Let us understand How does Discord Make Money and Earn?
The Discord application has become quite popular in recent years. Its popularity is because it provides a lot of ad-free features to its users. People can send texts or voice messages and can video chat without any disturbance. But if all of it is available for free and there are no ads, how does Discord generate revenue?
Discord earns money in different ways. Some of its revenue comes from the purchase of games. There are also options for subscriptions. Discord has its merch store, which allows the users to purchase items with the logo of Discord. Discord might also introduce some new income-generating features in the future.
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How does Discord make money?
In 2017, Discord generated an income of $108.9 billion through its 2.2 billion gamers. By 2020, there were 100 million gaming users of Discord spread across 6.7 million users. This is an obvious statement that Discord is making a lot of money. But many people do not know how Discord makes its money. Discord makes money through games. The game developers market their game on Discord servers, and there is a 90/10 revenue cut; this is a great deal for everyone.
Many gamers use Discord; therefore, it becomes a good marketing strategy for developers. This is beneficial for gamers who can get many games on a single platform, for developers who can market their new games, and for Discord who can earn from every percentage. Apart from the games, Discord also makes money through subscriptions to a premium account. Here are specific ways listed through which Discord makes money.
Discord Nitro
The basic version of Discord is free. Regardless, certain features are available only to those who have subscribed to the Discord Nitro which is a premium version. There are two subscription packages available: one is the premium version, and the other is classic. You can get the premium subscription at $9.99 per month or $99.99 per year. The definitive version is available at $4.99 per month or $49.99 per year.
This is how Discord generates some of its revenue. Many essential and straightforward features are available for free, but the features such as creating your animated avatar and other cool ones can only be accessed through a subscription. Good quality screen share, video calls, and live streaming are available for premium users as well.
Merchandise
Any famous brand can make extra money by selling its merch. A brand that has become popular can start selling clothing items such as t-shirts, hoodies, hats, cosmetic items with its logo. People like buying things with the logo of their favorite brand on them. Currently, Discord’s merchandise store will be returning. Once it is done, people can start buying their favorite items and support Discord this way.
Discord’s Game Store
There is a Discord game store available to the subscribed users. If you have paid for the subscription fee to Discord, you might be aware of Discord’s Game Store. A lot of games are available in this store. Whenever developers create new games, they can install it on their Discord server by paying a small fee. Whenever someone purchases these games, Discord gets 10% of the price. People throughout the world appreciate this 90/10 revenue cut. This is a lot less than Discord’s counterparts such as Apple and Google Stores. Thus, Discord earns some of its revenue from the purchase of games.
Partnership and Ecommerce
Discord does not generate money by selling the personal information of its users or through advertisements. Instead, Discord believes in being on good terms with business developers and owners. Discord has good relations with different business owners. This is one way, Discord generates finances. This revenue-generating partnership has funded Discord for a long time.
Server Boosting
If you get the membership of Discord, your server speed will be boosted. This will increase your productivity as the functionality and performance will be increased. Many people call these subscriptions to boost their speed. This helps Discord earn money. The server boost is available for as low as $4.99 per month. There are three levels of server boosting.
Level 1: Level 1 is a custom server. You get 128 kbps audio quality, and you can live stream up to 720 p at 60FPS. Apart from this, you get 50 extra slots for your emojis; this will raise it to 100 emojis. You also get an inviting background and an option to have an animated icon for your server.
Level 2: Level 2 is the server banner. You get 256 kbps audio quality, and you can live stream up to 1080 p at 60FPS. Apart from this, you get 50 extra slots for your emojis; this will raise it to 150 emojis. You also get an inviting background and an option to have an animated icon for your server from level 1.
Level 3: Level 3 is the Vanity URL. You get 384 kbps audio quality, and you can have a 100 MB upload limit on the server. Apart from this, you get 100 extra slots for your emojis; this will raise it to 250 emojis. You also get an inviting background and an option to have an animated icon for your server from level 1.
Discord Investors and Revenue
Discord has earned a lot of revenue up till now. However, this revenue generation of Discord is still a work in progress. It was noted that Discord has generated up to $279 M through other firms such as Spark Capital Greylock, Benchmark, Tencent, Index. Some of these are the inventors of great apps such as PUBG and League of Legends. The Discord Company has a valuation of $3.5 billion. It has been speculated that Discord might have generated more than $120 million in 2020.
Future strategies of Discord
The developers of Discord are still coming up with new features. They are generating a lot of revenue right now. In the future, they may come up with a lot of other features as well. To stay long in the market, they must provide an ad-free experience to their users. This decision of Discord, along with not selling the personal data, will make it go far. The subscription option is one feature through which it is getting money. There are some other features which might come in the future. Some of them are Gamebridge and Game Revenue Sharing.
Gamebridge
Gamebridge is a feature that Discord is currently working on. This will allow the game players to enjoy more features in chatting while playing games. The game developers will not have to work separately on this feature then. This will allow the player to share screenshots, gifs, and videos while playing. This will become an additional source of revenue for Discord.
Game Revenue Sharing
Discord earns a lot of income through its partnerships. It can, in the future, enter into a collaboration with other game apps and make money through referrals. Once a person who has been referred through Discord buys something, then Discord will earn a small percentage.
Unlike many other apps, Discord does not earn money by selling its users’ data to other companies. It instead relies on the funding of its partners. Partnerships and e-commerce are a significant source of revenue for Discord.
Discord is a beautiful app for communication and playing games that have become very popular in the last few years. The best part is that the whole experience is ad-free. If there are no apps, then how does Discord earn money? Discord generates money through a lot of sources. There are options of subscription; people can buy games on the app. Apart from this, some partnerships help. Discord generates revenue. With this app developing continuously, many new ways of generating income may come in the future.
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