How you can Discover Previous Tweets: 4 Tried-And-True Strategies

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Do you ever revisit your previous tweets? Twitter has been round since 2006 — when you have been an early adopter, you’d in all probability 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 assist you preserve your model picture in test, and it must be a part of your common social media audits.

On this submit, we go over learn how to seek for previous tweets and delete them.

Bonus: Obtain the free 30-day plan to develop your Twitter following quick, a every day workbook that may assist you set up a Twitter advertising and marketing routine and observe your development, so you possibly can present your boss actual outcomes after one month.

Why is conserving observe of previous tweets vital?

If, like me, you joined Twitter in its very early years with no thought what it was actually about, you could be questioning learn how to discover previous tweets. What did it’s a must to say within the halcyon days of 2007? Are irrelevant or probably embarrassing tweets lingering in your timeline?

Singing the praises of free wifi at a significant worldwide airport (nevermind calling it “wi-fi”) seems a little bit goofy from the absolutely related days of 2022.

After all, this random tweet isn’t going to get me in any hassle. But when my timeline have been affected by this type of factor, I’d in all probability wish to go in and clear it up. It may also 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 wish to delete previous content material out of your Twitter timeline.

Perhaps you began with a private Twitter account and now wish to use it for enterprise functions. Perhaps you’re job searching and know potential employers might be checking you out on social. Or perhaps you stated some issues if you have been younger that you’ve got grown as much as perceive weren’t so clever.

Maintain studying to learn the way 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 fashionable Twitter choices. If somebody copy and pasted a part of your tweet (like we did for old-fashioned RTs and MTs) or screencapped it, the content material is there to remain.

How you can discover previous tweets: 4 strategies

Technique 1: Twitter superior search

Twitter’s superior search function is the best option 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.

Twitter’s advanced search page

2. Below the Accounts subheading, enter your username into the From these accounts discipline.

enter username in from these accounts field

3. Enter no matter info you possibly can keep in mind in regards to the tweet(s) you’re in search of. This might be a key phrase or phrase, a hashtag, an account you replied to or talked about, and/or a particular date vary.

minimum replies likes retweets or dates

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.

search results with top tweets from that period

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.

You can too use the tabs throughout the highest of the display screen to search for tweets that comprise photographs or movies.

Technique 2: Obtain an entire archive of your tweets

Downloading an archive of your tweets every so often is sweet social media apply typically. It’s additionally an effective way to go looking your total document of previous tweets. Right here’s learn how to see previous tweets utilizing the Twitter archive:

1. Go to https://twitter.com/settings/account

2. Below Your Account click on on Obtain an archive of your knowledge. When prompted, re-enter your password and select a verification technique.

3. Below Twitter knowledge, click on Request archive.

request archive under Twitter data

3. It may possibly take a few days for Twitter to arrange your archive. When it’s prepared, you’ll get a push notification and an e mail to let you recognize.

notification Twitter archive ready to be downloaded and viewed on desktop browser

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 below 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 getting the .zip file in your desktop, open the file known 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.

open folder to see summary of all activity

You’ll see a listing of all of your previous tweets, in reverse chronological order. You need to use the search field and filters on the suitable of the web page to slim 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 straightforward entry.

old tweets with link to live tweet

Technique 3: Use an app to see your previous tweets on one scrollable web page

In case you don’t wish to wait to obtain your total Twitter archive, right here’s learn how to search for previous tweets utilizing a third-party service. Choices like AllMyTweets help you see your 3200(-ish) newest tweets virtually instantaneously in simply scrollable kind.

The 3200 tweets restrict is imposed by Twitter’s API. In case you tweet as soon as a day, that 3200-tweet view will take you again almost 9 years. However when you’re like Hootsuite and take part in a whole lot of Twitter chats, it would in all probability take you again lower than two years.

Nonetheless, it’s place to begin your seek for previous tweets.

1. Go to AllMyTweets and log in utilizing your Twitter account. You’ll need to grant AllMyTweets entry to your Twitter account, however you possibly can all the time revoke this entry later.

