It’s proprietary software

Discord is not under a Free Software license (e.g., GPL, MIT, BSD) and it is bound by a strict Terms of Service.

The source code for the Discord client isn’t publicly available, meaning there’s no way to tell what it’s actually doing, you just have to trust the claims Discord makes. Discord’s Terms of Service prohibit arbitrary things about how you can use the software (e.g., it’s against Discord’s Terms of Service to use third-party clients).

It doesn’t respect your privacy

An email address is required to register a Discord Account. That alone isn’t unusual, especially since people can just use throwaway emails, but Discord often makes users give out their phone number, despite the fact your phone number isn’t used as an identifier (what other people use to contact you).

Discord does not have end-to-end encryption, not even for private messages, meaning your messages can be intercepted if need be. In fact, Discord uses AI to scan your messages and ranks your account by how many warnings you’ve received.

Age Verification

The latest Discord controversy is surrounding age verification. It’s already a thing in the UK and Australia for age-restricted channels due to local laws, but Discord intends to roll this out globally. Palantir (a giant surveillance company with ties to the CIA) is a major investor in the Persona Age Verification System.

If the system is truly about protecting children (which I doubt), Discord is basically admitting that they’ve done a bad job at it. Personally, I think children shouldn’t be on Discord anyway and the fact NSFW channels are even a thing suggests Discord attracts some… questionable people.

March 2026 Update: Discord have delayed rolling out age verification worldwide, but they haven’t cancelled it, meaning they could roll it out in the future.

Moderation

Many people (myself included) have been falsely banned from Discord (not individual communities but rather the platform as a whole). I submitted a support ticket to see if I can get my account back or to at least provide more information. They just said they weren’t going to re-enable my account and it was scheduled for deletion.

I never found out why I was banned (no evidence or further explanation was provided) and it’s very easy to get someone else banned because Discord’s moderation is a complete joke.

Petty Things

Some people hate Discord because of Nitro and microtransactions.

Personally, I don’t really care because they’re an optional gimmick people pay for voluntarily. I don’t use Nitro myself because I think it’s a waste of money, but if you wanna decorate your profile with cat ears and an animated profile picture, so be it.