Your Personal Blog Should Have Comments

I will say something not popular.

Your blog should have comments.

Yes, even in 2026.

Especially in 2026.

I see many personal blogs today. Clean design. Fast loading. Static site generator. Deployed on some cool edge platform. And then at the bottom of the post?

Nothing.

No comments.

Just silence.

I remember the days of WordPress.

Every blog had comments.

Every post had a discussion.

People argued. People added links. People corrected mistakes. People said thank you.

It felt alive.

You did not just publish into the void. You started a conversation.

And that was good.

Messy sometimes. But good.

Now we have static site generators.

Hugo. Jekyll. Eleventy. Astro. Next.js.

I love static sites.

They are fast.

They are simple.

They are secure.

But "it's a static site" is not an excuse to remove comments.

Static does not mean silent.

Some people say:

"Comments are too hard to host."

No.

They are just uncomfortable to host.

That is different.

We became used to outsourcing everything.

Auth? Use GitHub.

Comments? Use a SaaS widget.

Discussion? Send people to social media.

But why?

It is your blog.

Why is the discussion happening somewhere else?

And please, GitHub login is not the answer.

I do not want to log in with my account from some random website just to leave a comment.

Maybe I have GitHub.

Maybe I have Google.

Maybe I have something else.

But why should I connect it to your blog?

I just want to say something simple.

"Nice post."

"I disagree."

"Here is another link."

That should not require OAuth.

Your blog is not a SaaS dashboard.

Make it easy.

Name. Email. Comment.

That's enough.

I hear another argument:

"Moderation is too much work."

No.

Just do premoderation.

Approve comments before they appear.

Delete the bad ones.

It is not that much work.

You are already writing full blog posts.

You spend hours thinking, drafting, editing.

Approving a few comments is nothing compared to that.

If you care enough to publish your thoughts, you can care enough to review replies.

Spam is not a new problem.

We solved it before.

We can solve it again.

Moderation is part of having a blog.

People ran WordPress blogs on shared hosting in 2008 and survived.

Another trend is using third-party comment services.

Disqus. Some "comment as a service" startup. Random embed script from a company that may disappear next year.

I do not like this.

They inject trackers.

They load slowly.

They can shut down.

They own the data.

And sometimes they put ads under your writing.

Why would you do that?

It is your blog.

Own your comments.

There is something beautiful about hosting your own discussion.

The comments live with your content.

They are part of the archive.

Ten years later, someone reads your post and sees the conversation below it.

Context.

History.

Disagreement.

Growth.

Without comments, your blog is a monologue.

With comments, it becomes a dialogue.

Also, comments keep you honest.

When readers can reply, you think more carefully.

You explain better.

You update mistakes.

You engage.

It builds trust.

And small blogs need trust more than big platforms do.

Some bloggers say:

"People can email me."

No.

That is private.

That hides discussion.

If someone asks a good question, others cannot see the answer.

Comments make knowledge public.

Email keeps it closed.

I think we lost something when blogs removed comments.

We optimized for speed.

For minimalism.

For "no distractions."

But we also removed community.

We removed friction, yes.

But we also removed connection.

If you have a personal blog, I have a simple request:

Add comments.

Even a basic system.

Even something small.

Even if only five people use it.

Do not be proud of zero comments.

Be proud of thoughtful ones.

Do not outsource your community.

Host it.

Moderate it.

Care for it.

A blog is not just publishing.

It is conversation.

Bring the conversation back.

Comments

Rob

2026-02-21 22:33:59

My writing is very similar to yours. One thought per paragraph. Sometimes this means just one line, one sentence. I find it easier to read and digest. Ideas don’t drown in rivers of text. I‘m genuinely surprised about the negativity and insults that this receives. Why wouldn’t people just tolerate it? Why the need to call it out and ridicule it. Feedback is okay, but why the attacks? Well, it tides me nicely to the feedback I wanted to give about a comment system: Some of us (me for sure) would like to avoid the hate that comes with comments. The personal attacks, insults, the spam, the sheer malice that stranger spew forth given the opportunity. I don’t write into the sense that you do; I just document technical solutions, and share them with the world in case it helps somebody. I wish people would give feedback; the swarm intelligence is staggering at times. But I don’t have the capacity to deal with the negative emotions. It’s more peaceful this way.

antonmedv

Thanks! It is nice go get comments like this one!

2026-02-21 02:17:55

You might feel differently if you write about controversial topics or openly belong to a marginalized group. Public comments provide a venue for harassment. Yes, they can still harass you over email, but there is less incentive without a public audience to revel in it. If i'm going to have to review them anyway, I'd rather only get responses from people who want me to see it personally, not perform for strangers.

phil

2026-02-20 23:33:48

I’ve been toying with the idea of adding comments to mine, this swayed me. No one reads my blog but it’ll give me something to do I suppose.

aykhan

2026-02-20 21:54:20

Nice post 😊

merled

2026-02-20 21:32:58

Pseudo authority with the rhetoric of pseudo aphorisms. Plus if it’s written by LLM, as mentioned in another comment, what is the point of owning your comments if you can’t own your blog posts ? Thinking has to be shaped by the language so it can be communicated and understood by others. It’s actually about putting the hard work of putting those words into the right order which shapes the thinking. Like in programming. Letting the machine to do it for you exacerbates the flaws of the thought and makes it eventually miss the point. Be an example of ownership by recommending owning the comments.

