How to reply on Hacker News without getting flagged
Hacker News is a terrible place to spray a pitch and a rare place to find senior engineers describing a buying decision in complete sentences. The people you want are not on Show HN launch day. They are in the comments three months later, on an Ask HN about billing, SOC 2, or the vendor that just raised prices. HN will flag anything that reads like marketing, anything with a tracking link, and anything that hijacks someone else's Show HN. The surviving comments are factual, slightly dry, and specific about what was tried. If you cannot survive a pushback without a slogan, do not reply here. PainHuntr still surfaces HN threads; this playbook is the filter on what you type once it does.
When this is real
Ask HN posts that name a job ('who is doing search for $20/mo', 'has anyone actually finished a SOC 2 without pausing the roadmap') are the buying committee. Comment chains under a Show HN that is not yours, where someone says they moved off a tool after a bill shock, are also real. 'Who is hiring' adjacent pain in tool rants counts. Threads about a vendor raising prices, a surprise invoice, or a security questionnaire that killed a deal are the ones worth an hour. Launch-day congratulations and generic 'this is cool' replies do not.
When to skip
Skip Show HN threads that are not your launch — do not drop a competitor pitch in someone else's moment. Skip flamewars about capitalism, AI hype, and Dropbox clones. Skip if your comment needs a graph from a pitch deck. Skip dang's graveyard: tropes, insinuation, and 'we built this to solve exactly that' without answering the question in the same comment. If you need a tracking parameter to know whether HN works, you are not ready to comment here.
The angle
Answer with a fact, a number, or a failure you actually saw. No marketing cadence. No tracking links. If you mention a product you sell, disclose and keep the rest of the comment useful if that sentence is deleted.
How to reply
- 01
Write the comment as if the product name will be cut
HN readers mentally delete the pitch and judge what is left. If nothing is left, you failed. Lead with the mechanism, the bill, the questionnaire, the outage. The product sentence, if any, is optional. This is the opposite of a landing page, which leads with the name.
- 02
Prefer Ask HN over Show HN for discovery
Show HN is for launches, including yours, with a Show HN title and a Show HN tone. Customer discovery happens in other people's Ask HN and in comments under articles. Mixing those modes is how you get flagged. If you are launching, use Show HN. If you are helping, use the other threads.
- 03
Take the most charitable reading of disagreement
HN will challenge your architecture, your pricing, and your character. Reply to the technical point. Do not ratio a commenter. Do not call someone non-technical. A calm correction with a source beats a founder-Twitter clapback, and dang can see both.
- 04
Drop the call to action
No 'happy to hop on a call.' No 'DM me.' No Calendly. If they want to continue, they have your profile. HN is not a funnel; it is a record. The lurker who hires you in six months will read the comment, not the CTA you wanted to add.
Example replies
Same thread, three outcomes. PainHuntr drafts toward the first one and away from the other two.
- Good
We ran Algolia at ~2M records and the bill crossed what the product earned in a month. Moved to self-hosted Typesense; the cost was an on-call person, not the invoice. If you do not have that person, the hosted middle is the actual decision, not 'search.' (I work on one of those hosted middles — discount accordingly.)
Numbers, a real migration, a constraint, and a disclosure that could be deleted without emptying the comment.
- Too salesy
Great question! We built an AI-native search experience that delights developers. Would love for the HN community to try it — launch discount in my profile.
HN hears 'delights' as a bug. Launch discounts in a discovery thread are a Show HN that wandered into the wrong post.
- Gets you banned
Can't believe people still use [competitor]. Their ranking is fake. Here's a stealth signup: example.com/?utm_source=hn&utm_campaign=sneak.
Astroturf accusations plus tracking parameters. This is how accounts get hellbanned. Also it does not answer the Ask.
Gotchas
- New accounts that only comment on threads in their category look like plants. Have a history of unrelated useful comments.
- Show HN has its own FAQ. Read it. Title format, no marketing, be on the thread for a few hours.
- Do not astroturf with colleagues. Coordinated upvotes are visible and punished.
- If dang asks you to stop, stop. Arguing with a moderator on HN is a sport you will lose in public.
Frequently asked questions
Is Hacker News worth it if the audience is so skeptical?
Yes, if you can survive the skepticism. You will not get a funnel. You will get a small number of senior people who write buying notes in complete sentences. That is a different asset than Reddit volume. Treat it as reputation, not as ads.
Can I reply to my own Show HN with a product update?
Yes, as the submitter, in a factual tone, when someone asked. Do not use your Show HN as a changelog dump every week. The thread has a lifespan. After that, write a new post only if there is a new story, not a new button color.
What about hiring threads?
Do not pitch a product in 'Who is hiring' or 'Who wants to be hired.' Those are jobs. Mixing sales into hiring is how you get remembered as the person who cannot read a room.
Should I use a throwaway?
Only if you need to describe an employer or a bill you cannot attach to your name. Do not use a throwaway to praise your own product. That is the oldest HN tell.
How does PainHuntr handle HN?
It retrieves Ask HN and comment threads, classifies intent, and drafts with the same no-walkthrough, no-pitch-unless-asked rules. This page is the HN-specific overlay: no tracking links, no CTAs, write as if the product sentence will be cut.
Related playbooks
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