How to Check Your Twitter Character Count

Love to Tweet? Want to use the new X social media platform now that it’s Elon Musk’s? Not sure where to start?  First things first, character count!  

How Many Characters Are You Allowed To Use For a Tweet?

It's good to know that Twitter now allows up to 280 characters per Tweet. This rule changed back in 2017, when Twitter used to only allow users up to the "old" 140 character-limit to say what they thought about a certain topic! That proved difficult for lots of users who sent Tweet after Tweet to get their point across. Twitter responded to this by increasing the character limit so nowadays, a Tweet is more like a short, social media post – with a Tweet character limit of 280 characters.

This immediately gave users plenty of leverage to express an opinion, send very short blog-like content, include affiliate links, links to 60-minute videos (even send cat videos), link clicks, visual content or post actual content such as interesting news or other information. 

The longer character count also benefited business users to send longer, compelling marketing messages. So from a business standpoint this was a great move!

What Do You Do When Your Tweet is Too Long?

However, knowing how to use Twitter is an art form. While some people think that brief Tweets are similar to SMS messages, they aren't. The newly converted platform (which is now called X, since Elon Musk’s takeover) is a place for people to send brief notes and over the years, has grown to huge heights

Many Twitter users take time to compose their 280-character count Tweets, and it’s aggravating to design a Tweet and then hop onto the platform only to find their Tweet’s too long! So what’s the answer? Using a quality character counter to help compose 280-character Tweets rather than composing lengthy status updates.

Here's your detailed guide on what to do when you want to ensure that your single Tweet contains the right amount of characters and hashtag limit for Elon Musk's X (formerly Twitter) platform.  You can also use this information for other social platforms. 

Use this complete guide to also determine your Twitter bio length as Twitter has a bio limit of just 160 characters.  This is probably wise, as Twitter users tend to have short attention spans! As an aside, Tweet length makes no difference to whether you're a Blue user or not (Blue users refers to the blue tick at the side of a Twitter profile to guarantee a verified account).

In terms of Twitter's direct messages limit - there isn't one and you're able to write to your heart's content - up to 10,000 characters (including special characters).

If you're a newbie to Twitter, here's a useful video on how to use the social media platform properly.

Choose a Reputable Online Character Counting Tool

Unlike a Word document or Google docs, there’s no character counter tool on Twitter menu bars. Instead, rather than counting up characters (with and without spaces – spaces count in Twitter terms), it’s better to choose a reputable online character counter tool.

All About Originality AI Character Count Tool

The best character counter tool available to find Twitter's sweet spot is Originality AI and we’ll tell you why.

• It counts characters in real time (including complex characters such as Chinese characters and extra characters), so you get an accurate character count.
• It includes characters with spaces and characters without spaces.
• It also counts words – useful for other documents such as blog posts, Facebook posts, articles, essays, press releases, presentations etc.
• For essay writers, it assesses plagiarism too so you know your work is 100% original before submission!
• The online character counting tool also checks for AI-generated content.

How to Use Originality AI for Twitter

So how do you use this brilliant online character counting tool?

Follow these steps below to determine if you're an active user over the 280-character limit.

• Access Originality AI by clicking here.
• Copy your text into the text box (or for Tweets, which are brief, just type directly into the box).
• Originality AI does the rest, giving you plenty of counting statistics and other analytics.

A Final Word...

It’s as easy as the above comprehensive guide, so when you need to send a Tweet and your Tweet length limit is just 280 characters, now you know that you can use the assistance of character counter tools  to check you’re not over the limit.  Use this guide for your other social posts too, and when you're on a social media platform with a bio character limit or your Twitter handle which needs to be short and sweet.