Mod Anchor

Mod Anchor helps the mod teams with onboarding new mods into the system and creates a workflow to bring the new mod up to speed with close coordination with existing senior mods.

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Inspiration

Moderation teams often need to grow, but onboarding new moderators is risky. A new moderator needs real practice to learn community standards, but giving them broad native moderation permissions on day one can create mistakes, inconsistent decisions, and extra cleanup work for senior moderators.

ModAnchor was inspired by that gap: Reddit communities need a safer middle ground between “no real responsibility” and “full moderator trust.”

What it does

ModAnchor is a private moderator onboarding and review workspace built with Devvit.

It helps senior moderators train junior moderators through a structured Review Mode. Junior moderators can submit real moderation actions through ModAnchor, while senior moderators approve, monitor, and review those actions before granting broader trust.

Core features include:

  • Private ModAnchor workspace for moderators
  • Senior and junior moderator views
  • Review Mode for moderator onboarding
  • Approval phase where junior actions are queued before execution
  • Monitoring phase where actions can run but are still tracked
  • Action Console for user, post, and comment moderation actions
  • Approval Queue for senior moderators
  • Per-action monitoring notifications
  • Daily digest monitoring
  • Manual digest generation
  • Automatic final review reports
  • Report History
  • In-app Guide for senior and junior moderators
  • Workspace post locking and feed removal to keep the workspace out of the public subreddit feed

ModAnchor is intentionally human-in-the-loop. It does not replace senior moderator judgment or Reddit’s native moderation tools. Instead, it adds a safer onboarding and coaching layer for moderation teams.

How we built it

ModAnchor was built as a Reddit Devvit app using a custom-post workspace and moderator menu actions. The app creates a private moderation workspace where senior moderators can configure Review Mode, junior moderators can submit supported actions, and senior moderators can approve, monitor, or review those actions.

The app uses Devvit server routes, Reddit moderator APIs, scheduled jobs for digest generation, and a web-based UI for the moderator workspace.

Challenges we ran into

The biggest challenge was designing around Reddit’s real permission model. ModAnchor should help junior moderators practice moderation workflows, but it cannot pretend to fully block native Reddit actions if a moderator already has those permissions.

Another challenge was keeping the workspace private and understandable. Since the app uses a Devvit custom post, we had to make sure the workspace is locked and removed from the public subreddit feed while still remaining accessible to moderators through the proper menu path.

We also had to balance scope carefully. Instead of building a fully automated moderation system, we focused on a polished onboarding workflow that keeps humans in control.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

  • Built a complete moderator onboarding workflow with approval and monitoring phases.
  • Created separate senior and junior moderator experiences.
  • Added support for user, post, and comment moderation actions.
  • Implemented approval queues, monitoring records, daily digests, manual digest generation, and final review reports.
  • Added Report History so senior moderators can review previous onboarding outcomes.
  • Published ModAnchor to Reddit for Developers and submitted version 0.0.2 for Reddit review.
  • Installed and tested the app in two development/test communities.

What we learned

We learned that moderation tooling needs to be honest about platform constraints. A useful tool does not have to replace Reddit’s native moderation system; it can make existing workflows safer, more structured, and more auditable.

We also learned that moderator onboarding is not just a permissions problem. It is a trust, coaching, and consistency problem. ModAnchor is designed around that insight.

What's next for ModAnchor

Future improvements could include:

  • Richer native mod action correlation using mod log data
  • Configurable digest schedules
  • Exportable reports
  • Team-level onboarding templates
  • More detailed coaching analytics
  • Deeper community-specific policy checks
  • Better visualisation of moderator progress over time

Built With

  • devvit
  • devvit-custom-posts
  • devvit-scheduler
  • devvit-web-views
  • moderator
  • react
  • reddit
  • reddit-developer-platform
  • typescript
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