5 Chan Sites – The Anonymous World of Image Boards

Remember those bulletin boards in high school or college where people would pin images or random posts they wanted to call attention to?

Or the walls in public restrooms that were scratched full of all kinds of messages from love declarations to gossip and philosophical quotes?

Chan sites are kind of like the modern-day versions of that. They are online forums where people can post images and messages anonymously without fear of repercussions.

Some of these sites have grown to be so popular that they attract hundreds of thousands of visitors and millions of posts per day.

Photo by Arina Krasnikova

Chan sites have been used to organize electoral campaigns, break news even before the media, prevent potential crimes, and spark critical conversations.

However, they have also been embroiled in major controversies like mass shootings, doxxing attacks, hacking campaigns, and political insurrection.

How have Chan sites managed to become such an influential part of online and popular culture? What exactly goes on on these sites? Who do they serve and how does anonymity impact the content and culture on these platforms?

This article is going to answer these questions and more to help you gain a better understanding of how Chan sites function, what they bring to the table, and their implications for internet culture and society at large.

Understanding Chan Sites

Chan sites, often referred to as image boards, are online forums that allow users to conceal their identity by posting images and discussing topics of interest anonymously.

Chan sites don’t require users to register an account before they can access the platform. Users who wish to create a recognizable identity can use tripcodes to sign their posts so other users can tell when they are posting.

Photo by Karolina Grabowska

However, these tripcodes do not store any information about the user’s actual identity and are randomly generated for each person, so the sense of anonymity is still preserved.

Modern-day Chan sites can trace their history to Hiroyuki Nishimura, a Japanese student who created 2Channel (aka 2Chan or 2ch) in 1999 while studying in the United States.

Although 2Channel had some English language boards, the site was predominantly used by Japanese speakers. 2Channel soon spread like wildfire, becoming one of the most popular and influential websites in the world.

Its success inspired people from other nationalities to create their own image boards where they could converse freely in their own languages. Some of these Chan sites have gone on to achieve notoriety and garner a massive and loyal community of users from around the world.

Unlike the Japanese textboards that spawned their creation, Chan sites shift the focus away from text posts and replace them with picture posts.

Chan sites usually have different forums dedicated to different topics so users can easily find subjects they’re interested in.

For instance, one site can have separate image boards for politics, anime, history, gaming, movies, and more. Users can contribute to these boards by joining an existing discussion thread or starting a new thread.

Another interesting feature of Chan sites is the temporary nature of the content shared on the site. Unlike other digital forums like Reddit where past threads can be archived, posts do not live forever on Chan sites; they are usually deleted within a few minutes or hours.

The fleeting content combined with the anonymity Chan sites offer empowers users to feel free to be themselves or whomever they want to be.

With their identities protected, they can speak freely and share opinions they might not be comfortable airing publicly otherwise.

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Unique culture and community that has emerged on Chan Sites

For a lot of people, Chan sites function as a social medium that connects them to people who share their interests. It’s a place where they can unwind, share memes, geek about topics that excite them, and engage in harmless banter.

But for plenty of others, it’s a license to expose the worst aspects of their characters and engage in borderline illicit behaviors. Since most Chan sites are created on the basis of absolute free speech, the rules governing what people can say on the platform are nonexistent or limited at best.

Photo by Katerina Holmes

This lack of moderation and liability had led Chan sites to become breeding grounds for hate, propaganda, extremism, harassment, violent threats, and distribution of illegal content like child pornography.

It’s not unusual to find image boards on Chan sites originally meant for discussing seemingly harmless topics like current events being co-opted to spread white extremist views, homophobia, and red pill incel ideologies.

Anyone who shares ideas that don’t conform to the reigning consensus on 4Chan sites will likely be met with venomous hostility aimed at silencing them.

This contentious and vile culture of such platforms and the blatant refusal of their owners and users to adopt normal internet etiquette have relegated many Chan sites to the dark web.

