Reddit: What is the Karma System? We explain

Karma is one of the core features on Reddit. If you're just learning about the platform, our guide explains what it is, what its purpose is, and what it means in practice.

For the digital ego: Every Reddit account builds up its own karma score.

The better known Reddit becomes in Germany, the more explanation is needed regarding its functions. There, karma plays an important role for the discussion culture.

Reddit: Karma as a rating system for posts and comments

Karma, so to speak, are the points that users can receive for all their posts and comments.

• Important in this context are upvotes and downvotes (voting up and down). Every post and comment can be rated positively or negatively by users - if they want to. This is comparable to Facebook likes (and the opposite).
• Always shows the total balance. For example, if a comment receives 100 upvotes and 30 downvotes, the difference of 70 is displayed. These 70 points go to the karma account of the author.
• Overweigh the downvotes, consequently appears a negative value.
• With this system, each user builds his own karma total score. This is openly visible in the user profile.

Long-term active users not infrequently have karma in the five- or six-digit range. However, the karma can not be spent; it is rather to be understood as a kind of award. Within posts, the karma should also take over a moderation function. In addition, in some subreddits only users with a certain minimum score of karma can comment and post, as this is to minimize the risk of fresh troll accounts.