Do you ever revisit your previous tweets? Twitter has been round since 2006 — when you had been an early adopter, you’d most likely be stunned to see a few of the content material you as soon as thought was cool and acceptable to share.
Reviewing your previous tweets will enable you preserve your model picture in verify, and it must be a part of your common social media audits.
On this publish, we go over the right way to seek for previous tweets and delete them.
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Why is retaining observe of previous tweets necessary?
If, like me, you joined Twitter in its very early years with no concept what it was actually about, you is perhaps questioning the right way to discover previous tweets. What did it’s important to say within the halcyon days of 2007? Are irrelevant or probably embarrassing tweets lingering in your timeline?
Having fun with the free wi-fi at YVR.
— Christina Newberry (@ckjnewberry) March 5, 2009
Singing the praises of free wifi at a serious worldwide airport (nevermind calling it “wi-fi”) seems just a little goofy from the absolutely related days of 2022.
In fact, this random tweet isn’t going to get me in any hassle. But when my timeline had been plagued by this sort of factor, I’d most likely need to go in and clear it up. It may additionally be a good suggestion to skinny out a few of my overzealous grammar assaults and intensive retweeting from the early 2010s.
We’re not advocates of cancel tradition, or of hiding out of your previous. However, realistically, there are many causes you’d need to delete previous content material out of your Twitter timeline.
Possibly you began with a private Twitter account and now need to use it for enterprise functions. Possibly you’re job searching and know potential employers will likely be checking you out on social. Or perhaps you stated some issues whenever you had been younger that you’ve got grown as much as perceive weren’t so smart.
Maintain studying to learn how to seek for previous tweets and delete them. Remember the fact that all of those strategies delete your tweets from Twitter itself and from retweets and quote tweets created with the trendy Twitter choices. If somebody copy and pasted a part of your tweet (like we did for old skool RTs and MTs) or screencapped it, the content material is there to remain.
How you can discover previous tweets: 4 strategies
Methodology 1: Twitter superior search
Twitter’s superior search characteristic is the best strategy to search previous tweets and doesn’t require you to provide any third-party apps entry to your account.
1. Log in to your Twitter account and go to Twitter’s superior search web page.
2. Beneath the Accounts subheading, enter your username into the From these accounts area.
3. Enter no matter info you’ll be able to keep in mind concerning the tweet(s) you’re on the lookout for. This may very well be a key phrase or phrase, a hashtag, an account you replied to or talked about, and/or a particular date vary.
The date choice choices return to 2006, when Twitter first launched.
4. Click on Search. Within the search outcomes, you’ll see a listing of prime tweets from that interval.
5. To see each tweet from that interval, click on on the Newest tab. This could return a listing of each tweet you despatched between the from and till dates you specified, in reverse chronological order.
It’s also possible to use the tabs throughout the highest of the display to search for tweets that include pictures or movies.
Methodology 2: Obtain an entire archive of your tweets
Downloading an archive of your tweets every so often is sweet social media apply basically. It’s additionally a good way to look your total document of previous tweets. Right here’s the right way to see previous tweets utilizing the Twitter archive:
1. Go to https://twitter.com/settings/account
2. Beneath Your Account click on on Obtain an archive of your knowledge. When prompted, re-enter your password and select a verification methodology.
3. Beneath Twitter knowledge, click on Request archive.
3. It may possibly take a few days for Twitter to organize your archive. When it’s prepared, you’ll get a push notification and an e mail to let you realize.
4. Click on on the notification to obtain your archive. Or, go to again to https://twitter.com/settings/account and click on on Obtain an archive of your knowledge beneath Your Account.
5. Click on Obtain archive to get a .zip file of all of your Twitter exercise, together with all of your previous tweets.
6. After you have the .zip file in your desktop, open the file referred to as Your archive.html. You’ll see a abstract of all of your exercise on Twitter. To see all of your previous tweets, click on Tweets.
You’ll see a listing of all of your previous tweets, in reverse chronological order. You should utilize the search field and filters on the correct of the web page to slender your search, or use the tabs throughout the highest to particularly see your replies and retweets.
Every tweet in your downloaded archive features a hyperlink to the dwell tweet on Twitter for simple entry.
Methodology 3: Use an app to see your previous tweets on one scrollable web page
For those who don’t need to wait to obtain your total Twitter archive, right here’s the right way to search for previous tweets utilizing a third-party service. Choices like AllMyTweets mean you can see your 3200(-ish) newest tweets virtually instantaneously in simply scrollable kind.
The 3200 tweets restrict is imposed by Twitter’s API. For those who tweet as soon as a day, that 3200-tweet view will take you again practically 9 years. However when you’re like Hootsuite and take part in a variety of Twitter chats, it’s going to most likely take you again lower than two years.
Nonetheless, it’s a very good place to start out your seek for previous tweets.
1. Go to AllMyTweets and log in utilizing your Twitter account. You’ll should grant AllMyTweets entry to your Twitter account, however you’ll be able to at all times revoke this entry later.
