How to Curate Your Reddit Profile: Privacy Tips [2025]

Reddit's been around for nearly two decades, and it's evolved from a niche community hangout into one of the internet's most influential platforms. You're probably already on Reddit. Maybe you're lurking in niche communities, dropping knowledge bombs in discussion threads, or confessing your deepest thoughts in throwaway accounts. But here's what most people don't realize: your Reddit profile is a window into who you are.

Every upvote you've given, every post you've made, every controversial comment from 2 AM when you couldn't sleep—it's all potentially visible. And yeah, Reddit's semi-anonymous, but the profile piece of it? That's where things get real.

The good news? Reddit finally gave you actual control over what shows up on your profile. Not the posts and comments themselves (those still exist in their respective subreddits), but what appears when someone clicks on your profile. You can hide your activity from certain communities, disable followers, hide NSFW content, and control who can see what.

The problem? Most people have no idea these settings exist. They're buried in menus, the defaults are pretty open, and there's no onboarding warning that says "Hey, your Reddit history is about to be an open book."

In this guide, we're walking through every single option. We'll show you how to access these settings, explain what each toggle actually does, help you understand what you might want to hide (and why), and give you a framework for thinking about your digital reputation on Reddit.

Because here's the thing: you never know who's visiting your profile. Could be a recruiter checking your background. Could be someone from a subreddit you post in. Could be a former friend doing detective work. The point is, you get to decide what they see.

TL; DR

• Reddit profiles are public by default, exposing your post history, comments, and activity across subreddits unless you actively change settings
• The new Curate Your Profile feature lets you show/hide content by subreddit, toggle NSFW visibility, and control follower information
• Privacy controls are separate from profile visibility: hiding posts on your profile doesn't delete them from subreddits, it just removes them from your profile page
• Customize by community: you can hide activity from sensitive communities while showing contributions to professional or technical subreddits
• Three content activity options exist: Show All (default), Hide All (complete privacy), or Customize (granular control by subreddit)

Thinking that curation deletes content is the most common mistake, with an estimated frequency of 80%. Estimated data based on typical user behavior.

Why Your Reddit Profile Matters More Than You Think

Most social platforms have privacy settings because they learned the hard way that people care about their digital footprint. Twitter learned it. Facebook definitely learned it. Instagram learned it after that whole Cambridge Analytica thing. Reddit's late to the party, but they're catching up.

The thing about Reddit is that it's weirdly authentic. People post things on Reddit they wouldn't post on Instagram or Twitter. It's anonymous enough to feel safe, but identifiable enough to build reputation through karma and post history. You'll see someone in r/personalfinance asking for advice about their marriage problems, then find them in r/investing discussing stock picks, then spot them in some niche hobby community.

Connect those dots, and you've got a pretty detailed picture of who someone is.

The Real Risks of an Open Profile

Let's talk about why this actually matters. First, there's professional risk. If you're job hunting, your profile visibility matters. Some recruiters absolutely check social media, and if they find your Reddit history, they're learning things you might not want them to know. You might be proud of your contributions to r/learnprogramming, but less excited about your very active participation in niche communities.

Second, there's the harassment angle. Reddit has its bad corners. If you've spoken up in communities that attract controversy, or if you've publicly disagreed with certain viewpoints, a visible profile makes you a target. Bad actors can build a detailed profile of your interests, vulnerabilities, and beliefs.

Third, there's just privacy for privacy's sake. You have a right to participate in communities without your entire activity being broadcast. Maybe you're dealing with health anxiety and found r/Health Anxiety genuinely helpful. Maybe you're working through relationship problems in r/Just No MIL. That's nobody's business but yours.

Fourth, there's the data angle. Every piece of information on your profile is data that can be collected, analyzed, and used to build increasingly sophisticated profiles of you. Third-party services scrape Reddit data constantly. If you make your profile completely public, you're feeding those data silos.

The last thing is just brand management. If you've built a reputation on Reddit—maybe you're known for helpful comments in r/Ask Historians or thoughtful discussion in r/Academic Biblical—you might want to control which parts of that are visible. You can show the professional stuff and hide the personal stuff.

The Misconception About Anonymity

Here's where people get confused: Reddit is pseudonymous, not anonymous. You use a username instead of your real name, so there's a layer of separation. But that's not the same as being anonymous. If you use the same username everywhere, people can identify you. If you post identifying information, you're done. If you post about specific life circumstances, someone determined enough can cross-reference that.

Think of it this way: you're not actually anonymous on Reddit. You're just not immediately identified. Your profile is like wearing a mask at a party—people can't immediately see your face, but if you stay long enough and talk about specific personal details, they'll figure out who you are.

The curation settings don't make you anonymous. They just give you control over how much of your profile is visible to someone casually browsing. It's not encryption or anonymity protection—it's just privacy controls.