2. When you’re logged in , you possibly can search for your individual previous tweets or another person’s. Enter the username you’d prefer to search for previous tweets for.

all my tweets Hootsuite loaded 3250 tweets

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.

Technique 4: Use the Wayback Machine

What if the tweet you’re in search of 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 trying to find it utilizing the Wayback Machine. It doesn’t archive particular person tweets, however it does have screenshots of fashionable Twitter pages from particular dates.

Observe: This simply goes to indicate you that deleting tweets is rarely a foolproof option to purge them from the web.

Right here’s learn how 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 wish to search.

Internet Archive Wayback Machine

2. Click on Browse Historical past. The Wayback Machine will current you with each screenshot it has of that person’s Twitter web page, organized by yr and day.

browse history by year and day

3. Choose which yr you’d prefer to see tweets from within the timeline on the prime of the display screen. Then click on on a date bubble.

4. The Wayback Machine will present you a screenshot of the person’s Twitter web page precisely because it appeared on that day. Most elderly screenshots of Twitter will comprise 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 seemed on August 24, 2014:

Hootsuite 2014 Twitter page

How you can delete previous tweets

Keep in mind, as we simply illustrated with the Wayback Machine, it’s sort of not possible to delete one thing as soon as it hits the web. That stated, you possibly can delete your Twitter content material from Twitter, which definitely makes them a lot tougher for somebody to seek out with out actually digging.

Technique 1: Delete previous tweets manually

If you wish to delete previous tweets instantly on Twitter, you’ll have to take action one after the other. There’s no native choice to delete a number of tweets. Right here’s the way it works.

  1. In your profile web page, or utilizing your Twitter archive, find the tweet you wish to delete.
  2. Click on the three dots (extra) icon on the prime proper of the tweet.
  3. Click on Delete.

delete old tweets manually

And right here’s learn how to delete one thing you Retweeted:

  1. In your profile web page, scroll to the merchandise you Retweeted.
  2. Hover your cursor over the Retweet icon.
  3. Click on Undo Retweet.

undo retweet on profile page

Technique 2: Mass delete previous tweets

As a substitute of trying to find particular gadgets in your timeline, it’d generally 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 help you delete previous tweets in bulk.

Among 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, sort, and media. A bonus of TweetDeleter is that it retains your previous tweets in a personal archive, so that they’re faraway from Twitter however nonetheless obtainable to you.
  • Semiphemeral means that you can mass delete previous tweets whereas conserving those who have a particular stage of engagement. You can too choose particular person tweets to avoid wasting 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 carried out all the pieces that you must do.

Technique 3: Delete previous tweets robotically

Perhaps you like to retweet issues however don’t need these tweets to dwell in your timeline ceaselessly. Or perhaps you solely wish to preserve tweets in your timeline that hit a sure stage of engagement.

On this case, an computerized delete service is an effective choice. The entire mass deletion instruments above additionally help you set ongoing duties that may delete tweets robotically over time.

For instance, right here’s how the continued Twitter deletion duties setup seems in Semiphemeral.

Semiphemeral ongoing twitter deletion tasks setup

Supply: micahflee.com

Technique 4: The (virtually) nuclear choice

WARNING: This technique means that you can preserve your username, however you’ll lose all of your followers. That is really an account reset. Use this technique solely as a final resort.

In case you actually need a recent begin on Twitter, you possibly can fully wipe your account and begin over. To take action, you’ll have to create a brand new account with a brief username, delete your previous account, after which do a username switcheroo.

This technique isn’t for the faint of coronary heart! However when you actually wish to scrap all the pieces, right here’s the way it works.

  1. Create a brand new Twitter account with a brand new (momentary) username.
  2. Delete your current Twitter account. (Yikes! Actually. We imply it once we say this technique isn’t any joke.) As soon as the account is deleted your username turns into obtainable, so do that subsequent half quick.
  3. Change the identify of your new account with the momentary 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 make sure your password,
    • Click on Username, then enter your authentic 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.

Use Hootsuite to handle your Twitter accounts alongside all of your different social media profiles. From a single dashboard, you possibly can monitor your opponents, develop your followers, schedule tweets, and analyze your efficiency. Strive it free right now.

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