We transitioned away from Disqus way back in 2015. Lots of our readers noticed this change and asked us to share our thoughts on why we switched.
After using Disqus for about a year, we identified several drawbacks that prompted our decision to switch back to the default WordPress comments. Today, this is still our preferred choice.
Now, we use the default WordPress commenting system alongside the Subscribe to Comments Reloaded plugin. This way, our readers can follow certain posts and conversations that interest them most.
In this article, we will explore the reasons behind our decision and how it led to a 304% increase in our comment engagement.
Why Did We Switch Away from Disqus?
At WPBeginner, we started using Disqus in April 2014.
However, just a year later, we decided to switch away from Disqus. Let’s go over some of the reasons why we decided to make the switch.
Inserting Affiliate Links without Permission
When we were using Disqus, it offered publishers the opportunity to earn a little extra money if they enabled Promoted Discovery. This enabled sponsored stories in the related posts section that Disqus could add.
Since we didn’t want any advertisements from them, we had all the settings unchecked.
However, we accidentally encountered what they called a “bug” in which Disqus inserted affiliate links into our blog post content without our permission.
Basically, Disqus had a partnership with Viglink, which looks through your content and changes any link that they’re partnered with to an affiliate link.
We caught this when we noticed Viglink referring sales to OptinMonster from our site, WPBeginner. How ironic since both of them are our sites. Hmmm.
After looking into it, we reported the problem to Disqus, which they fixed, calling it a “bug.”
We were quite disappointed in the way this was handled. We’re not sure how much money Disqus made through this affiliate injection bug and how widespread this was.
There was no public disclosure announcement about this, and we definitely didn’t get any $$ credit for advertising they placed on our site for who knows how long. That just left a bad taste in the mouth.
Sponsored Comments
We learned this from our friend Michael Hyatt, who noticed sponsored comments appearing on his site without permission.
He reported that you couldn’t opt out without assistance from the Disqus Support team. So, we contacted Disqus for an official response.
They confirmed that there was no easy way for individuals to opt out without reaching out to their support team. However, they noted that due to specific criteria for Sponsored Comments, most users would not be affected.
Nonetheless, managing spam comments was already challenging, and monitoring Disqus to ensure they didn’t enable sponsored comments on our site added to the workload. These additional tasks became too much.
Note: During this sponsored comments fiasco, we discovered a setting that was auto-enabled for cookie tracking. At the time, it was located in the ‘Advanced’ settings tab. So, if you’re using Disqus, you’ll want to check if this feature still exists and disable it.
Significant Decrease in Comment Engagement
When we used Disqus, a few readers complained that it made guest commenting harder. Since Disqus was widely used across several top sites, we didn’t pay much attention to those complaints at first.
However, over time, our comment engagement dropped significantly. After disabling Disqus, we saw that our users were starting to leave more comments. Soon after the change, we noticed our comments increased by 304%.
Moderation Interface
When we switched to Disqus, we were initially quite excited about the new comment moderation interface. But, as we used it more, it wasn’t something our editors liked.
Note: This is completely a personal preference, and we know there are other users who love the Disqus interface.
What Did We Like About Disqus?
Despite some concerns with Disqus’ business practices, there were several features we appreciated about the platform.
Scalability and Site Performance
Comments are very resource-intensive. If you have a lot of comments on a post, then it will take a long time to load.
If many users leave comments at the same time, it will also impact your server load. The advantage of using a third-party commenting system like Disqus is that you can shave that server load off yours and send it their way.
Even if a malicious user attacks your site, it won’t impact your server because it has to go through Disqus first. However, please do note that this is only true if you have disabled Comment Sync.
Redundancy
The best part about Disqus was that comments were stored on a third-party database, which is extremely helpful in dealing with redundancy. We definitely miss that.
This means that if you ever have to do a fail-over, you can simply disable comments until your main servers are back. Although not ideal, this is the simplest option that you have.
