exactly. The Button is simply a social experiment on human curiosity and patience. The 60-second countdown clock measures how long an entire community of Redditors are able to wait until one member pushes the button, restarting the clock back to 60.

reddit the button

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Since April Fools’, however, members are now seeing colored circles next to their usernames. This flair indicates how long the member waited to push to button. If they hadn’t yet used their one push, the color remains grey.

This color-coding ranking only appears for users who joined Reddit before April 1, 2015 to avoid people making new usernames to try their trigger fingers at getting a different color.

reddit colors
Screen Shot 2015-04-10 at 2.23.33 PM

As of Friday morning, more than 687,000 users have pushed The Button. Redditors have even begun cataloging members who waited long enough to get “rare” colors, meaning they waited until the clock counted down to 31 seconds and below. At the time of this article, no one has made it down to the red or orange level just yet.

r/thebutton has gained so much momentum that even ‘Game of Thrones’ actress Maisie Williams has gotten in on the fun.


Will the clock ever count down to zero? Only time will tell for such a pressing issue.

Read next: The best (and worst!) April Fools’ Day pranks in the tech world ever

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