r/oilpainting vs r/painting

Side-by-side using public descriptions, members, growth and rule titles from SubMouse. Missing fields show as n/a. Adult communities are excluded.

Swap sides New comparison Related to r/oilpainting Related to r/painting

Oil painting room vs painting gallery room

r/oilpainting’s public description is for sharing your own paintings in real oil paints — digital and AI-generated work are removed. r/painting describes an artist cooperative gallery for painters at many levels.

In our directory, painting is larger (about 4.6M, rank #198) than oilpainting (about 1.1M, rank #991). Activity samples show painting posting more often (~120 posts/day vs ~46). Both samples are image- and gallery-heavy; oilpainting flairs include “I did a thing,” critique ok, and materials/technical questions. Our directory lists each name among the other’s related communities.

Rule titles: oilpainting requires oil-painting relevance, bans commercial plugging and careless hazmat tips, and wants proper image crops; painting requires own works, bans ads/reposts/NSFW paintings, and limits to one post per day.

Choose r/oilpainting for real oil-paint work and materials questions under its medium-only and no-AI rules.
Choose r/painting for general painting gallery shares across media under its own-work rules.
Both sit outside the current Top 100 cut. watercolor-vs-painting is a related medium comparison when present.

Written comparison based on public descriptions and rule titles · updated 2026-11-07.

r/oilpainting

Oil Painting

r/Oilpainting it's a place to share your OWN paintings, we don't care if you are new or professional, all art are welcome. we only allow real oilpaints, not digital or AI generated, both will get you banned.

Members: 1.1M
7-day growth: +1.6K
Posts/day: 45.6
Directory rank: #991 (listed; no SubMouse page yet)
Created: Sep 22, 2011
Submissions: Text or links

Sample mix: images 63%, galleries 26%, text posts 10%

Topics: Art, Painting

Rule titles (short names we collected)

be kind
Should be relevant to oil painting.
Do not recommend hazmats w/o caveats
Commercial plugging prohibited
Self Promotion
Civilized Political Discussion
First time oil painter only for beginners
Crop Image Properly

Look up r/oilpainting (info tool)

r/painting

Painting

Welcome to /r/Painting! Functioning like an artist cooperative gallery, this is the place where beginning to advanced painters display their work in an ongoing group discussion. Artists who post their work are strongly …

Members: 4.6M
7-day growth: +3.6K
Posts/day: 119.8
Directory rank: #198
Created: Jun 12, 2008
Submissions: Text or links

Sample mix: images 63%, galleries 27%, text posts 6%

Topics: Art, Painting

Rule titles (short names we collected)

Be respectful and civil.
No advertising of any kind.
Only post your own works.
No reposts.
Painting posts only.
One post per day.
This is not a mental health support subreddit.
Use existing resources.
Critiques must be constructive.
No "is this good for x" posts, "what style is this" posts, or requests to name your artwork.
100 karma is required to POST.

Open r/painting on SubMouse

Supported differences

Aspect	r/oilpainting	r/painting
Public focus (from each community’s public description)	r/Oilpainting it's a place to share your OWN paintings, we don't care if you are new or professional, all art are welcome. we only allow real oilpaints, not digital or AI generated, both will get you banned.	Welcome to /r/Painting! Functioning like an artist cooperative gallery, this is the place where beginning to advanced painters display their work in an ongoing group discussion. Artists who post their work are strongly …
Size r/painting is larger in our directory (about 4.3×).	1.1M members	4.6M members
Posting activity (our sample)	45.6/day	119.8/day
Common post types in our sample	images 63%, galleries 26%, text posts 10%	images 63%, galleries 27%, text posts 6%
Selected rule titles (short names we collected)	be kind; Should be relevant to oil painting.; Do not recommend hazmats w/o caveats; Commercial plugging prohibited; Self Promotion	Be respectful and civil.; No advertising of any kind.; Only post your own works.; No reposts.; Painting posts only.

What they share

Shared SubMouse topics: Art, Painting
Our directory lists each of these communities on the other’s related list.

Rules and posting patterns we can verify

oilpainting short titles include: be kind; should be relevant to oil painting; do not recommend hazmats without caveats; commercial plugging prohibited; tag NSFW; self promotion; civilized political discussion; first-time oil painter beginner lane; crop image properly. Our sample flairs include “I did a thing,” critique ok and materials/technical questions.

painting: be respectful and civil; no advertising; only post your own works; no reposts; NSFW paintings not allowed; painting posts only; one post per day; not a mental-health support subreddit; use existing resources; critiques must be constructive.

Where this comparison comes from

Public descriptions and member counts from SubMouse’s safe-for-work directory. Short rule titles and activity samples SubMouse collected. Mutual related-list links. Short titles only. Related curated page: watercolor-vs-painting.

Members and public descriptions come from SubMouse's safe-for-work directory (as of 2026-11-02 UTC); 7-day growth measured from 2026-10-26. Posts/day and post-type mixes appear when we have an activity sample. Rule lines are short titles, not the full sidebar. Directory rank is listing order — communities outside the current Top 100 open in the info tool instead of a full community page.