

How to Make Twitter Threads Better

To see everything you write in a Twitter thread at once, you need to use a tool that isn't Twitter. The same goes for unrolling Twitter threads into a single page of text that's easier to read. 

How to Make Twitter Threads Better Image (Illustration: René Ramos)

Twitter threads are confusing, and there's a reason for that. They're a feature that Twitter only developed after users began making them ad hoc. Twitter famously limits how long tweets can be, so users found a workaround: posting a bunch of tweets in a row. 

In ancient times (think 2012), people made threads by writing a bunch of tweets and adding numbers to the end so readers knew in what order to read them. Later Twitter added official support for threads. Now, all you need to do is respond to your first tweet with yet another new tweet and then another. Even with this functionality, though, it's confusing to both make and read threads. 

Twitter knows creating and reading threads isn't an ideal experience, which is why the company announced Notes, a feature that could replace threads(Opens in a new window), but which isn't yet widely available. Notes lets you post longer messages, almost like a blog. It's an overdue idea, but as of this writing, it's only available to a small group of people to try out and there's no official timeline for wider release. Plus, threads have advantages that Notes don't. You can add new messages to a thread over time, and threads tend to resurface frequently in Twitter's algorithmic timeline when you add to them.

If you don't have access to Twitter Notes and you want a better experience with threads, two apps make it possible: Typefully and Threadreader. 

Create a Whole Thread at Once With Typefully

Creating a thread in Twitter isn't rocket science, but there are a few tricks to getting it right. You have to remember to reply to the most recent tweet every time. And because there's no way to see and edit all the posts in a thread in one clean view before you press Tweet, you have to be careful to read and revise your messages carefully to make sure they're in logical order and that one idea is clearly connected to the next.

Typefully(Opens in a new window) solves this problem by giving you a simple user interface for writing Twitter threads. Just write your thread. Character count is shown as you type, and text that’s beyond the character count for a single tweet is highlighted in red. You can split apart paragraphs into tweets by hitting enter twice. You can publish the entire thread whenever you're ready. 

Typefully being used to write a tweet, with the character count shown at the bottom and any characters over Twitter's limit for a message highlighted in red

Typefully is a web app—there’s no mobile version or browser plug-in. When you first visit Typefully, sync your Twitter account by logging in. Then, you can easily create a thread. Here’s an example, featuring my favorite subject:

The web app Typefully being used to write a Twitter thread with three tweets about a cat

You can add pictures or paste links as you go, and Typefully shows you previews as you type.

A High Fidelity mode allows you to see how your tweets will look on Twitter as you edit:

Typefully being used to view tweets in a thread about a cat named Mira

As you can see in the results of my very important test(Opens in a new window), Typefully works well. The free version lets you create threads and quickly publish them, while paid plans (starting at $10 per month) let you schedule threads in advance, view analytics, automatically schedule retweets, and more. The free version’s interface has links to all of these premium features, which can be annoying, but if you just want to create threads it shouldn't bother you too much. 

Make Threads Easier to Read With Thread Reader

Reading threads on Twitter is annoying because Twitter doesn't always display all the tweets in the thread at once. You might end up tapping on different tweets and never being sure if you've read the whole thread.

Enter Thread Reader(Opens in a new window). This web-only service makes it easier to read any thread. You can use Thread Reader in two ways.

First, you can copy the URL for the top tweet in the thread and paste it into the field on threadreaderapp.com. Thread Reader then displays the entire thread as though it's an article. The result is a lot easier to read than what you get on Twitter. 

A Twitter thread displayed on one page, making it easier to read, using the third-party web app Thread Reader

Second, you can reply to any tweet in a thread with "@threadreaderapp unroll," and Thread Reader's Twitter account responds to you with a link to the thread. You don’t need to create an account to use Thread Reader, but you can create an account to collect all of the threads you’ve unrolled in this way. 

An account also lets you subscribe to all threads by a particular Twitter user, along with any unrolled threads you like on Twitter. Premium accounts start at $3 per month and let you export threads to PDFs, automatically save threads to cloud services, and get real-time alerts for threads from authors you like. 

Thread Reader isn't flawless. Only fairly recent threads can be "unrolled" due to API limitations, and the service can't unroll threads from private accounts. Still, these kinds of limitations apply to any third-party tool, and Thread Reader is valuable despite them. It's the best tool I've found for expanding threads. 

Don’t Lose the Thread

Twitter threads aren't perfect. They're messy. So is Twitter itself, which is no small part of why the service is still so popular—that, along with a wide variety of tools that make it a little less chaotic.

Speaking of Twitter's idiosyncrasies, make sure you know how to stay safe and secure when you're using it. If you want more privacy, you can create a private Twitter circle or even delete Twitter and your terrible tweets if it all becomes too much.

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About Justin Pot

Justin Pot

Justin Pot believes technology is a tool, not a way of life. He writes tutorials and essays that inform and entertain. He loves beer, technology, nature, and people, not necessarily in that order. Learn more at JustinPot.com.

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