Are you an active member of the Reddit community and want to boost your Karma? Don’t worry because learning how to get Karma on Reddit is not as hard as you think. While Reddit doesn’t publicize its Karma computation, several ways are guaranteed to increase your Karma. You just have to know what to do and how to do it.
If you are already thinking of deleting your Reddit account just because your Karma is low, don’t just yet. We’ve got some tips to share to boost your Karma.
Inside This Article
- What Is Karma on Reddit?
- How Does Reddit Determine Your Karma?
- What Are the Benefits of High Karma?
- How to Get Karma on Reddit
- How to Check Your Karma
- What Is the Highest Reddit Karma You Can Earn?
- Can You Buy Karma on Reddit?
What Is Karma on Reddit?
Let’s say you’re a new Reddit user who has found browsing through the app’s subreddits entertaining. You’ve even downloaded the best Reddit app you can find to optimize your viewing experience. However, you’ve never truly participated or contributed to any community because you’re afraid of what users call Reddit Karma.
What is karma on Reddit? Unlike Snapchat’s Snapchat score, karma on Reddit isn’t a scoring system the app uses to encourage users to stay engaged. On the contrary, the system is both an incentive to participate or a demerit to users, depending on your score.
That’s because you can have both positive and negative karma, which affects your usage of the app. Positive karma is what you have as long as your Karma is over one point. On the other hand, negative karma is the term used for users who have less than zero points.
How Does Reddit Determine Your Karma?
Each post or comment you post can draw in reactions (upvotes and downvotes) that will determine your karma. Upvotes reflect positively on your karma while downvotes do the opposite. However, it’s worth noting that the ratio isn’t 1:1 – i.e. one upvote doesn’t equal one positive karma. Likewise, one downvote doesn’t yield one negative karma, either.
Unfortunately, Reddit isn’t clear about the formula and how they compute karma. Nonetheless, there are both perks and drawbacks to having positive or negative karma.
What Are the Benefits of High Karma?
Learning how to get karma on Reddit can prove to be beneficial. That’s especially true if you aim to be more active within the app. Moreover, high positive karma provides special privileges that most regular users can’t access. Here are some of them:
1. Good Credibility
Firstly, the most obvious benefit of having high karma points on Reddit is gaining good credibility. With high karma, the app (and other people) know you’re generally a knowledgeable and good user. You don’t post spam and are likely to be polite and a positive force in the overall community.
Sure, this isn’t exactly the best way to judge someone’s character online. That’s because someone could simply be a polite user yet engage in questionable things within the app. Moreover, people could even delete their Reddit history to hide that side of them from other users. Nonetheless, it’s certainly one way of gaining ample respect within communities.
2. Posting Without Approval
Some subreddits and communities encourage users to post by nature. For example, the whole purpose of certain subs like r/AskReddit is to provide an avenue for strangers to ask random questions. Other communities don’t require users to post questions but other things like memes or hot takes.
On the other hand, while some communities let users post freely, others have an approval process set up. These subreddits only let posts that were approved by a moderator pass through to the community. However, if you have tons of positive karma, some subreddits will allow you to post without the need for approval.
3. Creating Subreddits
Reddit is a unique social media app that doesn’t allow just anyone to create any kind of subreddit. If that were the case, the app would be too bloated to even have meaningful communities. That’s why it employs the karma system and uses it to determine whether someone can create a subreddit. Without a certain amount of positive karma, you won’t be able to make one.
4. Access to Exclusive Subreddits
Are you interested in joining more exclusive clubs like r/CenturyClub? If so, you might need to rack up some good karma points before you jump in. That’s because some communities are so exclusive that they have a karma requirement for all their users. In this case, r/CenturyClub only accepts users with at least 100,000 karma points.
If you’ve racked up too much negative karma, you might want to delete your Reddit account to start over. You’ll have an easier time starting from scratch rather than trying to salvage all that negative karma on your account.
5. Reddit Marketing
Finally, if you want to do Reddit marketing, you’ll need a high positive karma rating. This will ensure you gain access to the app’s other perks that we’ve just listed. Moreover, it’s the only way you can post many links in various subreddits without obstacles. It’s also a great way to show potential clients that you’re a good user who means no harm.
How to Get Karma on Reddit
Are you on the lookout for the perfect method to learn how to get karma on Reddit? Here are the best ways you can do so as a regular user.
1. Make Good Posts
Like most social media apps, Reddit is all about circulating good and entertaining content. This means your posts on any subreddit have to be witty, creative, unique, or interesting. Make sure it’s attention-grabbing enough for people to upvote your post.
Moreover, make sure it’s engaging enough that people will want to comment and participate. However, we strongly advise you not to repost other people’s posts because it’s seen as low-effort or attention-seeking.
2. Ask Good Questions
Posting declarative statements or witty memes aren’t the only methods for how to get karma on Reddit. Sometimes, posting a genuine question could yield even more karma if people find it intriguing. It’s a great way to boost engagement and incur tons of upvotes if you post the right question.
3. Time Your Posts
Like most social media platforms, timing is key to virality and engagement on Reddit. It’s one of the most underappreciated methods for how to get karma on Reddit, but it’s certainly worth considering. That’s because even if you post something captivating, you won’t get upvotes if people don’t see it.