Accessing Your Profile Curation Settings: Desktop Edition

Let's get practical. If you're on desktop, here's how to find these settings.

First, log into Reddit. Look at the top right of your screen. You'll see your avatar (or a generic placeholder if you haven't set one). Click it. A dropdown menu will appear with options. One of those options says "View Profile." Click that.

Now you're looking at your profile page. This is what other people see when they visit your profile. At the top, you'll see several sections: Posts, Comments, Upvoted, Downvoted, and sometimes Saved. Below those sections, on the right side, you'll see an "Update" button next to each section header.

Here's the new button you're looking for: "Curate your profile." This button appeared in 2024 when Reddit rolled out these new controls. It might be on your profile page itself, or you might need to go into settings. If you can't find it on your profile, try this: Click your avatar again, then select "Settings." Once you're in Settings, look for the "Profile" tab. Scroll down, and you should see "Curate your profile."

Understanding the Settings Screen Layout

Once you click into Curate your profile, you'll see a pretty clean interface with several toggle switches and dropdown menus. Don't get overwhelmed. We're going to walk through each one.

At the top, there's usually basic profile info: your display name, your avatar, your banner image if you've set one. This isn't part of curation—this is just profile branding. You can change these anytime without affecting curation.

Below that, you'll see the curation-specific controls. These are the important ones. They're organized into logical groups, and the layout makes sense once you understand what each control actually does.

One thing to note: these settings only affect what's visible on your profile page. They don't delete anything, they don't prevent mods from seeing your activity, and they don't prevent the subreddit where you posted from showing your post. These settings are specifically about what appears on your profile page when someone visits it.

Estimated data suggests a balanced distribution among users choosing professional, hobby, hidden, and transparent profile setups.

The NSFW Toggle: Hiding Adult Content from Your Profile

Let's start with the simplest setting: the NSFW toggle.

NSFW stands for "Not Safe For Work," and on Reddit, it technically means content that's sexually explicit, violent, or otherwise not appropriate for viewing in professional settings. But Reddit communities marked as NSFW include everything from sex-related communities to political communities to true crime discussions. The definition is broad.

When you enable the NSFW toggle in your curation settings, it hides all posts and comments you've made in communities that are marked as NSFW. So if you've posted heavily in r/sex or r/True Off My Chest (which is marked NSFW), that activity won't appear on your profile.

Here's what's important to understand: this only hides activity in NSFW-marked communities. It doesn't hide NSFW subreddits you've merely viewed or scrolled through—Reddit doesn't track that or display it on your profile anyway. It specifically hides your contributions (posts and comments) in adult communities.

When You'd Want This Enabled

The obvious case is if you participate in adult communities and don't want that visible to potential employers, romantic interests, or family members who might stumble on your profile. That's totally legitimate.

But there's a subtler case too. Maybe you've posted in r/Sexual Abuse seeking support. Or r/Depression Regimens discussing medical treatments. These are marked NSFW, and having that activity visible might feel invasive even if it's not actually explicit content.

Another scenario: maybe you've got a large following on your Reddit account, and you want to keep your public persona family-friendly. Hiding NSFW activity helps maintain that image.

The Limitation You Need to Know

Here's the catch: this is all-or-nothing. You can't hide activity from some NSFW subreddits while showing activity from others. It's either enabled (hides all NSFW activity) or disabled (shows all NSFW activity).

So if you've posted thoughtful comments in r/Sex Positive (a discussion-based community marked NSFW) and also posted in more explicit communities, toggling NSFW on hides both. You don't get granular control here.

If you need that level of control, you'd use the "Customize" option in the Content and Activity section instead, which we'll cover later.

The Followers Toggle: Controlling Your Social Graph

The second toggle is about followers. On Reddit, followers are people who've chosen to see your posts and comments appear in their feeds. It's not the same as Twitter followers. Most Reddit users don't even have followers enabled.

When you toggle the Followers option on, visitors to your profile can see how many followers you have and can click to see who those followers are. When you toggle it off, that information isn't displayed.

Why This Matters Less Than You Think (But Still Matters)

Follower count on Reddit is genuinely not that meaningful. It doesn't affect your karma, your visibility, or your ability to post. Some accounts have zero followers, and some have thousands, and it doesn't really correlate with influence or activity level.

But there are reasons you might not want this visible anyway.

First, if you have a very low follower count, it might feel embarrassing or make you feel less credible. Stupid reason? Maybe. But psychology is real.

Second, if you have a large follower count and you're trying to keep a low profile, having that number visible defeats the purpose. It draws attention.

Third, there's the "who's following me" angle. When you disable the Followers toggle, people can't see a list of your followers. If you're concerned about being linked to certain communities or accounts through your followers, disabling this makes sense.

The Real Privacy Implication

The privacy angle here is weaker than with other settings, because Reddit doesn't show much about followers anyway. It's just names and links to their profiles. But if you're being thorough about privacy, disabling this prevents someone from building a network map of accounts that follow you.

