For blog’s using the Disqus commenting system, you may see some article links to other websites below the Disqus comments section, with the heading “Around The Web“. Here is how to disable Around The Web Disqus links to external website articles.
The Disqus “Around The Web” link area is called Discovery in Disqus, and it is not a new feature, but it was not available to all Disqus users from its launch in 2012, so you may or may not have seen it displayed until recently.
It’s purpose is to generate traffic for users and to possibly earn users some money based on traffic sent to other sites.
Here’s what it looks like:
For this site, TechUserFriendly.com, links like those in the screenshot above aren’t relevant to the content here.
So, one reason you may want to hide Disqus Discovery links, is that it may be showing unrelated content. Maybe you just don’t like the way it looks for your website. Or you may just want to experiment with the different settings for Discovery.
How To Disable Discovery in Disqus
To disable Discover in Disqus, so the “Around The Web” links will not show:
- Log in to your Disqus account.
- Go to the Admin section. Choose the website you want to disable Discovery for, if you have more than one. Then go to Settings.
- Under Settings, go to the Discovery tab.
- Select the “Discovery level” you want.
The default “Discovery level” is “increased traffic and revenue“. As it says at the bottom, for this setting: “The Discovery box will be used to increase your referral traffic, and also to let you make money by sometimes showing promoted content.”
Change it to “increased traffic” or “just comments“, then check out the preview below the settings area, and see if this is the Discovery level setting that you want.
For the “increased traffic” setting: “The Discovery box will be used to increase your referral traffic by recommending content from your site to your readers.”
For the “just comments” setting: “The Discovery box won’t be used, and your site will only display Disqus powered comments.”
Selecting “just comments” will make sure that the “Around The Web” links will not show up in the Disqus comment sections of your blog posts.
Thanks.