Exploring 5 Different Chan Sites

Before we go any further, let’s look at some of the most popular English-language Chan sites in operation today and what they each bring to the table.

4Chan

4Chan is an image-based bulletin board that allows anyone to post images and comments on a variety of topics. It was inspired by the Japanese forum, Futaba Channel, and designed to serve as an alternative for fans of Chan sites who don’t understand Japanese.

Since it came online in 2003 4Chan has been one of the most influential sites on the web. Currently, 4Chan attracts about 22 million monthly visitors who flock to its 70+ image boards to discuss topics like comics, weapons, extreme sports, television, video games, and politics.

The Chan site has given birth to several internet phenomena including rickrolling, lolcats, Pedobear, and Tox, the innovative open-source alternative to Skype.

4Chan is also considered the founding base of the infamous hacktivist group Anonymous.

The site and its user base have gained notoriety in the eyes of the general public for various reasons including plotting and participating in cyber attacks, targeted harassment, extremist discussions, and violent attacks.

4Chan’s interface follows the regular image board structure. Users are not required to register an account to use the platform so they can post whatever they want and remain anonymous.

The only information that 4Chan logs for users is their IP addresses which can only be viewed by the site’s administrators.

Since Christopher Poole founded 4Chan to be a platform without many restrictions or moderation, the site tries to stay away from policing user activity.

All it asks is that users be 18 or older and avoid posting anything that violates the law of the United States. It also enforces other basic rules like no advertising, spamming, using bots and scrapers, and posting with VPNs.

Everything else is pretty much fair game. This lax approach to moderation has turned 4Chan into a noxious environment where misinformation, homophobia, harassment, racism, anti-semitism, and misogyny thrive.

Also Read: 4chan Alternatives

8kun (Formerly 8Chan)

Former 4Chan user and WizardChan administrator, Frederick Brennan created 8Chan in 2013 to enable users to exercise their freedom of speech and expression to the max, without any kind of extralegal restrictions.

However, after the website became implicated in multiple instances of far-right violence in 2019, 8Chan’s infrastructure providers revoked the platform’s access to their services.

This led to 8Chan being taken off the internet. It returned online in late 2019 under the name 8kun after managing to secure hosting and domain privileges from a Russian provider.

8kun’s only global rule is that you cannot post any content that is illegal under United States law. Although 8kun was modeled after 4Chan, it differs from the latter in one key aspect-it allows users to create their own image boards.

On 8kun, you don’t have to wait around for administrators to create boards for the topics you want to discuss. You can create your own board, make it public, and manage the posting of images and comments on your own.

At the moment, there are 490 public boards on 8kun dedicated to a wide range of interests from cryptocurrency to political debates and even religion.

You just have to find a board that interests you and jump into an ongoing discussion or upload an image to start a new thread.

Like most image boards, account registration is not available on 8kun. The site doesn’t store any personal details about its users including their IP addresses, so there’s total anonymity when posting to the platform.

In terms of culture, 8kun is practically 4Chan on steroids. It makes no attempts to curtail the kind of stuff that users can post so offensive opinions, extremist views, and outright criminality reign supreme on the site.

Also Read: 8chan, 8kun, 4chan, Endchan – Why Are They Controversial?

EndChan

EndChan is an anonymous image board that prioritizes ideas over individual identity. It was created in 2015 but didn’t garner a significant following until 2019 after 8Chan was taken offline, leaving its users without a digital refuge.

EndChan’s moderation activities are based on only three global rules: no posts that are illegal under U.S. law, no spamming, and no suggestive audio-visual content featuring minors.

Although EndChan’s interface looks a little more outdated than most of its competitors, it is still easy to move from page to page and figure out how the site works.

The only user data that EndChan records is the unique IP address of visitors. However, most users access the site via anonymous browsers like Tor that hide their IP addresses, making it impossible to trace them through their posts.