For most people, this toggle is less critical than others. But for people in sensitive situations—activists, people in communities that face harassment, people maintaining professional separation—it's worth disabling just to be safe.

Content and Activity: The Core of Profile Curation

Now we're getting to the real stuff. The "Content and Activity" section is where you control what actually shows up on your profile.

You have three options in a dropdown menu: "Show All," "Hide All," and "Customize."

Show All: The Default Aggressive Transparency

"Show All" is the default setting. When this is enabled, every post and comment you've ever made shows up on your profile in reverse chronological order. Someone can scroll through your entire Reddit history. It's like leaving your diary open on a table.

For most people, "Show All" is too much. You probably don't want complete transparency of everything you've ever posted.

But there are people who genuinely don't care. Some accounts are professional by design—a company account, a moderator account for a subreddit, an expert sharing knowledge. If that's your situation, "Show All" is fine.

The thing about "Show All" is that it requires no additional configuration. You enable it, and you're done. Everything's visible. No granular choices to make.

Hide All: Maximum Privacy, Zero Nuance

"Hide All" is the opposite extreme. When enabled, no posts or comments show up on your profile at all. Your profile becomes a blank slate as far as activity goes.

This is useful if you want complete privacy but still want to maintain an active Reddit account. Maybe you've got communities you love, conversations you enjoy, but you don't want any of it visible on your profile page.

People often choose "Hide All" if they're using Reddit for personal exploration in sensitive areas. Therapy discussions, political exploration, identity questions—anything where you want to participate but wouldn't want anyone to see your participation history.

The downside? If you've built actual expertise or credibility on Reddit, "Hide All" makes that invisible too. If you're known for thoughtful comments in r/Ask Historians or helpful advice in r/Personal Finance, hiding everything prevents that reputation from being visible.

So "Hide All" is about choosing privacy over reputation.

Customize: Granular Control by Community

This is where the real power is. "Customize" lets you choose, community by community, what shows up on your profile and what doesn't.

When you select "Customize," Reddit shows you a list of every subreddit where you've posted or commented. You get a checkbox next to each one. Check it, and that community's activity shows up on your profile. Uncheck it, and it doesn't.

This is the middle ground. You can show your activity in professional communities (r/learnprogramming, r/webdev, r/datascience) while hiding activity in personal communities (r/Health Anxiety, r/Just No MIL, r/Suicide Watch).

The power here is obvious: you get to choose your public reputation on a granular level.

How to Actually Use Customize

Once you select "Customize," a dialog box or modal pops up. It lists every community where you've been active. Scroll through it. For each community, you'll see a checkbox.

Decide which communities you want visible. Think about it strategically. Which communities represent your public self? Which represent your private self?

Here's a framework: visible communities are typically ones where you're sharing expertise, offering help, or contributing to public discourse. Hidden communities are typically ones where you're seeking help, exploring vulnerabilities, or participating in sensitive discussions.

Once you've made your selections, save. That's it. Your profile now shows activity from some communities but not others.

Here's what you need to understand: this only affects what shows on your profile. The posts and comments still exist in their respective subreddits. If you posted something in r/Personal Finance, that post is still there, visible in r/Personal Finance. You're just controlling whether it shows on your profile page.

The All-or-Nothing Limitation

One important limitation: you can't hide individual posts or comments. It's all or nothing per community. Either all your activity in r/Health Anxiety is hidden, or all of it is visible. You can't hide specific posts while showing others.

If you need that level of control, you'd have to delete the specific posts or comments yourself. But most people are fine with community-level granularity.

Updating Your Preferences Over Time

The beauty of Customize is that you can come back and change it anytime. As your life changes, as you move between communities, as you become more or less comfortable with certain aspects of your history being visible, you can adjust.

Maybe you were very active in r/Ex JW five years ago while leaving your religion. You hid it then. Now you're comfortable with it being visible, so you uncheck the hide. Or the opposite: you were fine with everything visible, then your profile started getting targeted by people who disagreed with your politics, so you hide those communities.

The settings are flexible specifically because your needs change.

An open Reddit profile poses significant risks, with professional and privacy concerns being equally important, followed closely by harassment risks. Estimated data.

Mobile: Accessing Curation on Reddit App

If you're primarily using the mobile Reddit app, the process is slightly different but equally straightforward.

Open the app. Tap your profile avatar (bottom right of the screen on most versions, top right on others). That takes you to your profile. From there, look for settings. You'll see a "Curate your profile" option. Tap it.

Alternatively, tap your avatar, then go to "Settings," then look for "Profile" or "Content Settings." From there, you should see curation options.

The mobile interface is actually a bit cleaner than desktop for this, because you're not hunting through multiple tabs. The process is fairly linear on mobile.