But I wrote this post! =) I guess my other comment is not....clear)

Steff

2026-02-20 21:20:49

I dislike your style. A thought per line is childish. So even if you made a point. An important one. It is lost. And you didn’t imho. Every blog is about the author. Their need to feel they’re helping, that they’re smart, that they’re employable. That they’re heard. That they’re worthy. Or they’d just write privately. It’s hard being human. And by not controlling the comments you risk your self image. Someone might say you’re wrong or have no value. We get it. And this is why platforms like lobsters are great. Should we even visit? As an author that truth could hurt. I write this assuming it will be moderated, but I hope you find it helpful. What are your 5-whys for having a blog? Can work on that and be a happier human? You are not doing it for us. So why are you, and what can you learn from that?

What can I say... You are welcome! =))))

Soptík

2026-02-20 20:23:19

I like the animation of the title. I fear pre-moderation would take ton of time, is spam *really* an issue today? Would people be that impolite on the internet to warrant moderation system at all? (apart from manually using a `remove` query by hand when needed, which would hopefully be almost never).

Thanks! Pre-moderation is simple for me. I actually see more normal comments than spam, actually.

Facundo

2026-02-20 19:39:58

You convinced me

Tom

2026-02-20 19:31:38

Why do write each phase on a new line? Is it a WhapsApp or Telegram here? Idiot.

Kos

2026-02-20 19:28:47

I did pre-moderation once when my blog had comments, and I did a terrible job of pre-moderating! I felt obligation to review the comments regularly (to keep the conversations going) but then I didn't. I guess I don't want my blog to feel like an obligation. I recently started submitting mastodon links because I want to have a way to submit corrections, there's some friction but it's better than nothing...

Ellis

2026-02-20 19:26:04

This post was the motivation i needed to roll my own comments section, was debating it for a while, now its next on my list. Thanks for the motivation

You are welcome. And thank you! This is exactly the reason for my post. PS I also got a few more comments (on different platforms) about starting own comments. This is a success, for me =)

Federico

2026-02-20 19:19:23

Small nitpick. Your post title looks wrong in Firefox on MacOS. There's more whitespace than needed between the uppercase Y and the o at the beginning of the sentence. If you remove all the span elements, it looks fine.

Thanks! Will try to fix it. UPDATE: I had to add manual font kerning, as I do need to keep chars as inline-block to animate them.

Franta

2026-02-20 18:05:29

While reading, I wanted to say „but…“ several times, however it is nice writing overall and I also support the internet as P2P network of independent servers run by individuals and small groups rather than few big corporations and their global clouds. It is not only about distribution of technology but also distribution of power, sovereignty and resilience.

bruce

2026-02-20 18:04:33

I leave comments on only in my most recent post. Too many spam bots know my site and firehose it daily. Yes, it is still WordPress and I've seen maybe one comment in the last year or two.

I think this is a problem with WorldPress. WP comment forms all looks the same. So writing bots for this platform is "preferable". But hosting custom comments; well less targeted.

sitegui.dev

2026-02-20 17:32:36

Interesting timing! I was thinking about adding comments to my own blog as well yesterday and I have a free weekend ahead ^^ Hope to get something working in my home-made Rust pasta that serves my content. Nothing fancy and with pre-moderation 👍🏽

I'd love to see how people implement own comments. If you ever gonna publish the source/post about it; ping me ;) via comments... =)

acdw

2026-02-20 17:17:10

Unrelated to the ideas here, but this style of every sentence on its own line is impossible to read. And it feels like LinkedIn posts (derogatory).

Yes, people expressed this thought! I will consider not using this style in my future posts.

Anonymous

2026-02-20 16:57:00

Awful writing style that reads like it was generated by a LLM

Actually it was! UPDATE: Apparently people, took this comment seriously. It is sarcasm. I wrote this post, unfortunately. So many negativity and aggression!

Idontwantaname

2026-02-20 16:39:45

If you implement your custom comment solution (like you are apparently doing), then I don't get notified about responses and have to keep the site open all along. Also, I don't think that you give good pointers for people who choose to have a static site for the sake of having fewer moving parts, on how to add a comment system.

2026-02-20 16:36:08

Is there a name for this kind of writing, where you replace all the punctuation with newlines? It reminds me of nothing but twitter and linkedin.

Well, this is a cool part! Software engineers have to figure it out on they own.