EndChan gives you a variety of boards to choose from including crowd favorites like Politically Incorrect, QAnonResearch, QR Bunker, News, Anarchism, and Random. It also allows users to register and moderate their own boards on any subject matter they want.

Since most of EndChan’s users came from 8Chan, it’s no surprise that they brought their bigotry and morally-repugnant opinions with them to the platform.

Like its counterparts, the Chan site is often littered with offensive and inflammatory posts that often border on illegal or cross the line.

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Wizchan

Wizchan is a Chan site for adult male virgins who are voluntarily or involuntarily celibate.

The name and ethos of the site draw inspiration from a joke from the anime Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai which states “If you pass the age of thirty as a virgin, you become a wizard.”

The platform was created by WizardChan’s admin and moderators in 2014 after the latter site was taken offline. The goal of Wizchan is to create a space for male virgins to vent their frustrations, share opinions, and discuss the challenges of living as they do.

Wizchan’s interface is what you’d expect from a traditional image board. The design is dated, minimalistic, and easy enough for anyone to navigate.

Wizchan has over half a dozen discussion boards and topics including /games/, /music/, /dep/ for depression, /jp/ for Japanese culture, /hob/ for hobbies, and /wiz/ for general discussions about the wizard lifestyle.

The site’s users have their own vocabulary which is unique to them and rarely used outside of the incelosphere because of their toxic and pejorative nature.

For example, they use words like “3D pigs” to describe women and “normalfilth” to refer to people who have any kind of sexual experience or romantic relationships.

Several rules govern the activities on Wizchan and the most paramount of them is that you must be a male virgin of at least 18 years old to use the site.

Of course, there’s no way of verifying who fits this criteria so anyone can post on Wizchan pretending to be a male virgin. But if you do this and you’re discovered, you will get banned.

The Chan site also forbids users from talking about desiring sexual or romantic experiences, posting about real-life social activities, sharing illegal or inflammatory content, and adding personal identifiers of any kind to their posts.

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ZeroChan

According to SimilarWeb’s data, ZeroChan enjoys upwards of 2 million visits every month so it’s a very popular website with an engaged user base.

Unlike the other image boards on this list that cater to a variety of topics and audiences, ZeroChan is dedicated to one subject matter, the love of anime.

ZeroChan is a Chan site for people who enjoy watching anime and reading manga to mingle with others who share their interests.

It requires you to create an account before you can begin sharing photos or videos to the site but you only have to submit a username, password, and email address.

So while you may not be able to remain fully anonymous, your identity will still be somewhat protected.

There are over 3 million images across different categories of manga and anime on the platform. So regardless of what your favorite show or book series is, Chances are you’ll find a community on ZeroChan to discuss it with.

As usual, you can either browse through the available categories on the site, pick a topic or image that appeals to you and start a conversation thread about it.

Or you can join an ongoing thread, read other users’ perspectives, and let them lead you to new anime content that’s worth checking out.

Instead of the typical bulletin board architecture that most image boards use, ZeroChan opts for discussion panels categorized by tags such as games, characters, art style, anime series, visual novels, and more.

All you have to do is click on a tag and look for the specific anime or manga that you want to post images or comments for.

Another interesting ZeroChan feature that anime fans will relish is the availability of ready-to-use anime digital wallpapers that they can download in high definition for their computers or mobile phones.

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Anonymity and Free Expression on Chan Sites

The reason why Chan sites attract a lot of people is because of the freedom from inhibitions that they promise.

For marginalized groups, people who feel voiceless, and those who have interests that are considered weird or obscure, the anonymity that Chan sites offer is a blessing.

It allows them to show up as their authentic selves and trade ideas and opinions with people who can relate. Anonymity also makes it harder for creeps to hack someone’s account and gain access to confidential information about them.

You can post freely, confident in the fact that no one will be able to tell who you are outside of the image board.

Photo by cottonbro studio

While anonymous posting can be a source of good, it can also turn into a nasty weapon in the wrong hands.