Android Specifics

On Android, the process is: Profile Avatar > Curate Your Profile or Settings > Profile > Curate Your Profile. The toggle switches and dropdowns work the same way as desktop. You can enable/disable NSFW, manage followers, and customize by community.

Android's implementation is pretty solid. No weird quirks.

i OS Specifics

i OS is similar. Profile Avatar > Curate Your Profile. The i OS app tends to be a bit slower than Android, but the functionality is identical. Same toggles, same customization options.

One thing: make sure your Reddit app is updated. Older versions might not have these curation options. If you can't find the settings, check the App Store for updates.

The Privacy Tab: Additional Visibility Controls

There's another layer of privacy settings in the main Settings area. If you go to your Settings and find the "Privacy" tab, you'll see additional options.

These are separate from curation but complementary.

Hiding Your Profile from Searches

One option here is to hide your profile from being indexed by search engines. When enabled, Google and other search engines won't include your Reddit profile in their results.

This is useful if you want to keep your Reddit activity invisible to people doing generic searches. If someone Googles your username, your Reddit profile won't show up. You're removing one avenue of discovery.

But understand: people who visit Reddit directly and search your username within Reddit will still find your profile. This only hides you from search engines like Google. It's a meaningful but incomplete privacy measure.

Controlling Who Can Follow You

There's a setting for whether people can follow you at all. You can disable followers entirely, or allow followers, or restrict who can follow you.

If you disable followers, no one gets a "Follow" option on your profile. You're invisible in that sense. No one's feed gets updated with your posts.

Most people just leave this enabled, because followers are fairly benign on Reddit. But if you want maximum privacy, disabling is an option.

Chat Request Controls

Reddit has a direct messaging system. You can control who can send you chat requests. Options are usually "Everyone," "Trusted," or "Nobody."

If you're getting unsolicited messages or harassment, setting this to "Nobody" stops it. People can still comment on your posts, but they can't direct message you.

Some people set this to "Nobody" by default, especially if they value privacy. It's a quick security measure.

Strategic Profile Curation: Thinking Like an Adversary

Let's talk about how to actually think about your profile. The goal is to show a version of yourself that you're comfortable with while hiding aspects that are sensitive, private, or potentially weaponizable.

The Professional vs. Personal Split

Most people benefit from a professional/personal split. Professional communities are ones where you're offering expertise, learning technical skills, or contributing to public discourse. Personal communities are ones where you're dealing with mental health, relationships, identity, spirituality, or other vulnerable topics.

Your curation strategy could be: show professional, hide personal.

Here's what that might look like:

Visible communities: r/webdev, r/learnprogramming, r/Ask Historians, r/explainlikeimfive, r/Personal Finance (for advice-giving, not seeking), r/Fitness (for guidance), etc.

Hidden communities: r/Health Anxiety, r/Just No MIL, r/Ex JW, r/Suicide Watch, r/BPD, r/Depression Regimens, r/Therapy, etc.

The logic: you're building a professional reputation on Reddit while protecting your personal vulnerability.

The Passion Interest Approach

Alternatively, you might hide everything except hobbies and passion interests. Maybe you're super into homebrewing, vintage audio equipment, and sci-fi literature. You show activity in r/Homebrewing, r/Audio Phile, and r/Sci Fi. Everything else—your professional work, your political discussions, your relationship advice—stays hidden.

This approach builds a specific, bounded reputation around your interests without exposing your broader life.

The Stealth Approach

Some people just hide everything ("Hide All") and never worry about their profile. They use Reddit for learning, seeking advice, and community without wanting any of it tied to their identity.

This is totally valid. You can be incredibly active on Reddit while being completely invisible on your profile page.

The Transparency Approach

Some people keep everything visible ("Show All") and lean into authentic self-presentation. They're not hiding anything because they don't think they need to. This works if you've been thoughtful about what you post and don't have anything you regret.

Whichever approach you choose, the point is to be intentional. Most people fall into the default ("Show All") without thinking about it. But taking ten minutes to curate means you're actively deciding what version of yourself is public.

Estimated data suggests that 'Hide All' is the most popular profile visibility setting, chosen by 50% of users, followed by 'Show All' at 30% and 'Customize' at 20%.

What Your Profile Says About You: Digital Reputation Management

Here's the reality: even with curation enabled, your profile still says a lot about you.

Your visible communities tell a story. If someone visits your profile and sees heavy activity in r/personalfinance, r/fatfire, and r/investing, they're inferring something about your financial interests and priorities. If they see r/writing, r/Screenwriting, and r/Authors, they're inferring creative ambitions. That's not bad—it's just information.

The key is managing what information is visible.

The Inference Problem

Even with communities hidden, people can infer things. If you're active in r/Ask Historians but hidden in r/Religion, people might infer something. If you've posted heavily in r/Fitness but hidden health anxiety communities, people might infer you're fitness-obsessed as a coping mechanism.