2026-02-20 16:33:55

Enlarge the thing! And all the good thing of the internet... Then you realise how silly is it to allow comments.

le hollandais volant

2026-02-20 16:12:54

> Even if only five people use it. I would say “Especially if only five people use it”. Above that, it’s not manageable anymore. It’s not about "some friction", but when it comes to the point of "only friction" and trolls, and spam… Sorry, it’s not worth my time. I have several blogs, all had comments in the past. Now my main blog (than is often about unpopular topics) does not have them anymore. I’m not sorry for having them closed a long time ago. But if I had an audience of only 5, yes, I would open them again.

I also hate this writing style

2026-02-20 16:06:49

This writing style is awful. It is pointless and annoying to read. Just stop.

jorje

2026-02-20 15:56:54

Great article!

György

2026-02-20 15:25:43

Universal "truths" like this can never apply to everyone. Maybe you like comments and find it important, but it's not for everyone!

asp dotnet developer

2026-02-20 14:56:30

I have a blog I vibe coded with asp dot net. I think if comments don't publish automatically and only publish after a pre-moderation, it would make sense. Can you please give some details about how you do this pre-moderation? Is your blog source code publicly available? Can you give some details on how, where, etc you run it and how much it costs? Just for future purposes, this was in my footer: 0.076 sec, #2315

I just use PHP and comments in SQLite database. Code is not public. But nothing fancy. Pre-moderation is simple: nothing is published. I need to approve all comments before they are published. In the footer of this website you see page generation time and number of unique visitors per page.

Rachael

2026-02-20 14:08:12

I feel like spending a paragraph on why you should add comments and the rest of the post on how would be more effective. I want comments, but I have a static site, and the options I've tried haven't worked.

Static sites are simple. But we can use our engineering skills to fight the complexity.

machinator@ik.me

2026-02-20 14:02:59

State censorship in France no longer allows comments to be posted on blogs, under penalty of arbitrary political arrests.

Erik

2026-02-20 13:45:21

My blog is an activitypub actor so everything i post can be followed by anyone with a fediverse account. It isn't that hard to build something like this there are libraries out there just have your clanker build one and deploy it on aws or somewhere.

I hate this writing style

2026-02-20 13:35:05

This writing style is awful.

imad

2026-02-20 13:25:08

This post made me want to add comments to my blog, thanks!

You are welcome!

Nixone

2026-02-20 13:03:02

Thank you, love it

xenobas

2026-02-20 12:47:41

This is a pretty reasonable take! Thanks for sharing.

Thanks =)

Emmanuel

2026-02-20 12:20:19

I tend to disagree. Firstly, nobody cares about my blog, so it's more a public personal journal than anything else (a web log, in other words). I do “publish into the void” and I'm not delusional enough to think otherwise, I'm okay with that. Secondly, yes emails are private; but if i have an interesting discussion by mail about a blog post, I can write a second article resuming our exchange in a more easily readable way than the naked messages. Thirdly, and maybe more importantly, if someone want to make their opinion about something I wrote public, they can do it in their own place. For me the blog ideal is not a succession of isolated islands, but a interconnected net. The discussion should occur not within the blogs, but between the blogs.

If you publish something online, I guess, you care about it. I know I do. And I value comments. All comments. Comments on lobste.rs, comments on HN. I want more comments! Conversations via email add friction. Conversation via email even more rare than comments. Publishing conversation never happen. Yes, blog post answers are good as well. But rare! If you make it easy to start a conversation, more lickly one gonna happen.

2026-02-20 12:09:54

Things can get messy though!

Yes, but we are engineers though! We can solve this.

tux0r

2026-02-20 11:59:05

Why do you use Yandex Metrika in this blog? Why would you do that?

I do like it more than Google Analytics. But I want to switch to something self-hosted. But I didn't find something what I will like. Maybe I will build my own...

testing

2026-02-20 11:58:28

I saw the title and want to see if you actually allow random internet weirdos to write comments here. How about emoji? Where do you draw the line 🤔 what about links to shady websites? Remember kids visual studio dot Com is legitimate but visualstuio dot Com is malware.

I do a pre-moderation. Comments are published only after I approve them.

cosa

2026-02-20 11:32:23

What happens when all you get are spam submissions, and no real comments? I have an email address posted at the bottom of every post; if people send thoughtful comments, I will add them to the bottom of the posts; except, nobody has ever emailed me about a blog post. So, maybe people who don't want to bother writing an email would instead take the time to write a thoughtful comment in a normal comment box? Maybe, or maybe it would be just a waste of time :(

Remove friction of writing comments! More easy comments to post -> more comments. E-mail is different!

Noman

2026-02-20 11:21:21

Nice post :)

Thanks! 😊

2026-02-20 11:21:05

Up until you realise you are in the UK and clearly don't want to deal/care with the Online Safety Act

DorotaC.eu

2026-02-20 11:13:17

I have a comment system. I made it. The code is bad, it looks terrible, but it works. Apart from one post that went on HN, I haven't received comments in maybe a year. It doesn't feel like writing the comment app was worth it. I could have sent people to mastodon and not gotten any comments, too. Easier that way. But I wrote it, so I'll keep it.