Lots of users are leveraging the fact that their identity is kept a mystery on Chan sites as a cover to engage in inappropriate activities such as cyberbullying, extremism, hate speech, distribution of revenge porn, and so on.

Since it’s very difficult, and even downright impossible at times, to track down the people behind violent posts or illegal activity on Chan sites, there’s little incentive for users to honor social etiquette or abide by the rule of law.

As a result, extremist groups, political propaganda, offensive rhetoric, and hateful ideologies have proliferated very quickly on these platforms.

Communities and Subcultures on Chan Sites

The Chan community is mostly composed of young males between the ages of 18 to 34. This male domination has helped institutionalize a culture that places a premium on toughness, contrarianism, and toxic masculinity.

This has resulted in women and other gender minority groups being treated with hostility and made to feel unwelcome on Chan sites.

Women who attempt to stake a claim to these spaces are usually rewarded with threats, harassment, sexist remarks, and other kinds of online abuse.

Although some platforms are actively working to rectify the gender imbalance on Chan sites by clamping down on harassment and creating an atmosphere that women can feel comfortable participating in.

Truth be told, there are diverse subcultures and communities on Chan sites, and not all of them have been taken over by the alt-right. There are Chan sites that do not condone negative behaviors like trolling and hate speech but simply serve as forums where people can have proper conversations.

However, it would be disingenuous to pretend that the general tone and culture of many Chan sites promote violence, radicalization, and extremist messaging.

Photo by George Milton

Oftentimes, these hate-filled narratives are coded into memes and images, and shared under the guise of irony or humor.

While some Chan sites are targeted at specific audiences, others have no audience preference so anyone is welcome to use them and find communities that revolve around their interests.

For example, there are Chan communities and boards for weed lovers, anime enthusiasts, avid readers, video gamers, male virgins, gun fanatics, and more.

Many of these communities within Chan sites have their own language, rules, and characteristics that are unique to them.

This creates an in-group mentality and allows users to transmit their ideas without outsiders catching onto the true meaning behind their communications.

Controversies

The reason Chan sites are so controversial to the general public is because they have been at the center of all kinds of negative and illegal happenings over the last two decades.

The hacker collective, Anonymous got its start on 4Chan. Since then, the group has carried out several major hacking campaigns such as Project Chanology which took on the Church of Scientology, and the Playstation hack which targeted Sony.

Photo by Andri

Users of Chan sites are also known for carrying out internet raids, swatting attacks, and cybersecurity strikes against people just for the heck of it or to prove a point.

Hal Turner’s DDoS attacks, Sarah Palin’s email hack, and Justin Bieber’s self-harm prank are just some examples of harassment incidents that have been coordinated by Chan site users.

Another reason Chan sites have been criticized by the public is that some users hide under the umbrella of anonymity to post content relating to child pornography.

Chan sites have also been repeatedly linked to murderous hate crimes and extremism attacks. In each of these attacks, the killer either posted their manifesto or shared live stream links on Chan message boards before embarking on their deadly mission.

These attacks include the Christchurch shooting in New Zealand, Buffalo shooting in New York, the Synagogue shooting in California, the Walmart store shooting in El Paso, the Baerum mosque shooting in Norway, and the January 6 assault on the U.S. capitol.

Challenges faced by moderators in maintaining a balance between free expression and harmful content

Since most Chan sites are founded on the principles of anonymity and unbridled freedom of speech, their administrators and moderators are forced to condone all kinds of content as long as they’re not in breach of extant laws.

Even when users actively post illegal content, such posts can be very difficult to track because there are only a handful of moderators overseeing the activities of tens or hundreds of thousands of users.

Consequently, Chan sites tend to rely heavily on the expectations of community and self-policing. Users are encouraged to report any content that they come across that violates board rules.

However, in reality, this is not really feasible because of the culture of Chan sites which often trivialize and glorify violence and harm.

No matter how controversial or harmful a post might be, Chances are that it’ll resonate with a lot of users within that Chan community so they’re unlikely to report it.

