Discord makes end-to-end encryption default for most voice and video calls

Discord has made end-to-end encryption the default for the calls that matter most to gaming groups: DMs, Group DMs, standard voice channels and Go Live streams. For players, that means party chat, raid planning and private community calls now get an automatic layer of protection without having to flip a setting first.

The big exception is Stage channels, which Discord kept on transport encryption rather than end-to-end encryption because they are built for more public broadcasting and use a different architecture. Text messages were left out of the rollout entirely and will continue to follow Discord’s moderation approach instead of being end-to-end encrypted.

That matters because Discord is not a niche chat app inside gaming. The company says it has roughly 200 million monthly users, and more than 90% of them play games, spending a combined 1.5 billion hours gaming each month. For a lot of multiplayer communities, Discord is the social layer holding everything together, from raid leaders and esports teams to friend groups hanging out after a match. A privacy upgrade on voice and video changes how that layer feels to use.

Discord started testing encryption for voice and video in August 2023, then introduced its DAVE protocol, short for Discord Audio and Video End-to-End Encryption, in September 2024 after design and implementation work and an external audit by Trail of Bits. By September 2025, Discord said DAVE was already protecting tens of millions of calls every day. The company also said that starting March 1, 2026, clients and apps without DAVE support could no longer participate in Discord calls, finishing the transition to encrypted calls as the standard.

The rollout is built to be automatic for updated desktop and mobile clients, which lowers friction for players who do not want to manage a privacy checklist before jumping into voice. Discord also says users can verify encryption through a privacy indicator and verification flow, a useful backup for anyone who wants to confirm a call is protected.

For gaming communities, the practical shift is simple: the most common kind of Discord call is now safer by default. That makes private coordination less exposed, cuts down the need for manual setup, and brings the service closer to the security expectations players already have for the conversations that run their games.