These inferences might be wrong, but they happen. The point isn't to be completely unreadable. It's to control the narrative and hide genuinely sensitive stuff.

Building Positive Reputation

One strategic use of curation is to actively build a reputation by showing the communities where you contribute meaningfully. If you're knowledgeable in r/Ask Historians, showing that activity builds your credibility in that space. Visitors see you as someone worth listening to.

This is useful for professionals, experts, or people who want to build influence in specific communities.

Protecting Vulnerability

The flip side is protecting vulnerable communities. If you're seeking advice in r/Just No MIL, you probably don't want that visible to everyone. Hiding those communities prevents people from building a narrative about your vulnerabilities.

The curation settings let you have both: a visible reputation in areas where you want it, and privacy in areas where you need it.

Common Mistakes People Make with Profile Curation

Let's cover some pitfalls to avoid.

Mistake #1: Thinking Curation Deletes Content

This is huge. When you hide your activity in a community, the posts and comments aren't deleted. They're still there in the subreddit. They're still on the internet. Archivists can still find them. People who knew the link can still access them.

Curation is only about your profile page visibility. If privacy is a real concern, you need to actually delete sensitive posts, not just hide them.

Mistake #2: Forgetting That Mods Can Still See Your Activity

If you're hidden from your own profile, mods in those communities can still see you. Curation doesn't affect mod visibility. If you're breaking rules, moderators will catch you regardless of curation settings.

Mistake #3: Using the Same Username Everywhere

Your profile curation is only useful if people can't identify you across platforms. If you use "John Smith 1985" on Reddit, Twitter, Linked In, and Git Hub, profile curation is somewhat pointless. Someone determined can connect the dots.

If privacy is important to you, use different usernames on different platforms. Or use generic usernames that don't identify you.

Mistake #4: Posting Identifying Information

Curation doesn't protect you if you've posted your real name, location, workplace, or other identifying information directly. Someone can read your visible posts and figure out who you are.

If you're curating for privacy, you also need to be careful about what you post. Vague language, removing specific details, avoiding identifying information—these matter as much as curation settings.

Mistake #5: Assuming Curation is Secure

These settings are user-facing, not cryptographic. Reddit can still see all your activity. Employees can see it. Data breaches can expose it. Curation is about controlling what regular users see, not about hiding from Reddit itself or determined attackers.

If you're concerned about Reddit seeing your data, you need a VPN and throwaway accounts, not just curation settings.

Reddit's Privacy Philosophy: Why These Controls Matter

Reddit, for a long time, didn't prioritize user privacy. Your posts were public by default. Your profile was open. The platform's philosophy was transparency.

That's changing. The new curation controls are part of a broader shift toward giving users more control.

Why? Several reasons. First, user pressure. People were complaining. Second, regulatory pressure. GDPR, CCPA, and other privacy regulations are making companies think about user privacy. Third, cultural shift. Privacy is becoming a competitive feature. Platforms that respect privacy attract users who care about privacy.

Reddit's introduction of these controls suggests they're listening. But understand: these are tools for managing your reputation, not for achieving anonymity or security.

The Data Collection Reality

Reddit collects a lot of data. Every interaction, every time you lurk, every search—it's logged. Curation settings don't affect that. They only affect what's visible to other users.

If you're concerned about Reddit's data collection, curation won't help. You'd need to change your Reddit usage fundamentally: use Reddit less, use Reddit through privacy-respecting tools, or switch to alternative platforms.

But if you're concerned about other users building a profile of you, curation settings absolutely help.

Estimated data suggests a balanced approach to community visibility, with a slight emphasis on showing knowledge-sharing and civic/professional communities while hiding more personal and sensitive ones.

Settings Beyond Curation: The Broader Privacy Dashboard

Reddit's overall privacy settings go beyond just profile curation. There are several other controls worth understanding.

Data Download

Under Privacy settings, there's usually a "Download Your Data" option. This lets you download a copy of all your data that Reddit has on you. It's useful for understanding what Reddit knows about you.

Personalization Settings

Reddit personalizes your experience based on your activity. Ads are targeted based on your interests. Content is ranked based on your history. You can disable personalization partially or fully, though it makes the experience less tailored.

Third-Party Sharing

Reddit shares data with partners in limited ways. You can control some of this in privacy settings. Most users just leave defaults, but if privacy is important to you, reading through these options is worthwhile.

Practical Step-by-Step: Setting Up Your Ideal Profile

Let's do a concrete walkthrough of how to actually set up your profile the right way.

Step 1: Audit Your Current Activity

First, understand what you're working with. Visit your profile (Desktop: click your avatar, View Profile. Mobile: tap avatar). Scroll through your visible activity. Which communities do you actually want visible? Which ones make you uncomfortable?

Make a mental list or write it down.

Step 2: Decide Your Curation Strategy

Are you going professional-focused? Hobby-focused? Completely hidden? Fully transparent? Decide your approach. This takes five minutes of thinking but is important.

