Twitter Is Finally Rolling Out An Edit Button — Here's How It Works

Anyone who has ever tweeted out what they thought was the perfect joke, observation, or take on a trending meme only to realize they have a typo in their text knows how important an edit button would be. For years, users and even celebrities like Kim Kardashian have asked Twitter to give us an edit button, and it seems the social media giant has finally listened. Now that the function is rolling out, you might be wondering how to use Twitter’s new edit button. Here’s the lowdown.

Back in April, Twitter announced they were testing out an edit button, but it was only available to a few subscribers of Twitter Blue. If you’re unfamiliar, Twitter Blue is the app’s paid monthly subscription service that gives users access to premium features, like the new edit button. Unfortunately for anyone currently on a budget or already paying for way too many subscription services, you will have to decide whether $5 a month is worth having the ability to undo, because it’s currently only available to Twitter Blue users. Like Twitter, TikTok has been behind on allowing users to edit their posts, but Instagram and Facebook have been offering the function for years — and for free. As of right now, not only do Twitter users need to spend a little money to be able to change that “you’re” to a “your,” but there’s a second catch you’ll want to be aware of as well.

How Does The Edit Button On Twitter Work?

One major complaint of the possibility of an edit button is that the function may be abused by users spreading false information or bots just botting. While a free for all would be nice for anyone just trying to tweet out pictures of their cat doing silly things or reviews of TV shows they’re watching, the company has had to put some restrictions on their new edit button. For instance, you will only have 30 minutes to edit your tweet once it’s been posted. However, you will be able to edit your tweet “a few times” in that period. Twitter’s reason for having the short window of time to edit is to “help protect the integrity of the conversation.”

Along with the 30 minute time limit, any Edited Tweets will also have “an icon, timestamp, and label” added to it to signify that the tweet you see has been edited. Just like on Facebook, you’ll be able to go into the edit history of an Edited Tweet to see past versions. This means that if you were hoping no one would know you misspelled a celebrity name or wrote down the wrong lyrics to a Taylor Swift song, they’ll still be able to see your snafu with the click of a button. The edit history definitely makes sense to “create a publicly accessible record of what was said,” but it doesn’t do much to protect your ego. Unless you happen to have a viral tweet — that goes viral in under 30 minutes — with a typo in it, your best bet is to still just delete it and start over again.

Who Can Edit Tweets?

While the testing for the edit button on Twitter was only available to a few Twitter Blue users, the function will now be accessible to all subscribers later in September — but just for one country. Twitter didn’t reveal which country that will be, but the site confirmed all Twitter Blue subscribers in a specific country will be getting the edit button by the end of the month as testing continues.

Twitter says the reason for only allowing the function to a small group is to be able to receive “feedback while identifying and resolving potential issues.” This will also help to prevent anyone from misusing the edit button. The company hopes to expand the edit button once they get a better understanding of how people are using it. Hopefully, that means it could even expand to non-Twitter Blue users one day. As Dionne Warwick once tweeted, an edit button “would be nice.”