Reddit is killing RSS feeds and ending public API access because of AI bots

Reddit has announced it will end RSS feed support on November 13, citing that RSS has become "a common surface for large-scale scraping and automated abuse." The platform will also shut down public API access by March 2027, affecting tools that rely on programmatic access to Reddit conversations, including social listening products, research tools, and AI assistants that currently use Reddit to answer questions. The decision comes as Reddit's user-generated content has become increasingly profitable through AI licensing deals — its "other revenue" beyond advertising grew 24% year-over-year to $43 million in Q2 — and Reddit no longer wants to give away data for free. Moderators who relied on RSS for alerts are directed to the Discord Relay Devvit app, though Reddit acknowledged no replacement exists for external RSS feeds. Additionally, Reddit is limiting Old Reddit access to users who have engaged with it in the past 90 days, and developers must register approved third-party apps by January 12, 2027, to maintain API access.

(Source：TechCrunch)