Digg has launched an alpha test of its new iOS app, aiming to relaunch itself as a Reddit rival built for the AI era.
The reboot comes from Digg’s original founder Kevin Rose and Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian. They want to tackle the flood of bots and AI agents online with a platform that pushes real human connections. Tech like zero-knowledge proofs may verify if users are human before posting.
The app is live now for selected testers in the Groundbreakers community. It offers a clean interface with a bottom nav bar for Home, Search, Leaderboards, and user profiles. 
Content is sorted into feeds like Most Dugg, Newest, Trending, and Heating Up. You can view these across all of Digg or just your personalized Feed based on communities you follow.
Only a few communities exist so far — art, entertainment, sports, finance, food, music, science, tech, AMA, news tracking, and Digg chat. The ability for users to create communities is coming in later tests.
Posts can be upvoted/downvoted, saved, and commented on. Digg also uses AI to summarize articles beneath posts, following similar trends from apps like Artifact and Particle. But no advanced AI summary like “Explain it like I’m 5” is in place yet.
Digg redesigned upvote/downvote buttons as hand icons, but testers say it’s unclear which hand means what.
User profiles show bios, stats, and achievements. Early diggers earn "Gems" for posting content that later trends. Leaderboards track top posts, comments, and Gem collectors daily but are dialed back on desktop.
Digg learned from its past when leaderboards grew dominated by power users manipulating trends and even charging for front-page stories. Now, leaderboards reset every 24 hours to avoid that.
The main question remains: why switch from Reddit? The team promises community creation and AI-powered design tools will come.
Kevin Rose said in a recent AMA:
“We see a world where eventually you have a conversation with a built-in LLM on Digg and say, hey, I want my community to show up like this … I want to be this widget over here, or this be structured.”
The app’s alpha is a rough but promising start. Digg is betting on AI and a fresh take on communities to make a comeback.
