Twitter’s New Timeline Shows The ‘Best’ Tweets First

Twitter has just flicked the switch on a new timeline layout, bringing the 140-character microblogging service much more in line with planet-consuming-social-giant Facebook: if you want, it’ll show you the “most important tweets from people you follow” at the top of your timeline when you open the app or refresh your Web browser.

If you’re using the official Twitter app for Android or iOS, or if you’re one of the faithful (like me) that still uses Twitter dot com the website on the internet in your Web browser, you’ll have access soon to the new feature if you dive into your settings and enable it. From there, all you have to do is refresh the feed.

You might have seen something like this in the past on your official Twitter mobile app — a box that shows you highly-shared and interacted-with tweets from the past 12 hours or so. Of course, every time you see it and close it, it’s asked whether you liked it and wanted to see it again. Now, Twitter’s turning that into a proper, baked-in feature for all users.

The updated, “show me the best Tweets first” timeline will be rolled out progressively across Twitter’s userbase. This is smart — it lets the company tweak the algorithm for choosing high priority tweets, and it also insures both Twitter itself and all your friends are insulated from any user backlash — of which there’ll inevitably be some, because some people just don’t like change.

The news comes from Twitter’s blog, in a post by senior engineering manager Mike Jahr. Emphasis ours:

You follow hundreds of people on Twitter — maybe thousands — and when you open Twitter, you may feel like you’ve missed their most important Tweets. We hear this from people every day. Starting today, you can choose a new timeline feature that helps you catch up on the most important Tweets from the people you follow. 

When you first open Twitter, the Tweets you’re most likely to care about will appear at the top of your timeline – they are recent, and in reverse chronological order. Then the rest of the Tweets will be displayed right underneath, also in reverse chronological order, as always. At any point, just refresh to see all new Tweets in the live, up-to-the-second experience that you already know and love! 

This option is available to everyone on Twitter for iOS, Android, and the web. To try it today, go into your settings and choose ‘Show me the best Tweets first’ within the timeline section. We’ve already noticed that people who have used this new feature tend to Retweet and Tweet more, which is good for everyone!  

Over the coming weeks, we’ll turn this feature on for you and send a notification in your timeline when we do. If you love it, great — we love it too! If you don’t, you can easily turn it off in settings.


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