Reddit finally rolls out its native poll feature for all communities

Anonymous social media platform Reddit has rolled out a new major feature that enables anyone to poll other users on the site. With this new poll feature, communities (that don't disable the tool) will enable their members to ask other users for their opinions on topics and gather other information when relevant. Until now, users were forced to use third-party polling options for these tasks.

The new poll feature is exactly what it sounds like: users can submit a question using the new 'poll' tab on the compose page, then add up to six questions for users to choose from. These polls are then submitted to the subreddit's community where users can contribute their answers. This makes it possible to get snapshots of demographics, beliefs, and more.

Communities that aren't interested in polling can disable the feature, meaning users will still only be able to submit text posts, images, or whatever the community is focused on. Poll titles can be up to 300 characters long; users can choose the duration the poll will be open for voting, as well. Text posts can be submitted with the poll questions.

Polls can be live for up to a week, meaning they can gather quite a few contributions from users. According to Reddit, its users were creating thousands of polls monthly using third-party services before the arrival of this native polling feature.

Of course, polls are not restricted to only the communities in which they're published, meaning they may end up reflecting the attitudes, beliefs, or opinions of people outside of the communities. Despite that, they may still be a fun addition and, at times, prove useful for gathering data.