A new Discord Social SDK allows developers to integrate the platform in-app for games. Discord is massively popular with gamers; the company estimates PC players alone spend more than 1.5 billion hours each month on the platform. This free SDK can extend the user experience beyond the third-party content in which it becomes embedded to reach the platform’s community of over 200 million monthly active users. “Developers can power friends lists, cross-platform messaging, voice and more for all players — with or without a Discord account,” the company announced.

“Social integrations include a unified friends list that serves as the foundation for the in-game social experience, deep-linked game invites that enable players to invite their friends to directly join their party or lobby, and communications features such as cross-platform messaging and voice chat,” explains VentureBeat.

From indie to triple-A, Discord connects game creators with a large and engaged community of players before, during, and after launch, Discord co-founder and CTO Stan Vishnevskiy says in an announcement about the new SDK. “Game discovery and retention have never been so critical, and we’re excited to help developers grow their games by reaching gamers where they are,” he adds.

In 2024, five major franchises accounted for more than 30 percent of total playtime, while the top 15 dominated 60 percent of gaming hours, VentureBeat says, citing Newzoo stats. With 20,000 new games dropping annually, developers are constantly struggling for visibility. Friend-to-friend discovery has emerged as a key factor in that quest.

Players who link their Discord accounts may gain access to “some convenient features,” like the ability to “continue an in-game chat in the Discord client,” reports PC Gamer.

While previously game devs could tap other third-party apps or code their own in-game chat solutions, those options didn’t aggregate the power of a mass user base like Discord.

PC Gamer compares the Discord Social SDK to Epic Games’ Epic Online Services, “another free friends list, chat, and matchmaking SDK,” noting that “Steam also has its Steamworks API, but that only works on Steam, whereas Epic’s services work across stores and platforms.”

The Discord Social SDK is available for games built using C++, Epic’s Unreal Engine and Unity, and currently supports Windows 11+ and macOS, “with support for console and mobile coming soon,” Vishnevskiy writes in a blog post explaining how it works.

“A handful of game developers have already been working with Discord’s SDK,” including Tencent, Theorycraft, and Mainframe Industries, among others listed by PC Gamer.