Details have emerged today that Discord has decided to overhaul how their standard username structure would behave, and instead move to something more like Twitter handles.
Basically for the longest time, your Discord username (not to be confused with your display name) was made up of a name that you chose, and a set of numbers that served as a discriminator (#0001) to differentiate your “ProGamer” name from all the other “ProGamer” people that were out there.
In most cases, it meant that you just needed to remember ProGamer#1221 and you were golden. But according to Discord, this isn’t what they want and they have decided to change it so that everyone has a personalised, individual name.
Discord is moving to a unique username system rather than discriminators (#0001).
You will be able to claim your username based on how long you've been registered with Discord. pic.twitter.com/YsoA2EBKyO
— Lowco (@LowcoTV) May 3, 2023
For the most part, the big concern from this is that usernames will now be a pool shared across all users – meaning you may find yourself bashing your head against that familiar wall of “That name is taken, please try another” when your long term gaming identity is more popular than you expect. It also means people will likely need to start tacking numbers and underscores to their name in a desperate bid to get something resembling what they are known for – and for the well known among us, names will almost surely be gobbled up by those who find it hilarious.
It’s worth clarifying that these usernames are separate to your display name, which is a moniker that you set for a particular server. So even though your username may end up being an ungodly abomination like x_progamer12_x (all usernames will be forced to lower case) it will not stop you from setting a more palatable display name.
Really the biggest argument against this system is for people who have a long term attachment to the Discord identifier they had established – and funnily enough, those who were able to choose their discriminator number as part of the Discord Nitro subscription.
One commenter laid it out pretty well:
discord username change is like if your phone company was like hey we changed it so your phone number is just your name. this is for convenience. home it helps
— yuuko from nichijou (@headfallsoff) May 4, 2023
Discord has at least been super thorough in their explanation for the change, with an entire blog post describing the kind of issues they wish to solve – and a huge glut of nitty-gritty support documentation that explains exactly how it should all work.
As for those that are desperate to lock-in their new username, the roll out is working in stages based off when a user might have initially registered their Discord identity – so if you were late to the party, cross your fingers and hope you haven’t already been sniped.
Otherwise, time to embrace some superfluous numbers and the almighty underscore. Welcome aboard, x_pro_gamer_12_x.
How do you feel about this Discord change? Does it impact you at all? Let us know in the comments or on social media.
Known throughout the interwebs simply as M0D3Rn, Ash is bad at video games. An old guard gamer who suffers from being generally opinionated, it comes as no surprise that he is both brutally loyal and yet, fiercely whimsical about all things electronic. On occasion will make a youtube video that actually gets views. Follow him on YouTube @Bad at Video Games