2. When you’re logged in , you’ll be able to search for your personal previous tweets or another person’s. Enter the username you’d prefer to search for previous tweets for.
4. Scroll by way of the tweets, which seem in reverse-chronological order. Or use the search choice in your browser to search for a particular key phrase, phrase, and even emoji.
Methodology 4: Use the Wayback Machine
What if the tweet you’re on the lookout for has been deleted, and also you don’t have entry to the Twitter archive for the account it was despatched from?
You might need some luck looking for it utilizing the Wayback Machine. It doesn’t archive particular person tweets, but it surely does have screenshots of in style Twitter pages from particular dates.
Word: This simply goes to point out you that deleting tweets is rarely a foolproof strategy to purge them from the web.
Right here’s the right way to seek for previous tweets utilizing the Wayback Machine:
1. Go to the Wayback Machine. Within the search bar on the prime, enter http://twitter.com/[username], changing [username] with the account you need to search.
2. Click on Browse Historical past. The Wayback Machine will current you with each screenshot it has of that consumer’s Twitter web page, organized by 12 months and day.
3. Choose which 12 months you’d prefer to see tweets from within the timeline on the prime of the display. Then click on on a date bubble.
4. The Wayback Machine will present you a screenshot of the consumer’s Twitter web page precisely because it appeared on that day. Most aged screenshots of Twitter will include the primary 20 or so tweets that appeared on the web page that day, however gained’t allow you to scroll to see older tweets. For instance, right here’s how Hootsuite’s Twitter web page appeared on August 24, 2014:
How you can delete previous tweets
Keep in mind, as we simply illustrated with the Wayback Machine, it’s form of not possible to delete one thing as soon as it hits the web. That stated, you’ll be able to delete your Twitter content material from Twitter, which definitely makes them a lot more durable for somebody to seek out with out actually digging.
Methodology 1: Delete previous tweets manually
If you wish to delete previous tweets straight on Twitter, you’ll have to take action one by one. There’s no native choice to delete a number of tweets. Right here’s the way it works.
- In your profile web page, or utilizing your Twitter archive, find the tweet you need to delete.
- Click on the three dots (extra) icon on the prime proper of the tweet.
- Click on Delete.
And right here’s the right way to delete one thing you Retweeted:
- In your profile web page, scroll to the merchandise you Retweeted.
- Hover your cursor over the Retweet icon.
- Click on Undo Retweet.
Methodology 2: Mass delete previous tweets
As an alternative of looking for particular gadgets in your timeline, it’d typically be simpler to mass delete tweets.
Like we stated above, there’s no native choice to do that inside Twitter, however there are apps that may mean you can delete previous tweets in bulk.
A few of the greatest choices embody:
- TweetDelete, which lets you mass delete tweets based mostly on how previous they’re or based mostly on particular key phrases or phrases.
- TweetDeleter, which lets you delete previous tweets based mostly on key phrases, date, kind, and media. A bonus of TweetDeleter is that it retains your previous tweets in a non-public archive, in order that they’re faraway from Twitter however nonetheless out there to you.
- Semiphemeral lets you mass delete previous tweets whereas retaining those who have a particular degree of engagement. It’s also possible to choose particular person tweets to save lots of from deletion.
Utilizing any third-party app requires you to grant the app entry to your Twitter account. It’s a good suggestion to revoke that entry when you’ve executed all the things you have to do.
Methodology 3: Delete previous tweets mechanically
Possibly you like to retweet issues however don’t need these tweets to dwell in your timeline eternally. Or perhaps you solely need to preserve tweets in your timeline that hit a sure degree of engagement.
On this case, an automated delete service is an efficient choice. All the mass deletion instruments above additionally mean you can set ongoing duties that may delete tweets mechanically over time.
For instance, right here’s how the continued Twitter deletion duties setup seems in Semiphemeral.
Supply: micahflee.com
Methodology 4: The (virtually) nuclear choice
WARNING: This methodology lets you preserve your username, however you’ll lose all of your followers. That is really an account reset. Use this methodology solely as a final resort.
For those who actually need a contemporary begin on Twitter, you’ll be able to fully wipe your account and begin over. To take action, you’ll must create a brand new account with a brief username, delete your previous account, after which do a username switcheroo.
This methodology just isn’t for the faint of coronary heart! However when you actually need to scrap all the things, right here’s the way it works.
- Create a brand new Twitter account with a brand new (non permanent) username.
- Delete your present Twitter account. (Yikes! Actually. We imply it once we say this methodology is not any joke.) As soon as the account is deleted your username turns into out there, so do that subsequent half quick.
- Change the title of your new account with the non permanent username to your earlier username:
- From the profile web page, click on the three dots (extra) icon.
- Click on Settings and privateness.
- Click on Your account.
- Click on Account info and ensure your password,
- Click on Username, then enter your unique username.
That’s it. You now have a brand-new Twitter account with 0 tweets – and 0 followers! – however the slate is wiped completely clear.
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