Disqus Alternatives
Currently, we’re using the default WordPress comments and the Subscribe to Comments Reloaded plugin. The core software helps us streamline comment management. Meanwhile, the plugin lets our readers follow the posts they’re most interested in, which boosts engagement.
While we don’t use Thrive Comments at WPBeginner, we recommend it based on its powerful features and the positive experiences we’ve seen on the Thrive blog. It’s an excellent choice for anyone looking to enhance their WordPress comment system.
For more details, you can see our extensive Thrive Themes Suite review and go to the Thrive Comments section.
Alternatively, you can improve native WordPress comments by using a suite of additional functionality plugins that enable users to:
These are just a few examples. You can check out our expert picks of the best plugins to improve WordPress comments and find the right tool for your goals.
Related: We’ve tried Disqus and Livefyre in the past, but we’ve returned to WordPress comments because it just seems like the best overall option.
We hope this review clarifies our reasons for switching away from Disqus, thank you for your continued interest and understanding. For further reading, you may like to see our guide on how to manage WordPress comment notification emails or how to export email addresses from WordPress comments.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
Moinuddin Waheed
Thanks for letting me know that disqus has some these bad practices and techniques in their part.
I have used disqus for a longer time for my blog comments and never knew that these are the issues with it.
I will definitely consider other options for wordpress comments. For now switching to wordpress comments.
Thanks a ton.
Sam Am
Great article , I used to have disqus for more than 2 years and I was always wondering why you guys are not using it. these days I was digging deep on my site and found couple of affiliate links redirects that I have never installed or dealt with. I just found out that it is from disqus “and I think you can disable them” but I decided to delete disqus all together since this is not acceptable doing something on my site with out my permission “it was automatically turned on”
it time to say goodbye disques, and thanks for the great post.
WPBeginner Support
Glad you liked our post
Admin
Frank Fajardo
I found your blog after doing a search on why Disqus would like to get quite a lot of permission from my Tweeter account, more than most apps that simply need my identity (email and name). Thanks for sharing. It makes me affirm my decision to not sign up.
WPBeginner Support
Glad our guide was helpful
Admin
Vlado
Congratulation! Very good decision!
WPBeginner Support
Glad you liked our decision
Admin
Erving
Interesting. I was researching if going with Discus was the way for my website. Now I will think it thoroughly a bit more.
WPBeginner Support
Glad our experience could be helpful
Admin
Kingju Pendalo
Thanks for you review, I was wondering about setting Disqus on my website. Looks like I’m not going to go this way.
WPBeginner Support
Glad our tutorial could help inform you
Admin
Abhishek Dorik
Hey! Thanks for this, it’s a great read. I too was using disqus on one of my blogs and I totally agree with all the takes in this blog. Interesting!
WPBeginner Support
You’re welcome, glad you like our content
Admin
Muskie
What changes did you have to make to your theme to move away from Disqus. It is basically blocked in China and slows my whole website down so I think it has to go given how long I’ve lived in China.
WPBeginner Support
As our theme is a custom theme, we had to ensure we had a comments template but for most themes, there should be a comments template already.
Admin
Muskie
I plan to upgrade to WordPress 5 and then update my theme. Disqus has been blocked for two years in China it has to go if you want anyone in China to leave a comment on your blog.
Mathukutty P. V.
You said you are using wordpress native comment, but this comment box is different than my native comment box. Also could not find subscribe option. Why this change? One visitor complained the comment box below comments is difficult to access, and hence box should be above comments.
Tim
Links to comments never, ever worked in Disqus. The software just plain sucks. Finding older comments is incredibly tedious.
Betsi
What comment plugin are you using now?
WPBeginner Support
Hi Betsi,
We are not using any comment plugin.
Admin
Taylor
I “Happened” across this article and am very glad I read it, along with numerous comments shared.
I do NOT ever recall doing a “thing” with Disqus, and yet they had an account on me, linked to FB that was so old it had an email address I have not used in AGES, as in probably 7 yrs or. more? I shut it down tonight, but not sure that really means a thing. I never register anything with my FB account, ever! So this is interesting that they had it. Maybe somehow way back when I did, is all I can think of.
