Visual content considerations

As per Community Rule #5, all visual content submitted or uploaded to osu! must be considered as appropriate for an all-ages game.

This includes:

• submitted beatmaps, even those tagged as explicit
• profile details (avatars, cover images)
• any other attachments or hyperlinks (forum posts, comments, beatmap discussion posts)

In the interest of keeping things as clean as possible, Community Rule 5 applies to anything that could be reasonably considered "questionable".

Important things to consider

All pictures should be judged as they are, without factoring in any other cases before them. Decide based on what you see.

Please also understand that we are a global, multicultural community with widely varying thoughts, opinions, and values on the topic of what is and isn't allowed.

When in doubt, aim to accommodate the collective values shared by the largest portion of the osu! community in general.

Criteria

Images or visual elements containing any of the following are not allowed:

• sexual content involving or targeted at minors
• excessive violence, gore, dismemberment, decapitation, or maiming
• significant sexual innuendo
• sexual posturing or solicitation
• erotic content or graphic displays of sexuality
• examples of drug use, preparation, or identification with illicit drug subculture¹
• depictions of deliberately inflammatory political, cultural, religious, or social content
• imagery depicting suicidal or self-harming behaviour, including preparation or imminent attempts

In addition, images or visual elements that could be reasonably appraised as being of poor quality (in either objective image quality or subjective composition/creation) may also be prevented from being used in a beatmap in cases where they are not directly related to any relevant subject matter.

Exceptions

Images or visual elements containing examples of the following may be considered acceptable:

• mild to moderate depictions of violence (small amounts of blood, non-critical or superficial wounding)
• artistic nudity (in the context of classical artwork, or work related to the element, such as album art with minor nudity present)
• mild romance, flirting or intimate affection (hugging, embracing, kissing without sexual connotations, hand-holding, etc.)
• swimsuits of reasonable design (standard swimwear with general coverage, ordinary bikini)

In certain circumstances, some exceptions may apply for artistic use of high-effort content, such as storyboards or bespoke (ie: specifically created) video content. This must be granted directly from the support team. Those interested may contact them directly via support@ppy.sh.

Getting your image assessed

See: Content voting process.

Images that are used anywhere on the site outside of a beatmap (avatars, profile covers, userpages, etc) are not subject to the voting procedure explained below and may be removed at any time at the discretion of the Global Moderation Team (GMT).

If you are unsure about an image that is going to be included in a beatmap in any way, please submit a request via the Beatmap Nominator Report Submission page. The image will be raised to a vote that must pass by a considerable majority, or will be automatically denied.

The result of any vote is final, unless the image is significantly altered in an attempt to resolve any potentially problematic elements raised during discussion.

At all times, the osu! team reserves the right to unilaterally declare any piece of content either valid or invalid at their discretion, regardless of any previous voting held on the matter.

What happens if my image isn't okay?

Any images, videos, or visual content the GMT deems inappropriate are removed from the website. Additionally, the user that uploaded that visual content may be silenced for 43 hours depending on the severity of the offence and the user's relevant history.

For inappropriate visual content on beatmaps, silences will generally not be handed out as long as the visual content is not severely inappropriate and the user removes the offending content within a reasonable time frame.

Notes