How do I know if I am shadowbanned on Reddit?

Open your profile in a logged-out or incognito window at reddit.com/user/yourname. If your posts are there when logged in but gone when logged out, the account is likely shadowbanned.

What causes a Reddit shadowban?

Spam-like behavior: links from new low-karma accounts, near-identical posts across subs, vote manipulation, or a domain flagged as spam. Over 90 percent follow the same avoidable pattern.

How do I fix a Reddit shadowban?

For an account-level shadowban, submit an appeal at reddit.com/appeal and wait a few days. For subreddit-level filtering, message the moderators. Then fix the behavior that caused it.

How do I avoid getting shadowbanned?

Warm the account up, comment far more than you post, keep self-promotion low, respect each subreddit's rules, and never manipulate votes. Karmy paces all of this automatically.

Reddit shadowban: how to check and fix it (2026)

What a shadowban actually is

A shadowban is silent. Your posts and comments look normal to you while you are logged in, but nobody else can see them. Reddit does not tell you it happened, which is why so many people keep posting into the void for weeks. There are two kinds: an account-level shadowban across all of Reddit, and a subreddit-level filter where one community's AutoModerator is quietly removing your content.

How to check for a shadowban

Logged-out profile: open reddit.com/user/yourname in a private or incognito window. If it shows nothing or a not-found page, the account is likely shadowbanned.
Logged-out post: copy a recent post's URL and open it logged out. Visible logged in but gone logged out means it is being filtered.
Search test: search your username or post inside the subreddit. Missing from results is another signal.

If it is only one subreddit hiding your posts, that is a subreddit filter, not a sitewide shadowban, and the fix is different.

What causes it

Links from a new, low-karma account.
Near-identical posts across several subreddits.
Vote manipulation (buying or trading upvotes).
A domain Reddit has flagged as spam.
Repeatedly breaking a subreddit's rules until AutoModerator filters you.

How to fix it

For an account-level shadowban, submit an appeal at reddit.com/appeal, explain honestly, and wait a few days. For a subreddit-level filter, message that subreddit's moderators politely and ask them to check the spam queue. Either way, stop the behavior that triggered it: slow down, comment more than you post, drop the links for a while, and never touch vote manipulation.

How to avoid it in the first place

Prevention beats appeals. Warm the account up over about 30 days, keep comments well above posts, keep self-promotion under roughly 10 percent, respect each subreddit's rules, and act like a person, not a burst of posts. See the warm-up plan and how to post without getting banned.

How Karmy prevents this

Built to never get there

✓ Warms accounts up and graduates by real karma, so they never post links too early.

✓ Reads each subreddit's rules before writing, so AutoModerator has nothing to filter.

✓ Paces every action like a human, with rest days and no duplicate content across subs.

✓ Never manipulates votes. Karma is earned with genuinely useful comments.

Shadowban FAQ

How do I know if I am shadowbanned?

Open your profile logged out at reddit.com/user/yourname. If your posts are there logged in but gone logged out, you are likely shadowbanned.

What causes it?

Spam-like behavior: links from new low-karma accounts, near-identical posts across subs, vote manipulation, or a flagged domain.

How do I fix it?

Appeal at reddit.com/appeal for an account ban, or message the mods for a single subreddit filter, then fix the behavior.

How do I avoid it?

Warm up, comment more than you post, keep self-promotion low, respect the rules, and never manipulate votes. Karmy paces all of this for you.