In fact, communities will often lash out and vehemently resist any attempts to moderate what users can or cannot share on image boards.

Users would rather flock to a different Chan site or create one of their own with lax rules than abide by stricter moderation policies that are implemented to address illegal and malevolent activities on their current platform.

As far as most Chan users and their administrators are concerned, any illegality, criminality, or harm that arises from the discussions and activities on message boards is simply the cost of doing business.

They consider it an unfortunate and unavoidable price to pay for their right to exercise free speech.

Impact and Influence of Chan Sites

One of the ways Chan sites have influenced internet culture at large is in the development of leetspeak. This is a system of communication that uses modified spellings, characters, and terminologies in place of original or intended words.

Chan sites have also played a significant role in the creation and proliferation of memes on the internet.

Platforms like 4Chan and 8Chan are responsible for the creation of lots of early memes including the viral “So I herd u liek mudkipz” which was inspired by Pokemon and spawned tons of YouTube videos.

Other notable memes that originated from Chan sites include lolcat which features the image of a cat with some kind of text to spark amusement and humor.

Pedobear, another popular meme, got its start on image boards where images of a bear with human-like traits were used by members of the community to mock users who displayed sexual interest in children.

If you’ve ever heard of QAnon or any of the outlandish conspiracy theories the movement has birthed, you have Chan sites to thank or blame for that.

Photo by RDNE Stock project

It all began in October 2017 when a 4Chan user who went by the name “Q” started sharing conspiracy theories about the deep state.

Q claimed to be a high-ranking government official with clearance to access top-secret information involving the Trump administration and its political opponents.

Before long, the user migrated to 8Chan, where their ideologies continued to spread, breaking out of the message boards and taking root in real life.

Several influencers and media personalities including Tracy Diaz, Sean Hannity, Liz Crokin, Alex Jones, and Roseanne Bar helped push QAnon conspiracy theories mainstream.

It’s clear that what happens on Chan sites does not stay on those platforms. Sometimes, they migrate beyond the borders of image boards to influence general society.

In some cases, like with harmless memes, the consequences are trivial or positive. But in other instances, like with Gamergate or the QAnon movement which led to the January 6 U.S. Capitol attack, they can have violent and devastating real-world implications.

Future of Chan Sites

With law enforcement and regulatory bodies cracking down on Chan sites, we might witness more and more of these platforms migrating to the darknet to escape scrutiny and offer added protections to users.

This move might cull the growth of Chan sites by making them difficult or impossible to access from regular internet search listings.

Photo by Alex Green

However, it can also intensify the in-group culture on image boards and these communities into thinking they are a law and authority unto themselves so the workings of the natural world do not apply to them.

With group-think and camaraderie heightened, users of Chan sites may feel emboldened to move further into extreme territory with their behaviors and actions.

The amount of illegal and inappropriate content being peddled on these platforms could grow exponentially and ultimately spill out into the public landscape where their effects can quickly turn ugly—as we have seen in the past.

Conclusion

Chan sites do not function in the same way as mainstream social media networks. Their primary motivation isn’t to gain a large audience base or make profits but to develop niche, self-moderating communities where people can converge around their specific interests.

Anonymous image boards attract users from all over the world and they have been very influential in shaping online culture and discourse.

On one hand, Chan sites have helped create space for people to share alternative perspectives, acquire new knowledge, and talk about experiences that are often ignored or marginalized.

However they have also played a part in furthering and normalizing harassment, hate speech, conspiracy theories, and extremist ideologies thanks to anonymous posting and lax moderation.

Those who wish to join the Chan sphere must keep in mind that it is the internet’s wild west. The expectations they have or practices they leverage when using other platforms might not translate to this world.

You will have to take the time to learn the language and culture of any Chan site you decide to join.

You should also be prepared to put up with a lot of obnoxious content along with the fun discussions and interesting people you might encounter along the way.