At Discord, we're committed to helping create a positive experience for everyone in our community. Our sensitive content filters are one way we work to support our users as they connect and hang out together online.

What this article covers:

Types of Filters

We currently offer image-based media filters to help reduce exposure to certain categories of potentially sensitive content:

Mature Sexual Media Filter: Helps detect image-based media that may contain sexually explicit or suggestive material involving adults
Graphic Media Filter: Helps detect image-based media that may contain violent or potentially potentially disturbing visual material

These filters currently can detect sensitive content in image and video-based media. No automated system is perfect, and some content that you consider sexually explicit or graphic in nature may not be caught by the filters.

You can report media that you think should have been blocked by selecting “Report Message”. This will help us improve our filters over time. You can learn more about reporting abusive content here.

Note: Your default content filter settings and ability to change your settings may depend on your region.

Sensitive Content Filters for the Adult Age Group

For adults, you have full control over your sensitive content filter preferences. You can choose to show, blur, or block potentially sensitive image-based media across both filter categories:

Mature Sexual Media Filter: Detects image-based media that may contain sexually explicit or suggestive material involving adults
Graphic Media Filter: Detects image-based media that may contain violent or potentially disturbing visual content

Adults can customize their sensitive content filters by changing their preferences in Content & Social settings. There are options to either show, blur, or block image based-media detected by the filters, and each filter (Mature Sexual Media and Graphic Media) has separate controls:

Direct messages from friends
Direct messages from others
Messages in server channels

Default settings for Adults:

DMs from friends: Show sensitive image-based media
DMs from non-friends: Block sensitive image-based media
Server channels: Show sensitive image-based media

Note: In servers, you can only choose to "Show" or "Blur" image-based media detected by the filters. Blocking is controlled by each server's individual safety settings.

If "Blur" is selected, image-based media detected by the filters where you are chatting will not be shown to you unless you choose to unblur it.

Adults can press on the eye icon to unblur the image-based media, or press the eye icon one more time to hide the media behind a blur again.

Blurred image warning in a channel, showing "May contain sensitive content" with a blurred attachment

For multiple images sent in one message, the blurring will only be applied to the specific images that are detected across either filter category.

Channel with multiple images, three blurred and one shown, each labeled "May contain sensitive content"

Sensitive Content Filters for the Teen Age Group

As part of our additional teen safety protections, we have standard sensitive content filter settings for users in the teen age group:

Direct messages from friends: Blur
Direct messages from others: Block
Messages in server channels: Blur

Sensitive Content Filters settings, showing Direct Messages and server channel media set to Blur or Block

You need to be in the adult age group to unblur media flagged by our sensitive content filters and to change any of these defaults to “Show”. You can check your age group status under User Settings > Account Status.

If your age group is incorrect or you are unconfirmed, you can confirm your age group. Find more detailed instructions here.

Note: Teen safety protections may vary slightly depending on where you live, as some regions have specific requirements under local regulation. For region-specific information, see our directory here.

Why We Hide Some Media?

All users with a filter enabled can press on Why we hide some media below the media. Pressing this will show more detail about our filters and the types of media they might detect.

Adults will have the option to go to User Settings to see their sensitive media preferences. Users can press on Mark As Not Sensitive if the media we blurred should not be considered sensitive. Pressing this will forward that media to our team to help us improve our content detection across both filter categories.

"Why we hide some media" dialog with Go to Settings and Dismiss options (adult-facing version)

What If Media is Incorrectly Flagged?

Another way to let us know if the media was incorrectly flagged is to right-click or long press the media and find the option to Mark as Not Sensitive. By selecting this, adults will see the media again with the ability to confirm "Mark as not sensitive."

"Mark as not sensitive" flow, showing a blocked DM image with a Clyde message and a Mark as Not Sensitive option

Note: Once these filter preferences are changed to show or blur all historic and new media will follow your selected settings. If you change the setting to block, it will only impact image-based media detected by the filters going forward.

Future Updates

Discord plans to continue improving our Sensitive Media filters to better detect sensitive content and provide users with more control over their Discord experience. We are also exploring additional filter categories and detection methods to help create a more comfortable environment for all users.

Check our Safety News Hub for the latest information about updates to our safety features and content filters.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What is the difference between “blur”, “block”, and “show” when it comes to sensitive media?

A: There are a few important differences between these options, namely:

Block: This option prevents potentially sensitive content from appearing in your Discord experience.
Blur: This option conceals content behind a cover that adult users and teen users in some countries can press to reveal when they choose to view it.
Show: This option displays potentially sensitive content.

Q: Can teens turn off the filters completely?

A: No. Sensitive content is filtered by default. Images and videos flagged by Discord's content filters are blurred or blocked for teens depending on where they appear:

Direct messages from friends: blurred
Direct messages from strangers: blocked
Server channel messages: blurred

These filters apply only to images and videos. They do not scan text messages, voice, or calls. Viewing blurred content, or changing these settings to "Show," requires confirming you're an adult.

Q: What's the difference between the Mature Sexual Media and Graphic Media filters?

A: The Mature Sexual Media filter detects content that may contain sexually explicit or suggestive material involving adults.

The Graphic Media filter detects content that may contain violent or potentially disturbing visual content.

Both filters work together to help reduce exposure to potentially distressing image-based media.

Q: How does Discord detect sensitive media?

A: When these filters are enabled, messages containing image-based media are processed by our automated systems to identify content that may fall under either filter category. While our technology continues to improve, no automated system is perfect, which is why we provide ways for users to report incorrect detections.

Q: Does Discord review all the content detected by the filters?

A: No. These filters have been developed to help improve the user experience on Discord by limiting exposure to image-based media that users may find sensitive or inappropriate.

Users can always report content detected by the filters to Discord for review if you believe the content violates Discord's Community Guidelines.