Reddit is increasing its use of moderation tools, and many moderators aren't happy at all.

With the aim, Reddit, of making moderation easier and faster, it's expanding its test of Rules Hub, a suite of new moderation tools.

"With Rules Hub, moderators will be able to choose which rules should be automatically enforced, decide what happens when a rule is triggered (send to queue, filter, or remove), preview the experience before enabling it, and review logs and insights to understand how community rules are performing," said the firm.

Earlier this year, Reddit expanded the capabilities of Post & Comment Guidance, adding support for Post Flair Guidance, which helps users choose the right flair, and Top Comment Check, which provides guidance on top-level comments and reduces repetitive moderation work.

The aim of all three efforts is to improve the platform’s systems and moderation tools, so that communities can rely less on things like karma and account age, which, it said, prevent many first time users from successfully posting in a community.

But the change will see the removal of Automod, a content filtering tool that helps moderators block unwanted messages, filter banned words and manage repetitive moderation tasks.

"Looking ahead, we believe Rules Hub, together with newer systems like Post & Comment Guidance and Safety Filters, can eventually replace many of the enforcement workflows that communities rely on from Automod," Reddit said.

"Unlike Automod’s enforcement tools, which depend on exact keyword and pattern matching, Rules Hub uses LLMs to evaluate whether a post or comment matches the intent of a rule. That allows Rules Hub to better handle nuance, natural language, and edge cases while preserving moderator control."

The announcement follows a test implementation for both new and experienced moderators from more than 700 communities, including members of Reddit’s Mod Council Network—a test which Reddit presumably saw as a success.

However, said one Reddit moderator, "I'm in the Rules Hub beta, it doesn't even come close to doing what automod can. One of my sub has 8 rules, Rules Hub can only enforce 2. It cannot enforce our version of 'remember the human'.

Reddit has promised to keep Automod going until replacement workflows have been tested and proven in partnership with moderators.

But, said another moderator, "Until it can do every single thing our automod config does now and, most importantly, accurately, replacing automod will be undoing untold hours of work and creating a lot more work with a system we can't fix. I don't mind new tools for those who can't automod, or to use as well as automod; that's great. But please don't scrap automod."

Several mods have threatened to quit their communities altogether if the move goes through.

This isn't the first clash that Reddit has had with its moderators in recent years. In 2023, volunteer moderators objected to the platform's plans to start charging developers for access to its application programming interface (API). Thousands of subreddits were taken private in a blackout. However, after threatening to remove moderators unless they backed down, Reddit got its own wayn the end.