I am hoping closing the account is the same as also rejecting them of any rights to access any of my information, or to share such information in part or in whole. But I don’t know. (??) Anyone know?
When I go to make a comment in some sites, they ask for my email and they want you to click a box giving consent for them to have access to your whole life and your friends … These apps do NOT need my friend’s lists, contacts, location(s), phone number, place of work, my whole life…its none of their business, just so I can make a comment? So I close the window and move on, no comment made. Many of us move on. But in time I’m betting that will continue to change, which for me is alarming.
Privacy matters! I fear for the next few generations as they further and further remove them from any understanding of the value of privacy and their rights to it.
While I do have a Company website we have as of yet to place anything up that allows for “commenting”. in our blog/article section because we work in Psychiatric care and Human Rights needs for marginalized populations that are heavily stigmatized, to begin with.
The last thing I want any of those we serve seeing is all the judgemental comments and crudeness that has already done enough damage to their healing process. So as a company in our field of work, we are torn on how to handle this and continue to debate what to do. We want people to have a voice and place to share their views appropriately, and give support to those who would gain from it, while educating the communities that are the foundation to the world we live in.
A rational conversation would be great! Reality has shown me that is nearly impossible. There is the ideal world, then there is a reality.
If there is a really good way to have comments done filtered from the spam and the hate, I’d love to know what it is. Yes, we do use Word Press but I don’t know it inside and out. I plan to explore plugins, etc. but frankly it seems to me that the time consumption of self-monitoring of comments would be extremely time-consuming.
Thank you for writing the article, it did lead me to more information. and awareness of some complexities and even some tools I was unaware of. If I had not crossed this article, I’d have not even known I was in their system! That’s scary. So thank you!
Khary
I recently removed the plug in after all my comments seem to have disappeared. Then i did an import and comments reappeared, but greyed out. In frustration in disabled the plug in and voila trouble free comments. Wouldnt ever use that program again.
Val
I was about to switch from Disqus to WP native comments, but then I realize that in order to have Akismet spam protection there, I have to pay $5/month for that. With Disqus spam protection is included free. And I have not had ad problems that I know of. Are you paying for Akismet or is there another option? Thank you
WPBeginner Support
Hi Val,
Akismet is free for personal blogs. During the signup you will be asked to choose a plan. Select name your own price plan and then you can set it to 0.
Admin
Ed
I’m so glad you posted this. Unfortunately, I’m just now seeing it after having the worst experiences with them. One thing, I can tell you, that made me leave Disqus is the way they’ve made it really easy to block individual voices that don’t agree with the status quo. I posted a comment on NPR that they didn’t like, and they marked it spam. Next thing I know, after posting on another site, my comment got marked as spam again. That makes it sound like it’s just me being a troll or something, I know, but I’m not. I’m just not someone who’ll say whatever it is that people want to hear instead of a dissenting opinion. Now, every time I post a comment, I have to go through a process where I’m more likely to get marked as a spammer because of these past two instances. As a result, I don’t use Disqus to discuss anything–but they did leave me filled with disgust.
John S
I’ve read some sketchy stuff Disqus was doing before. As a Disqus contributor I was researching Disqus and came upon your experience with Disqus. I have to rethink myself using such a service that seems to do things a bit shady and underhanded. I don’t like Disqus because it tends to allow some really derogatory users who continue to berate other user comments without any ramifications. For me Disqus as sort of done a disservice to the web comment services by becoming more a negative then a positive way to exchange opinions and ideals.
John
Disqust wants to see my friends list and many other things in order to become their customer? Really? And it told me it found my secret account (everyone’s entitled to privacy) and asked me whether I wanted disqust to let everyone know about it and tie it up with my public profile? Seriously? Does Yelp have a buddy at Disqust? Cause Yelp is buddies with Twitter, which in turn allows Yelp president to freely spy on everyone’s comments at Twitter (no kidding). I find difficult to post even using the very Disqusting account. And I never allow them to connect with my Gmail, Facebook etc. accounts. Once Disqust blocked me from posting on Disqust and exposed to me that they knew everything about me and my posts. Nothing illegal on my side and who is Disqust, a Scotland Yard?