Step 3: Access the Settings

Desktop: Avatar > Settings > Profile > Curate Your Profile.

Mobile: Avatar > Curate Your Profile (or Avatar > Settings > Profile > Curate Your Profile).

Step 4: Set NSFW Toggle

Decide: do you want NSFW content hidden? If yes, toggle it on. Most people toggle it on just to be safe. Takes five seconds.

Step 5: Set Followers Toggle

Do you care if people see your follower count? Most people don't, so this is often left alone. But if you want maximum privacy, toggle it off.

Step 6: Configure Content and Activity

This is the big one. Choose "Show All," "Hide All," or "Customize."

If you choose Customize, you'll see a list of communities. Go through them. Check the ones you want visible. Uncheck the ones you want hidden. Be strategic.

If you've been on Reddit for years, this might take a while. Take your time. It's worth doing right.

Step 7: Check Privacy Settings

Optional but recommended: go to Settings > Privacy. Review the options there. Decide if you want to hide from search, restrict followers, or limit who can chat you. Adjust as needed.

Step 8: Test and Adjust

Ask a friend to visit your profile (from a different account if possible) and see what shows up. If something's visible that you wanted hidden, adjust. If something's hidden that you wanted visible, adjust. It's not permanent.

Step 9: Revisit Periodically

Set a reminder to check your curation settings every 3-6 months. As you participate in new communities, as you grow older and change perspectives, as you become more or less comfortable with certain aspects of your history, adjust accordingly.

Your curation strategy should evolve with you.

When to Hide, When to Show: Community-Specific Guidance

Not sure if you should hide a specific community? Here's a framework.

Communities You Should Probably Show

• Knowledge-sharing communities: r/Ask Historians, r/explainlikeimfive, r/learnprogramming, r/webdev, r/datascience, etc. These build credibility.
• Hobby communities: r/Homebrewing, r/Woodworking, r/Photography, etc. These show your interests without being sensitive.
• Civic/Professional communities: r/Personal Finance, r/Investing, r/Law, r/Medicine (if you're a medical professional), etc. These position you as knowledgeable.
• Creative communities: r/writing, r/Screenwriting, r/Poetry, r/gamedev, etc. These showcase your talents.

Communities You Should Probably Hide

• Mental health communities: r/Health Anxiety, r/Depression, r/BPD, r/Suicide Watch, etc. Personal and sensitive.
• Relationship/Family communities: r/Just No MIL, r/Dead Bedrooms, r/Suicide Watch, r/Narcissistic Abuse, etc. Highly personal.
• Sexual health communities: r/sex, r/sexover 30, etc. These are nobody's business.
• Political/religious communities: If you're concerned about alienating people, consider hiding. Political and religious views are divisive.
• Identity communities: r/Ex JW, r/LGBTQPlus, r/Mental Health Support, etc. These can be sensitive depending on your situation.
• Specific problem-seeking communities: r/legaladvice, r/personalfinance (when seeking advice, not giving), etc. You don't need to broadcast that you had this problem.

The Gray Area

Some communities are ambiguous. r/Ask Women Over 40, r/Depression Regimens, r/Therapy—these could go either way depending on your situation and comfort level.

Trust your gut. If showing activity in a community makes you uncomfortable, hide it. The whole point is that you're in control.

Estimated data suggests that 40% of Reddit users employ throwaway accounts to manage their digital footprints, while 30% rely solely on their main account.

The Bigger Picture: Digital Footprints and Long-Term Thinking

Profile curation is one piece of managing your digital footprint. But it's worth thinking bigger.

Everything You Post Lives Forever

This is the hard truth. Even if you delete a post, even if you hide it on your profile, even if you delete your entire account—archives exist. Wayback Machine archives Reddit. Third-party services scrape Reddit. Your post might be quoted somewhere. Someone might have screenshotted it.

The implication: before you post anything, ask yourself if you're okay with it being permanent. Because it might be.

Think Decades Ahead

You probably won't remember what you posted on Reddit in 2019. But ten years from now, someone might bring it up. Politicians have been destroyed by tweets from years ago. People have lost jobs over Reddit posts they'd forgotten about.

If you're going to be a public figure, be thoughtful about what you post. If you're going to be private, be intentional about keeping things private.

The Throwaway Account Strategy

Many experienced Reddit users maintain multiple accounts. A main account for your "public" Reddit persona, and throwaway accounts for seeking advice, exploring sensitive topics, or participating in communities you don't want linked to your main account.

This is a legitimate strategy. It lets you use Reddit authentically without everything being tied to one identity.

Troubleshooting: When Settings Don't Work as Expected

Occasionally, curation settings don't work perfectly. Here are common issues and fixes.

Issue: Communities Still Showing After Hiding

Cause: Browser cache or app sync lag. Reddit caches pages.

