How Does Twitter Work?

How Does Twitter Work?

Twitter is one of the most popular media which has more than 300 million active users monthly. To stay updated, Twitter would change its algorithm consistently. So, to better use Twitter, it is essential to understand how does this algorithm has changed, or what would be the future of twitter algorithm. In this article, you read about the newest twitter algorithm and assumptions about its future.

How does twitter work?

There are a few rules that you should know about popular social media, including Twitter, Instagram, Facebook. They are almost similar in terms of keeping users active and show the relevant content to them. Twitter is one of the best platforms for all users to make money. For example, they can build an online store and share it on their Twitter bio. The more you perform better on Twitter, the more you can get followers and make money.

There are a few crucial factors on every social media. Twitter works based on:

1. Interests

What information you enter in your bio or any actions matter on twitter. For example, if you one person with a specific profile, twitter gets the signal that you might be interested in the same profiles. So, it would suggest similar profiles. If you would follow them, this will continue, and you would have a circle of following with almost similar interests, work, or professional profiles.

2. Relevance

The above explanation is correct for the topic you follow. If you are following the news related accounts, who follows you almost have the same interests as you. So, if you want to have a clear and favorite account, you should be very careful about what actions you do on twitter.

3. Consistency

Consistency is essential for other social media, including Facebook and Instagram. But what exactly is this consistency? There is indeed no exact number of times to post on twitter, but how you call a person active on twitter? If they publish daily? Hourly? Twice a day or three times a day?

Personally, if a person posts three tweets per day, I call them active. It seems that other articles also have the same opinion, and post daily is a must to be active on this platform.  And the more important it is to keep this sequence. If you are publishing every day, keep it and try to post every day. You can also use the Twitter scheduler to post in advance. This would help keep your presence on twitter.  

Twitter timeline algorithm

If you are one of the active Twitter users, so you need to know how does twitter works and to know the twitter timeline algorithm. It would help to use the app better and also if you want people to see you most often. Here I will bring a brief story of the previous twitter algorithm because it helps you to understand the current one better.

how does twitter work

In 2006, the Twitter timeline was a simple application founded by Jack Dorsey founded, and with some character limits and twits publishing in chronological order. Each user could see the twits from followers on the most recent one. In 2014, Twitter added recommendations, topics, and twitter accounts bar to its timeline. A year later, the phobia of missing content caused the creating the ICYMI (in case you missed it), which could help users to read published twits in case there were not online and could not see that, under the “while you were away” on top of users’ timeline. A few years later, Twitter changed its algorithm again, and the best twits came to the front to show the most favorable twits from people.

And now, in 2019, the twitter timeline algorithm is about both types of posts. Now users can switch between both recent posts and the most favorable one. However, this option is available on the mobile app, and if you tap the star icon on the top right corner. You see the” see latest twits instead,” and other options are “go back home.”

And there is another option just beside the posts that users can tap on that to see those posts less often.

As Twitter has announced, they are now collaborating with researchers at the University of Berkely to have some changes shortly. Jack Dorsey in his comments about twits tells that Twitter is a real-time media. It seems that they have focused on live trends all around the globe, instead of making Twitter a passive application. That is why most twitted posts should come first, and if you don’t like it, you have to change the setting as you want.

There are some debates about the content which twitter show to the people. For example, seeing retweets from people you follow, but the main content is from a person who is not in your follower’s list. Another discussion is about paid content, in which you may don’t like to see. These are all about twitter algorithm and their preference about what they want to people mind. In the most recent changes, Twitter has begun demonstrating tweets from who your friends are following. Twitter is putting these posts into the feed of users without permission from clients.

Jack Dorsey’s interview about twitter issues

As Twitter said, its goal is to expose users with more relevant content, which they might be interested in that content. However, it can be useful in some cases, such as being involved in football and seeing twits from people whose users are not following. But what about the unwanted content?  For example, a harsh political sentence, or whatsoever. There some crucially important content, and shouldn’t people distributed them without considering its credibility. It means that not all the material has the same value to be published wherever they are related. Take medicine courses as an example: what if an untrue content about the vaccine or any other treatment handed over by users? Should twitter algorithm change to omit harmful content that might have a detrimental effect on society?

Spreading unwanted content is a matter of debate for all other social media too. For example, Instagram is preventing the sharing of pictures that might be sensitive to people. There is an alarm icon on the image that shows it is sensitive content. You can choose to watch or skip watching that. It might be easier to prevent unwanted pictures from distributing, but how about content?

The future of Twitter timeline algorithm

As a Twitter spokesperson said in a CNN interview, their team is working on publishing the wanted and relevant content. There would be a choice for people to see the content from people they follow only. Following the health of conversation is the main focus of the company in the coming year.

Jack Dorsey’s conversation with CNN shows that they are questioning everything, and they need some more considerations about twitter. Politics twitter is something that is broken about twitter because there is a lot of empowering conversation. He is considering to address this issue to remove the harmful content from Twitter. He is saying that 12 years ago, when they started the company, issues were small.

Jack Dorsey conversation about the near future of Twitter
Jack Dorsey conversation about the near future of Twitter


The newest twitter algorithm gives the users two choices about top twits or seeing the latest one. However, there are other issues about the type of content you want to read. False information, harassment, and all the problems are getting out of Twitter. Twitter is a place for open conversation, but As Jack Dorsey discussed, the future of Twitter algorithm would be about the health of discussions instead of false ones, fraud, and so on. What matters most is going to be twitter’s next step.

How Does Twitter Work?
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How Does Twitter Work?
The newest twitter algorithm is the Top Tweets feed, but users can switch this to the most recent twits by tapping on the icon on the top right corner.
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