X’s Communities feature, once pitched as the platform’s answer to Reddit subreddits, faces extinction. Head of Product Nikita Bier laid out the grim stats in a post that racked up over 1.3 million views. ‘Communities had a great vision, but they were used by less than 0.4% of users—yet contributed to 80% of spam reports, financial scams, and malware on X,’ he wrote. ‘It occupied half the team’s time some weeks, while the rest of the app suffered.’ Engadget broke the news on April 23, 2026, noting the initial shutdown date of May 6, later pushed to May 30 for migration. Low engagement. Rampant abuse. Bier didn’t mince words on the culprits. Successful groups often doubled as funnels for Kick streamers or clip farms, not genuine discussion hubs. Niche holdouts—like coin collectors, baseball card traders, skincare enthusiasts, and artists—must now scatter to timelines or chats. ‘That content should really live on Timeline or in chats—instead of a Temu version of subreddits,’ Bier added in the same thread.…