Generally, we recommend posting between 6 AM and 8 AM (EST) on weekdays. For weekends, posting between 7 AM to 9 AM and 8 AM to 12 PM (EST) should be effective. This is because these times are when the app usually pushes content to the peak to reach larger audiences. Hence, it’s the best way to optimize a post’s views.
4. Comment With Intelligence
One of the easiest methods how to get Karma on Reddit fast is by commenting on others’ posts. Of course, we don’t mean you should post spam content and comment on every post within a subreddit. People will likely see you as annoying that way.
What we mean is that you should add comments that provide more value to other people. Comment anything insightful, thought-provoking, or noteworthy and you should be good to go. If it’s especially compelling to other users, you might even see a large boost in karma.
5. Comment on New and Rising Posts
Commenting on random posts may get you a few upvotes from the original poster (OP). However, if you want more upvotes, you’ll want to comment on new or rising posts. This means commenting on any post that’s gaining traction or popularity within the subreddit. It’s even better if you’re one of the first commenters because people will more likely see your comment.
6. Answer Others’ Questions
There are many “Ask” subreddits within the app – and utilizing them is a great way to increase karma. That’s because posts on these subreddits usually prompt users to ask any question within the boundaries of the subreddit’s theme.
All you must do is answer people’s questions if you have a good answer. This is almost the same as regular commenting. However, it’s more specific and more likely to yield upvotes if you give a compelling answer.
7. Join Free Karma Subreddits
Do you want to farm for free karma on Reddit? If so, we recommend joining free karma subreddits like r/FreeKarma4U. People within these kinds of subreddits generally acknowledge that whoever’s posting wants karma. Hence, most people should upvote your comments or posts regardless of what you type.
However, proceed with caution because these subreddits also have strict rules. You shouldn’t simply post anything like “please upvote this” or else you might get downvoted. Make sure to read the subreddit’s rules before you post anything.
8. Join Large Subreddits
Joining niche subreddits might be a good method of getting positive karma on Reddit if your focus is visibility. However, joining large subreddits is also important because they have higher foot traffic. Communities like r/AskReddit and r/funny are great places to start.
Who knows? You might one day create a post that goes viral or make a witty enough comment to earn many upvotes. Just make sure to follow all the other guidelines we’ve listed here so far. That means posting only interesting or high-quality content, commenting politely with insightful thoughts, or genuinely answering people’s questions.
9. Reply to Others’ Comments
Unlike apps like Instagram or TikTok, Reddit is all about encouraging conversation. This means replying to other people’s comments on your posts is a great way to farm karma. It’s especially true if you’re replying to a comment with a lot of upvotes already.
Try to reply to every commenter and make sure their comments/ideas were heard. Keep the conversation going for a while and you might rack up a few upvotes here and there. It’s not only a great method on how to get karma on Reddit but it’s also just good etiquette.
10. Be Slightly Controversial
Most people love a good controversy, especially if it’s a good hot take on a conventional opinion. In fact, a lot of things that go viral on social media are usually controversial or decidedly against the crowd. Doing something similar could help your posts or comments go viral pretty quickly.
However, do note that you should exercise caution when posting something controversial. That’s because posting things that are against Reddit’s rules could get you banned. In addition, a controversial take could be taken as an attack on something or someone else that’s beloved. This might earn you more downvotes than upvotes, which goes against your goal.
With that said, we generally recommend posting things that are only mildly controversial. Something simple but unique. For example, you can disagree with a popular concept or opinion – say, you like pineapples on pizza. You can also post media content like GIFs, memes, photos, or videos.
11. Don’t Farm Karma too Much
While we generally recommend staying engaged within the app, we do advise against going overboard with the farming. That’s because other Redditors can usually sense when someone is just farming karma with low-quality comments or posts.
Doing so could have the opposite effect and yield more downvotes than upvotes. With that said, make sure your karma growth is more natural and gradual.
12. Be Mindful of Copyrights
Reddit has tons of copyright rules within the platform that prevent its users from disobeying copyright laws. If you violate any rules, Reddit could take down your post. Moreover, if you simply copy content from other websites, Reddit could even ban you altogether.
How to Check Your Karma
Now that you’ve learned how to get karma on Reddit, you might be wondering how you can even keep track of the metric. Luckily, the app provides an easy way for users to view their standing within the app. All you must do is click on your Reddit account and username. Afterward, click “Profile” and you’ll see a metric that shows you your Karma earned so far.
What Is the Highest Reddit Karma You Can Earn?
In the past, anything over a million would have been considered high karma. However, Reddit’s recent leaderboards now even list people with over 40 million karma. So far, there hasn’t been a cap on how much Reddit karma you can earn – and it seems like there won’t be.
Can You Buy Karma on Reddit?
Technically, yes you can. You can’t do so by buying karma within the app per se as it’s not like in-app currency. However, you can buy Reddit accounts with good karma. Furthermore, you can even pay people to upvote your posts if you’re resourceful enough.
Nonetheless, we generally don’t recommend you to buy karma on Reddit. That’s because it’s a manipulative tactic and if people find out, the community will likely cancel your account. This could harm your reputation and it will mean people won’t trust your brand or any products you sell.
An Uphill Climb
Learning how to get karma on Reddit is fairly easy if you know your way around the app. The only thing it requires is good engagement with the community through posts or comments. Of course, you can’t earn high karma overnight. You’ll need to slowly build your reputation and gain upvotes by posting quality content.