Jess Pacheco
This is some good insight. I actually came across this on my search for why my Disqus comments weren’t loading at the footer of my newest blog post. So, it seems like a lot of folks have encountered my issue with no solution.
Vincenzo
“When we enabled Disqus, few readers complained that Disqus makes it harder for guest commenting.” This is the main reason why I hate disquis.
Peter
This is a great article. Thank you for sharing. I was about to pay for Disqus but this has raised a red flag. Again, thank you.
Trina
I just stumbled upon this while I was just about to download the disqus plug in. I am glad I read it.
I have a few questions, at the moment I have a facebook plugin but my normal wordpress comment box is underneath. But I keep getting people trying to advertise in the wordpress comment box and it’s pretty annoying. I primarily work on facebook… would you suggest keeping the facebook plugin? I would like people to post from all platforms. Also, how do I moderate the comments?
Sorry for all the questions, I am relatively new to this. Many thanks
Ramin Faizy
Thanks for this great post i wanted to use disqus for my site but after this great post i will not use that thanks a lot
Lisa
Thank you for the update. As a now -post article former Disqus user- I appreciate knowing their deceptive practices and absolutely appreciate the ease and security in which I can now comment.
hipo
That’s exactly the reason why since some time ago I decided not to use Disqus at all.
Regards,
Georgi
Natalie
Would I loose all comments that were left on my site via Disqus if I switch to regular wordpress comments?
WPBeginner Support
Hi Natalie,
No, if you have been using the official Disqus comment system plugin in WordPress, then all your Disqus comments will be synced with your WordPress database. You can view them by visiting the Comments page in WordPress admin area.
Admin
Randy
Hey WPbeginner,
How do you make your wordpress native comments look like this? I tried using native wordpress and it looks hideous, also background is grayish and people can’t reply to each other’s comments. Any idea how you made yours look the way is now? Please help, would love to use something alike. Thanks
WPBeginner Support
Hey Randy,
We are using a custom theme so we were able to design our comments the way we wanted. You can also do that by adding custom CSS to your theme. Check out our guide on how to style WordPress comments for more details.
Admin
Knut Holt
Disquss are stedily more taking the role of being a service for global eensorship, surveillance and spam on behalf of their commersial partners and the constellation commonly called the “deep state” which is also a partner.
They sensor stedily more any comment that goes against the interests of these partners and any spam, according to a wide definition, that might compete with their parners. They do so globally and steadily more also globally ban people that issue comments not strictly according to maintream consensus.
But simultaneously they take the freedom to act as a grand scale spammer themselves.
What I said here I already knew, but this article also shows that Disquss is involved in downright economical Fraud ny changing affiliate links. But I cannot say I am surprized.
Be aware that this activity takes a lot of computational resources from website owners, so that the owners get higher costs and lose income at every corner.
Fagad
If it is so good, then why you do not use Disqus instead of this commenting system?
Tim
It’s there on their website:
Personalization
Disqus collects anonymous data from you in order to deliver better targeted content and advertising.
haris
Great! I am having trouble with Disqus Comments and now disabling it
Dave Ellis
Pretty interesting reading. I was thinking 0f using Disqus, but on reading your article, I am having second thoughts.
Pat Slice
I have canceled my Disqus account. Not that I don’t believe in open comment I found that the oarticipants blewback so hard and no real reason. I somestimes think disqus participants were overly irate. Maybe I am sensitive but I do believe that we should be able voice our opinions without being personally and viciously attacked.
Matt Hutson
I just signed up for Disqus. After reading your post I’m a little skeptical but then again my blog hasn’t got many comments so I’m willing to try something new to see if it works. Thanks for all the good information!
