Up the Vote: Reddit’s IRL 2020 Voting Campaign

For 15 years, Reddit has been home to a diverse network of communities. From fashion and politics to sports and gaming, the common thread connecting all Reddit communities is the upvote and downvote system. It puts power in the hands of our users, giving them a voice in determining which content is most visible (and which content falls to the bottom of the feed).

Content on Reddit receives an average of 165 million votes per day. But did you know that the 2016 presidential election only saw 128.8 million votes, representing only 58% of eligible voters? Numbers like these are why we are launching our Up the Vote initiative, an effort to get redditors to vote where it matters most: at the ballot box.

With this campaign, we are focused on alerting, educating, and activating redditors on their right to vote; and have a number of special holidays, initiatives, and surprises lined up in order to do so, including:

An AMA series on voting laws, rights and processes, to answer all your questions about voting, from the security of voting by mail to how you can volunteer to Power the Polls as a poll worker.

On September 22, Reddit celebrates National Voter Registration Day . Look for special AMAs and activations across the site connecting you with all the information you need to register to vote, including how to update your registration in the case of a life event like a move or a name change (pssst– get a head start by going to vote.gov to check registration information for your state).

On October 24th, we are activating around Vote Early Day , where we’ll help connect Redditors with resources about their options to vote early, either by mail, or early in-place voting (check the options in you state here )

On November 3rd, it’s Election Day! We’ll remind you (maybe to the point of annoyance) to get out and vote, and connect you with resources about how to find your polling place, what ID requirements you might need to bring (and what to do if you don’t have it), and other important information. (But hey, no need to leave it to the last minute– start researching here today and make a plan to vote now.)

You thought it was over, didn’t you? Not even close! On November 4th, look for special AMAs and announcements on “What just happened?” to learn about vote returns, election registration, and everything else you need to know as we watch the counts come in.

Also, be on the lookout for some other easter eggs around the site (and maybe elsewhere…) that underscore the importance of voting.