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Those are identical AFAIU.

Often .compact and i.reddit.com will interchange in my experience. (I forget which switches to which.)

They're the exact same for me. In fact links on i.reddit.com are for www.reddit.com/...[/].compact

Oh, so they are! So what happened here, IYI: I did a paranoiac double-check that both domains resolved and showed content before commenting, but my (...)/.compact result was with smaller text/more "squeeze". I thought it odd but it made sense because, y'know, "compact."

Turns out I had at some point set an 80% zoom while visiting there on this particular browser. Sorry for the confusion!

Holy shit, TIL