Twitter view counts start appearing prominently

Twitter view counts start appearing prominently

Making it easier to quantify how much of a banger your tweet was. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

View counts for tweets are starting to show up for some Twitter users — at least for their own tweets. On December 1st, Musk promised the feature would be coming for “all tweets, just as view count is shown for all videos,” an announcement he reiterated a week later adding that it would be coming “in a few weeks.”

One Verge staff member has started to see a counter when he clicks into his posts. While a few other Twitter users have reported getting the feature as well, it doesn’t seem to be available to everyone yet (for example, at time of writing I’m currently not seeing view counts on any tweets besides videos). My coworker also says that he’s currently not able to see view counts on other users’ tweets.

Screenshot: Richard Lawler / The Verge

A view counter has joined the other markers of how popular your tweet was.

Tweets will show view count in a few weeks, just like videos do. Twitter is much more alive than people think.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 9, 2022

In its current state, the feature isn’t providing any new information. You’ve long been able to turn on analytics for your account, and see how many “impressions” your tweets were getting. However, doing so does require clicking on an analytics button; the view counter puts it right in your face.

It’s unclear whether Musk intended for users to be able to see how many views other peoples’ tweets are getting. His comment about the feature being “just like videos,” whose view counts are public for other users, does make it seem like you should be able to see how many views other peoples’ tweets were getting. We’d ask Twitter for clarification on the matter, but it no longer has a communications department. Musk hasn’t recently tweeted about the feature.