Around 10 years ago – back when online discussions about Reddit were mainly sequestered to dedicated forums – Planty Stamey had a lively idea: Shotgun a beer at the campsite on day one of the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, 80 minutes before the festival kicks off.
Stamey, who has been attending the festival for 17 years, only ever missing three weekends in that stretch, had been active in digital forums about the festival. But he said the forums had become “bitey” overtime, and he sought out a different, more communal way to talk Coachella.
That’s around the time he moved to Reddit, a social media platform with dedicated, topical communities called subreddits, and joined r/coachella. It was a growing subreddit that offered a new chance to plan, discuss, and debate all things festival-related.
And one of Stamey’s most notable contributions? Inviting people to his annual beer shotgun, which has grown to become an annual tradition. On Friday, April 18, the unofficial event gathered around 200 people who all had at least one thing in common: the Coachella subreddit.
What once was a simple discussion forum has turned into a massive online community, with over 204,000 members. It ranks in the top 1% of all subreddits in terms of size, and is likely one of the few subreddits that translates into a real-life community every year in the desert.
Members of the r/Coachella subreddit pose for a photograph on weekend two of the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio on Friday, April 18, 2025. (Photo by Drew A. Kelley, Press-Telegram/SCNG) Planty Stamey drinks a beer with his friends from the Reddit community on day one of the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio on Friday, April 18, 2025. (Photo by Drew A. Kelley, Press-Telegram/SCNG) Show Caption1 of 2Members of the r/Coachella subreddit pose for a photograph on weekend two of the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio on Friday, April 18, 2025. (Photo by Drew A. Kelley, Press-Telegram/SCNG) ExpandVisit the subreddit and you’ll find a highly-organized approach to festival discussion, complete with tags and community bookmarks to optimize navigation.
There’s a camping gear market, for first-time campers. There’s a meetup section, for making connections at the festival. There’s an “artist of the day” section, for discussing each act in the lineup, months ahead of when they’ll grace the stage. There’s a thread of Coachella mistakes, where you’ll find cautionary tales galore.
And then there’s the community-made FAQ document, a multi-page tell-all with just about everything you’d need to know about the festival: When you’ll likely get your wristband, the different ticket tiers explained, the importance of bringing a bandana – they’ve got it all, even down to the type of acrylic paint you should use for your car decorations.
Stamey called it invaluable.
“If you’re new to Coachella, go to that subreddit immediately,” Stamey said. “I wish I had that. I would’ve come a lot of years differently.”
@the.socal.localThe Redditors during their annual beer shotgun meetup at Coachella. Full story at the link in our bio! #coachellaweekend2 #coachella #reddit #redditor #festivalseason
♬ Sauti – Francis Mercier & Faul & Wad & African Children’s Choir
The subreddit, which at its peak gets hundreds of posts a day, is a grassroot effort that falls on the backs of 15 dedicated moderators. The moderators are tasked with determining what can and can’t be posted within the community, organizing information, flagging misinformation and setting the page’s norms.
Kelsi Halverson, who was happily bopping between people and conversations during Friday’s beer shotgun, has been a moderator since 2017. That year, most of the moderators were in-person at the festival during weekend one and she offered to step up while they were busy.
She’s been moderating ever since, and says that the connections she’s made have been lifelong: She was at this year’s festival in a camping group of 15 cars and 38 people, all of whom she met through different means of Reddit.
“I met some of my best friends in the whole world on Reddit,” Halverson said. “I was a bridesmaid in a wedding for someone I met on Reddit. It’s become quite a tight-knit group.”
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