Learn how to mute words on Twitter

Twitter's mute feature is the perfect way to remove unwanted tweets from your timeline.

As one of the world's largest social media platforms, Twitter is a great avenue to follow celebrities, interact with people worldwide and consume content of virtually any kind.

But at times, tweets go too far. You may find a movie spoiler or tweet containing sensitive content. While a spoiler isn't the end of the world, a trigger-heavy tweet might negatively affect your mental health.

Thanks to the mute feature, you can filter your feed and reduce any unwelcome words and phrases from appearing on your timeline.

Here’s all you need to know about how to mute words on Twitter.

Why would you mute words on Twitter?

There are many situations where you prefer muting an account rather than unfollowing or blocking. For example, you can't unfollow or block a whole topic through a few accounts, making muting a more reasonable choice. Here are a few scenarios where muting makes sense.

• Avoiding spoilers: You've had a busy week and couldn't catch the latest “The Last of Us” episode, but everyone on Twitter is talking about it. Muting prevents spoilers from appearing on your feed by removing certain words, phrases, and hashtags that could ruin a significant scene or plot twist.
• Trigger-sensitive topics: Twitter's mute functionality protects you from sensitive issues that may trigger a reaction and spoil your day. Whether emotional, social, or political, muting sensitive terms is a great way to preserve peace of mind and enjoy the app without worrying about something upsetting coming your way.
• Removing inappropriate content: Muting ensures inappropriate or mature content doesn’t appear on the feed. This is especially useful for account holders with children.
• Timeline curation: The ultimate objective on any social media platform is to create an experience that provides value and encourages you to return to the site or app. Muting helps curate a feed customized to your tastes and preferences, moving you closer to this goal. Whether it's muting annoying trends, sensitive topics, or movie spoilers, muting optimizes your timeline.

What you need to know before muting on Twitter

Before learning to mute words on Twitter, familiarize yourself with the feature's technicalities. Here are a few things you should know.

• Muting doesn’t distinguish between upper and lower case letters: Muting on Twitter isn’t case-sensitive. If you mute a specific word, all instances of that word will disappear from your timeline. For example, if you mute “zebra,” Twitter will also remove “Zebra” and “ZEBRA.”
• Mute words or phrases in any of Twitter’s supported languages: Twitter supports 34 languages at the time of writing, allowing you to mute specific keywords and phrases in these languages.
• Muting a word includes its hashtag: If you mute a word, you’ll also mute all instances of it with a hashtag. For example, muting “zebra” will stop “#zebra” from appearing on your timeline.
• The default muting period is forever: The feature allows you to specify how long you want to mute particular words from your feed. However, the default mute period is forever.
• You can still see muted words in search results: Muted words stop appearing on Twitter’s explore page, timeline, and notifications, but you’ll still see them on a search results page.

How to mute words on Twitter

Now that you’re familiar with muting technicalities, it’s time to learn how to mute words on the Twitter app and website. Before we start, note that muting doesn’t only remove a specific word from the timeline but also hides the full tweet, including the number of likes, retweets and quotes.

Muting tweets on the Twitter app

• Open the Twitter mobile app on your iOS or Android device.
• Tap the profile icon in the top-left corner to expand the menu.
• Select “Settings & Support.”
• Tap “Settings and privacy.” Then, go to “Privacy and safety.”
• Find “Mute and block” under “Your Twitter activity.”
• Click “Muted words.”
• Tap the plus icon in the bottom-right corner.
• Write the word or hashtag you’d like to mute. Remember, you can only mute one word or hashtag at a time.
• After this, choose the word or phrase you want to remove from your home timeline and notifications tab to add to your muted list.
• Choose the mute duration.
• Finally, tap on “Save” in the top-right corner.
• Similarly, choose “Muted accounts” or “Muted notifications” to mute notifications from specific Twitter accounts.

Muting tweets on the web

• Go to the Twitter website and log in to your account.
• Head to the left side menu and click “More.”
• Then, tap “Settings and Support,” followed by “Settings and privacy.”
• Under “Settings,” click “Privacy and safety.”
• Once you’re in there, tap “Muted words.” Return to this menu later, and choose “Muted accounts” or “Muted notifications” to silent notifications from specific accounts.
• Click the plus icon in the upper-right corner.
• Enter a word, hashtag, phrase or username under “Add muted word.” Choose to mute from the home timeline or specific accounts, and set the duration.
• Then, click “Save.”

How to edit or unmute words on Twitter

Besides muting words, accounts, and notifications, Twitter permits unmuting. Here’s a step-by-step guide.

• Open Twitter on your mobile device or browser.
• Go to “Settings and Support,” followed by “Settings and privacy.”
• Head to “Privacy and safety.”
• Go to “Mute and block.”
• Select “Muted words.”
• On mobile, tap the word you want to edit. Click “Delete word” if you want to unmute.
• On the desktop, select the word you want to edit or click on the speaker icon next to it to unmute.
• Make the desired changes and select “Save.”

FAQs about muting on Twitter

If you still have questions about Twitter muting, check out these FAQs to clarify any doubts.

Are muting and blocking the same on Twitter?

No. Muting will only make certain words, phrases, and hashtags disappear from your timeline and notifications. You can follow and see someone’s tweets if they don’t contain muted words. Blocking, however, entirely removes a person’s profile from your feed. Additionally, a blocked account will know you’ve blocked them when they visit your profile.

Will someone know if I mute them?

No. Muted accounts don’t have any way of knowing you’ve muted them unless you tell them. A blocked account will know when you’ve removed them as a follower.

How do you mute hashtags on Twitter?

Since muting a word also mutes its corresponding hashtag, you can add the hashtag symbol (#) before a word to mute it.

Does Twitter automatically mute explicit words and phrases?

No. But Twitter may take action if certain tweets contain explicit language that violates their policies and guidelines.

Level up your Twitter game with Linktree

Muting is just one of Twitter’s nifty features, but there’s a lot more you may not know.

Linktree’s blog is a great educational resource for discovering Twitter’s hidden tools. Learn how to delete accounts, find your Twitter URL, or verify your account.

Talking about hidden gems, add a Linktree to your bio and keep all your socials in one place, making it easy for your audience to switch between profiles. And it’s free!