Fix: Hard refresh your browser (Ctrl+Shift+R on Windows, Cmd+Shift+R on Mac). On mobile, close and reopen the app. Wait 5-10 minutes for changes to sync across Reddit's servers.

Issue: Settings Reverted to Default

Cause: Clearing cookies or cache sometimes resets settings. Logging out then logging back in occasionally causes this.

Fix: Re-apply your settings. Consider taking a screenshot of your preferred settings for reference.

Issue: Can't Find the Curation Settings

Cause: App is outdated. Settings location varies by app version.

Fix: Update Reddit app. If you're on desktop, try a different browser or clear your cache. The settings definitely exist—they're just hidden in the menu structure.

Issue: NSFW Toggle Isn't Working

Cause: Some NSFW content isn't properly tagged by the community. Or browser settings are interfering.

Fix: Check that the toggle is actually enabled. Manually hide specific communities if needed. Check browser content filters.

Issue: Followers Still Visible After Disabling

Cause: The toggle controls visibility to others, but you still see your own follower count.

Fix: This is expected behavior. Others won't see the count, but you will in your own settings.

Comparing Reddit Profile Curation to Other Platforms

How does Reddit's approach compare to other social media?

Twitter/X: Twitter lets you make your account private (preventing anyone from seeing your tweets without approval) or public. Reddit's system is more nuanced—you can't make your entire account private, but you can hide specific activity. Twitter is simpler, Reddit is more flexible.

Facebook: Facebook has granular privacy controls per post and per friend group. You can hide activity from specific people or groups. Reddit's system is less granular (it's community-level, not post-level) but simpler.

Instagram: Instagram offers similar privacy controls to Facebook. You can make your account private or public, and control visibility per post. Reddit's approach is less detailed.

Tik Tok: Tik Tok defaults to public. Privacy controls exist but are limited compared to Reddit's system.

In general, Reddit's profile curation is moderately flexible. Not as granular as Facebook or Instagram (which offer per-post controls), but more flexible than Twitter's all-or-nothing privacy model.

Looking Forward: What Reddit Might Add Next

Reddit's curation tools are relatively new. What might come next?

Possibilities include:

• Scheduled deletion: Auto-delete posts or comments after a set time period.
• Granular comment hiding: Hide specific comments while showing others in the same community.
• Community-specific privacy levels: Different visibility levels for different communities.
• Data export: Export your Reddit data in a structured format.
• Encrypted direct messages: DMs that Reddit can't read.

Right now, none of these exist. But as privacy becomes more important, expect Reddit to add more tools.

For now, the curation controls you have are useful. Use them thoughtfully.

The Psychological Side: Why Privacy Matters

Beyond the practical privacy concerns, there's a psychological element to controlling your profile.

Having control over your digital representation matters. It reduces anxiety. It lets you participate in communities without feeling exposed. It separates your public and private selves, which is healthy.

Research on digital privacy suggests that feeling watched increases anxiety and changes behavior. When you know your activity is visible, you self-censor more. You're less authentic. You engage less.

Curation settings reduce that surveillance feeling. You can participate more freely in private communities because you're not broadcasting to everyone.

So beyond the concrete privacy benefits, curation settings have a genuine psychological benefit. They make Reddit feel safer.

Final Framework: Your Reddit Privacy Checklist

Use this checklist to ensure your profile is set up the way you want it.

1. Profile Curation Status: Have I configured curation settings? (Show All / Hide All / Customize)
2. NSFW Toggle: Is this set to my preference?
3. Followers Toggle: Do I want followers info visible?
4. Community-Specific Choices: Have I reviewed which communities should be visible?
5. Search Visibility: Have I hidden my profile from search engines if desired?
6. Chat Restrictions: Have I configured who can message me?
7. Follower Restrictions: Have I configured who can follow me?
8. Throwaway Accounts: Am I using throwaway accounts for sensitive discussions?
9. Username Strategy: Am I using different usernames on different platforms?
10. Content Awareness: Am I being thoughtful about what I post, regardless of curation settings?

If you can check off all ten, your Reddit privacy strategy is solid.

Conclusion: Taking Control of Your Reddit Presence

Your Reddit profile is yours. It's a window into your interests, your vulnerabilities, your thoughts, and your community. For years, Reddit kept that window wide open. Now, with curation controls, you get to decide how open it is.

The fact that you're reading this means you care about that. You understand that your digital presence matters. You want control.

The good news: the tools exist. They're free. They're built into Reddit. And they're actually pretty powerful when used thoughtfully.

The bad news: they require you to be intentional. You can't just set it and forget it. You need to think about what you want visible, what you want hidden, and why. You need to be aware of what you're posting. You need to understand that curation isn't anonymity—it's just reputation management.

But if you take twenty minutes to configure these settings, you're taking back control. You're deciding what version of yourself is public. You're protecting vulnerable parts of your identity. You're building a reputation in areas you care about while keeping personal aspects private.

