Reddit Is Killing RSS Feeds and Public API Access to Fight AI Scrapers

Reddit will disable RSS feeds on November 13, 2026, and phase out public API access, ending new public API requests on October 31, 2026 and cutting all remaining public access in March 2027. The company says the moves are intended to curb large-scale scraping and automated abuse while steering developers to its paid Developer Platform, Devvit, supported by a $1 million migration fund.

By AI Newsroom· Reviewed by Pranav, Founder & Editor-in-ChiefPublished 1 minute agoUpdated 1 minute ago0 views

Reddit Is Killing RSS Feeds and Public API Access to Fight AI Scrapers

Why It Matters

The changes remove two widely used channels for external tools and bots, threatening many third-party apps, moderator utilities, and alert services that rely on RSS or open API access. They come as Reddit licenses content to major AI companies while pursuing legal action against other data scrapers, highlighting tensions over how platform data is monetized and protected.

Key Facts

RSS feed shutdown date: November 13, 2026
New public API requests end: October 31, 2026
Unregistered apps start losing access: January 12, 2027
All remaining public API access closed: March 2027
Developer platform: Devvit

Reddit announced a plan to end RSS support on November 13, 2026, and to shutter public API access in stages, with new public API requests blocked from October 31, 2026, unregistered apps losing access beginning January 12, 2027, and all remaining public access cut off by March 2027. The company framed the changes as part of broader infrastructure modernization and efforts to reduce large-scale scraping and automated abuse.

The firm is urging developers to migrate to its official Developer Platform, Devvit, and has launched a $1 million App Migration Program to ease the transition. The program includes $1,000 payments for eligible apps and free hosting; applications for the fund are due November 30, 2026. Reddit says more than 14,000 apps and bots have registered so far, and highlighted that several prominent bots — including DeltaBot, MagicEyeBot, and RemindMeBot — have completed or nearly completed migration.

Reddit pointed to scraping and automated abuse as the justification for the restrictions. The company has previously charged for API access since 2023 and has entered licensing agreements with major AI companies — including an approximately $60 million-per-year deal with Google in early 2024 and a later agreement with OpenAI. At the same time, Reddit has pursued legal action against other firms, suing Anthropic in June 2025 and filing claims in October 2025 against Perplexity and three data-scraping companies.

The move affects moderators and many small tools differently. For moderators who rely on RSS-based alerts, Reddit recommends a Devvit app called Discord Relay; but the company says there is no replacement for RSS use outside communities the user moderates. Reddit also plans to restrict access to Old Reddit to logged-in users who have accessed it in the past six months, while moderators will retain their access. If app developers do not migrate to Devvit, their tools risk going dark when access is cut.

These steps reflect an effort to control how third parties obtain Reddit content while centralizing developer interactions through a paid platform. Reddit has pointed to logged-out access and disguised crawlers as primary vectors for abusive scraping, and the company previously limited Old Reddit for similar reasons. The changes will remove longstanding public data endpoints that many third-party services and community tools depend on.