Chrissy
Did you export your comments from Disqus to your site and if so, how did you do that?
Chug
Do you need to sign up to comment or?
Tom Tom
DISQUS is really shady…..
Recently it became impossible for me to post using the DISQUS since they started “building walls” and doing really creepy things such as displaying my business email and my password (which I never used with them) everywhere. So that way they let me know that they know everything about me and who I am and what my business is etc. etc. And I don’t give rat’s behind. They do that even if I log out, delete cookies, clear the cache etc. They must have stole that information from Facebook etc. Never let DISQUST anywhere close to your email or your Facebook etc. They were illegally spying on me, my friends, my communications, my posts and they decided to make posting on DISQUST for me a living hell, so I quit them every time I see DISQUS I just close the browser for that site even if it is a shopping site or site with ads where I may clocik on, as soon as DISQUST shows up, I shut the browser down immediately. I developed such a habit. DISQUS = SHUTDOWN. And now I blocked their domain and IP addresses from my PC.
Also, BEWARE, DISQUS is working with Twitter and Yelp spying on your tweets by forwarding your tweets to themselves.
Aziz Brimah
Good article. Thanks.
Umer Iftikhar
Alright! But I just want to know few more things. I am thinking to switch from Disqus since I can see drop in comments from my readers. Further what options would you recommend to stop spam? Secondly How did you switch and took all those comments back to your wordpress from Disqus?
In the last what comment system you are now using?
Is Jetpack good?
WPBeginner Support
Hi Umer,
We use default WordPress commenting system. For spam protection we use moderation and Akismet.
Admin
Chris Curley
I simply refuse to sign up for disqus and simply don’t comment on websites that require me to do so.Sometimes I feel like correcting an opinion I feel to have deep factual flaws,however my input isn’t that necessary that I need to be forced to go through the steps required by disqus and I too cringe when I see their eblem
Tim
Do you refuse to sign up to any website to leave comments? For example if this site didn’t allow anonymous and you had to creat an account, would you?
Kat
That’s a bit like asking if you’d refuse to get an account on Vimeo, to validate your refusal to get a Youtube account. There are plenty of websites that require you sign up to leave a comment, but few have the history of data breach, trolls and doxxing threats that Disqus has. They have a reputation, and it’s well deserved.
And yes, I speak from both research and personal experience. After deleting a personal-use account several years ago, I later tried to set up a very carefully limited account for my professional profile. I eventually deleted that one too – it just wasn’t worth the intrusions.
I have joined many websites in order to leave a single comment, if they’re not asking for more information than I’m willing to pony up. But if I see Disqus is their comment system, I not only will not comment, I will sometimes go out of my way to let the site owner’s know that having Disqus as their commenting tool is the very reason they’re getting no engagement from me and probably others. Because I am as quick to advocate for tools that I believe stimulate active engagement, as advocating against those that interfere with engagement.
Tim
Thanks for the post. Would like to have more info on why you saw a 304% increase in comment participation.
This is what’s most interesting to me.
Is disqus just another Bay Area tech bubble startup? Or is there value?
According to your headline you can see a 304% increase in commenting when getting rid of them
What do you think the reasons for this are?
Mario
Hi,
You are still running native Wordpress comments I presume?
Keeping it that way?
Is the “Notify me of followup comments via e-mail.” standard Wordpress?
WPBeginner Support
Hi Mario,
No we use Subscribe to comments reloaded.
Admin
Mario
Thanks, I already figured that out, was too quick to ask :).
nickwalt
I really don’t understand why Wordpress haven’t treated comments like a first-class citizen and made the built-in technology (sans-plugin) a truly excellent experience (for site admins and users).
So often we read about “coming back to Wordpress comments” but why aren’t they so good that nobody wants to leave in the first place? Why? Why are site developers still going around in circles looking for a decent commenting technology for Wordpress? Why aren’t Automattic developing a truly innovative comment technology for their platform?