That's not paranoia. That's just good digital citizenship.

So go to your Reddit settings. Access the curation controls. Make some decisions. Your future self will thank you.

And if you ever need to adjust your settings—maybe as your life changes, as you become more comfortable with certain things or less comfortable with others—you can. These settings are flexible. They're meant to evolve with you.

The internet doesn't have to be a completely open book. You get to control the chapters that are visible. Use that power.

FAQ

What does "Curate your profile" actually do?

Curate your profile is a Reddit feature that lets you control which of your posts and comments appear on your profile page. It doesn't delete anything or hide content from subreddits where you posted it, but it removes activity from view when someone visits your profile. You can use "Show All" (everything visible), "Hide All" (nothing visible), or "Customize" (visible by specific communities).

Is hiding my profile activity the same as deleting posts?

No, absolutely not. Hiding content on your profile only removes it from your profile page. The posts and comments still exist in their respective subreddits. Anyone can find them by visiting the subreddit directly or searching. If you want to actually delete posts, you need to individually delete them from each subreddit. Curation is reputation management, not data deletion.

Can Reddit staff see my hidden profile content?

Yes. Curation settings only control what other users see. Reddit employees and moderators can still see your entire history, including hidden content. Curation doesn't provide privacy from Reddit itself, only from other users. If you're concerned about Reddit's data practices, you'd need to use different approaches like VPNs or throwaway accounts.

What happens to old posts and comments when I enable curation?

Old content is hidden from your profile page retroactively, but it's not deleted. If you had posted something five years ago in a community you now hide, that post remains in the subreddit, but visitors to your profile won't see it. If you later unhide that community, the old posts reappear on your profile.

Does the NSFW toggle actually hide adult subreddit activity?

The NSFW toggle hides your posts and comments in any subreddit marked as NSFW by Reddit. This includes adult communities, but also some non-explicit communities marked NSFW for various reasons. The toggle works all-or-nothing—you can't hide some NSFW communities while showing others. For granular control, use the Customize option instead.

Can I hide individual posts instead of hiding entire communities?

No. Reddit's curation system works at the community level, not the post level. When you hide a community, all your activity in that community is hidden. You can't pick and choose specific posts to hide while showing others from the same community. If you need to hide specific posts, you'd need to delete them individually.

Will hiding my profile activity affect my karma or awards?

No. Hiding content on your profile doesn't affect your karma, which is calculated from upvotes and downvotes on actual posts and comments. Awards remain attached to the posts in their respective subreddits. Curation is purely visual—it only affects what shows on your profile page.

Is there a way to make my entire Reddit account private?

Not exactly. Reddit doesn't have a "private account" mode like Twitter or Instagram. You can hide all your profile activity using "Hide All," which makes your profile appear empty, but you still post and comment publicly in subreddits. If you want true privacy, you'd need to use throwaway accounts and different usernames across platforms.

How often should I review and update my curation settings?

There's no set schedule, but reviewing every 3-6 months is reasonable. Life changes, you might become active in new communities, and you might become more or less comfortable with previously visible activity. Some people review whenever they have a major life change—new job, new relationship, moving—to ensure their profile reflects their current situation.

What's the difference between curation settings and the Privacy tab settings?

Curation settings (on your profile page) control what posts and comments show on your profile. Privacy settings (in Settings > Privacy) control broader visibility options like whether search engines can find your profile, who can follow you, and who can message you. Both work together for a complete privacy strategy, but they control different things.

Can other Reddit users see that I've hidden certain communities?

No. When you hide communities, your profile simply doesn't show activity from those communities. Visitors don't see a list of "hidden communities." They just don't see activity from those communities. There's no indicator that you've hidden something.

Ready to take control of your Reddit presence? Start by auditing your current profile activity, decide on your curation strategy, and apply the settings today. Your digital privacy is worth twenty minutes of your time.

Key Takeaways

• Reddit profiles are public by default; you have 3 main curation options: Show All, Hide All, or Customize by community
• Curation controls affect only your profile page visibility—posts remain in their original subreddits and can't be hidden this way
• Use strategic curation to show professional/hobby communities while hiding mental health, relationship, and personal identity communities
• Curation is reputation management, not anonymity; combine it with different usernames and throwaway accounts for stronger privacy
• Privacy settings in the Settings tab offer additional controls like hiding from search engines and restricting who can message you

Related Articles

• How to Deep Clean Your Air Fryer & Keep It Like New [2025]
• Womanizer Coupons & Discounts: Complete Savings Guide [2025]
• AirDoctor Coupon Codes & Promo Deals [January 2025]
• Western Digital Promo Codes & Deals: Save Big on Storage [2025]
• Surfshark VPN 2025 Milestones and 2026 Roadmap [2025]
• Hydrow Discount Codes & Coupons: Save Up to $150 [2025]