Rick
Disqus has MAJOR problems IMO. I previously deleted a Disqus account because they refuse to take action against trolls that post extremely crude, profane and vulgar comments in comment sections. I had one that started stalking me looking for any comments I made, and then attacking me (personally) over them.
I just tried to sign up a new account with Disqus and found that I had to “verify” my account. Surprise, when I clicked on the verify button, it was blocked by the ‘hosts’ file in my computer that blocks access to know Spam/Attack sites. In this case, it was viglink.com.
So… I just deleted the new account I never validated. Show me ads when I visit your site. DON’T use a known spammer that is going to flood my mailbox with crap just so I can make comments as Disqus appears to be doing.
erse
thanks for the great review about this product
Trilby O'Feral
I don’t have a website, I’m speaking purely from a commenter’s point of view. Disqus seems to have many problems, the worst one being that notifications of new replies aren’t showing up. I take part in a Disqus channel page and when 3-4 of us are chatting, it’s annoying to have to keep refreshing the page to see new replies/comments. Then you have to check the times to see which ones are new. It puts a damper on things. The problem is intermittent throughout the day.
I’m sorry for the friend who created the page, but it’s really too difficult to follow and participate in discussions so I, as well as others, don’t go there much now. I’ve been encouraging her to switch to WordPress, I hope she does. Or at least finds a better alternative to Disqus.
Thanks for a good article.
Shri
Thanks for detailed review. I was planning to add it to my blog. Now I am rethink and research other reviews before implementing it.
D.J.
I did some reading about Disqus vs. native WP, etc., some weeks ago now. Wasn’t intending to do more tonight, but came across this article while searching on how to monetize Disqus.
I haven’t even started yet and am just trying to do preliminary research before publishing this way.
In my earlier readings, it had seemed that Disqus was a good way to go, but this article and the comments make me wonder now.
Is it true that there is no monetization available from them unless you have at least 10,000 avg monthly page views? Also, what some have posted below about the sharp decline in revenue is not encouraging.
The one thing, however, which still makes me suspect Disqus is a good option is the spam factor. From the readings I did earlier, it seems that people agree with the anti-Spam features of Disqus are great and you hardly ever have to deal with spam at all with Disqus. With native WP, however, it seems people agree that spam is a HUGE problem and you can have to spend a lot of time and energy dealing with it.
WPBeginner Support
We run native WordPress comments without much spam
Please take a look at our guide on how to combat comment spam in WordPress.
Admin
Tim
Ok,
after reading this article a bit further I do agree with the signup process making it more difficult to just go ahead and comment on different posts. After working in the PSM Plus industry it’s nice to read helpful articles like this on wordpress and commenting ingeneral.
Leanette
I’ve grown to hate Disqus.
Their developer/moderator team is something to be desired. Sucks that (you) the creator must go through the (development) team in order to make any channel changes (logo/image). And you cannot delete/remove your old channel either. Ridiculous.
Amol
I am using disqus form a long time.
Nate Balcom
I was considering Discus as I hadn’t used it before and have noticed it being used on a lot of sites I visit. So there must be an upside..right?
I like the idea that you login once and you can post anywhere there is a Discus commenting system, but I was afraid it might dissuade people from posting as it didn’t allow for back links.
This can also be a problem with spammers, but as I moderate my comments before they’re posted this isn’t an issue. I don’t get enough comments on my site as it is and I don’t want to give visitors another reason to not communicate.
I’m currently using default Wordpress comments and am thinking I’m going to stick with them. This article has been helpful.
John Smith
what comment system are you using now?
WPBeginner Support
We are using the default WordPress comments.
Admin
John Carroll
(my last message: request removal of post on censorship)
I guess (please) disregard (or remove) my post about being censored at Disqus since even under a pseudonym, it wouldn’t be hard for someone Disqus-connected to figure out who posted it. They’re still doing it to me (someone else mentioned it happening to them, I replied it happens to me, and my post went *poof* after a few minutes, but theirs didn’t in this case). I hope something good comes of this and websites switch away from that garbage service (IMO). Thanks for your time.