Using X/Twitter with Buffer
With Buffer's publishing dashboard, you can craft, schedule, collaborate, and publish posts and X/Twitter threads that drive meaningful engagement (and growth!) for your brand. From there, you can pop over to your analytics dashboard to analyze your key X/Twitter metrics, doubling down on what works.
These features are available for X/Twitter
- Publishing: Yes
- Analytics: Yes
- Engagement: No
Connecting and refreshing your X/Twitter profile
Head to your Channels area to connect your X/Twitter account: https://account.buffer.com/channels
You can connect multiple X/Twitter accounts to Buffer. To make sure Buffer knows which one want to connect, log in to that X/Twitter account in another browser tab before trying to connect it to Buffer.
To see a step-by-step guide and troubleshooting steps for connecting X/Twitter, check out the article: Connect your channels to Buffer.
:::info
- X/Twitter’s Delegate feature is not supported at this time. To connect your X/Twitter profile to Buffer, you’ll need to be logged into X.com/Twitter.com as the owner of the X/Twitter profile.
- Connecting multiple X/Twitter accounts - Buffer will automatically try to connect to whichever account you're logged into in your browser, so we recommend logging into X.com/ Twitter.com with the account you want to connect to Buffer first and then heading to Buffer to connect the channel.
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If your connected X/Twitter channel requires a refresh, check out the article Refreshing a channel in Buffer.
Scheduling posts, reposts, and threads
Check out the table below to see which features are available while scheduling posts for X/Twitter.
:::info The "best time to post" feature in Analyze is not available for X/Twitter. For advice on creating an optimal posting schedule, check out our blog post: The Best Time to Post on Twitter/X.
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| Features & good-to-knows | Notes |
|---|---|
| Scheduling posts | Check out our step-by-step guide to scheduling posts on any social channel or peruse X/Twitter-specific details below. \n \n📝 It’s only possible to schedule to one X/Twitter account at a time due to X's/Twitter’s guidelines. Duplicate posts (repeating the same content) are not allowed by X/Twitter. |
| Scheduling X/Twitter threads | 1. Click + Start Thread to add another post/tweet. \n2. Continue using the “+” button in the lower right-hand corner of your composer or press Enter three times to grow your thread. \n |
| Scheduling reposts | It is possible to schedule reposts to Buffer directly from your ex/Twitter feed. As long as you have the Buffer browser extension installed (when on a web browser) or the Buffer mobile app (when on mobile). Learn more about Scheduling reposts on web and mobile here. |
| Tagging / Mentions | To tag/mention another X/Twitter account, type in the exact handle. Once published to X/Twitter, the account you mention will become hyperlinked. X/Twitter's API no longer allows third-party tools to autocomplete handles. Learn more about Adding mentions (tags) in posts here. |
| Image descriptions / Alt text | It is possible to add alt text to images scheduled to X/Twitter by clicking on your image and typing in the alt text. Learn more about Adding alt text to your images here. |
| Daily posting limit | • 50 posts per 24 hours for unverified X/Twitter accounts. \n• 100 posts per 24 hours for unverified X/Twitter accounts. \n• Learn more about Daily posting limits here. |
| Character limit | X Free users: 280 characters \nX Basic, Premium and Premium + users: 25,000 characters* \n \n**Extended character counts for paid X users are available on our Free, Essentials, and Team plans. If you are a legacy customer on our Pro, Premium, or Business plans and would like to switch to our updated pricing, please email us at hello@buffer.com and we’ll be happy to help!* \n \n📝 Only the first 280 characters of a post will be visible on the timeline, so if you're including a link in your post and want the preview to be visible, be sure to include the URLin the first 280 characters of the post. |
| Hashtags | In the composer, type the hashtags you'd like to use. When the post is published, the hashtags will hyperlink just as if they were sent from the native platform itself. Learn more about How hashtags work in Buffer |
Media specifications for X/Twitter
X/Twitter supports images, videos, and GIFs.
| Videos | Images | GIFs | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Number allowed per post | 1 | 4 | 1 |
| Video length | Minimum of .5 seconds and up to 140 seconds \n \n📝 Longer videos for X Premium/Twitter Blue subscribers only apply to posts published natively on X/Twitter | - | - |
| File size | up to 512MB | up to 5MB | up to 15MB |
| Dimensions | - | 8192 x 8192 pixels | 1280 x 1080 pixels \n \nMax total: 300 million px |
| File types supported | MP4, MOV, AVI, M4V \n \n📝 Audio-only mp4 files cannot be shared to X/Twitter. The mp4 file must contain video. | JPG, PNG, HEIC, WebP | GIF |
| Video autoplay in the feed | No | - | - |
| Custom thumbnail supported | No | - | - |
| Optimal number of frames | 60 FPS or less | - | 350 |
Note for GIFs:
If you see quality loss or errors when creating posts with animated GIFs, try these recommendations to improve success:
- GIF Maximum resolution - 1280 x 1080 (width x height)
- GIF Maximum number of frames - 350
- GIF Maximum number of pixels (width * height * num_frames) - 300 million
Engagement on X/Twitter posts
Engagement features are available for X/Twitter accounts within Buffer's Community feature (available on the web version of Buffer and in Buffer's mobile app).
To use Community on the desktop version of Buffer:
- Head to the Community tab at the top of the dashboard.
- Select your X/Twitter channel on the left menu and start replying to your comments.
:::info Note: Unverified X/Twitter accounts are limited to 200 replies per day. 💡Tip: Prefer to reply to comments on the go? Check out our guide to Engaging with Community comments in Buffer's mobile app.
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X/Twitter analytics
:::warning X/Twitter analytics are available on our paid plans.
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We can post all day, but the real excitement comes when seeing the reactions to our posts. If you’re on the Essentials or Team plans, you’ll find all of your stats within two places: the Sent tab of our Publish dashboard offers basic post metrics, while our Analytics dashboard offers advanced analytics.
Basic analytics
:::warning X/Twitter sent post data requires a paid plan. At this time, we're unable to pull sent post data for accounts on the Free plan. If you connected your X channel on a Free plan and your Sent tab shows no data, upgrading or starting a free trial will populate it.
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To get a quick view of each of your X/Twitter account's metrics, head to the Publish tab of the web dashboard and then click the Sent tab to access likes, clicks, reposts, and impressions.
Advanced Analytics
For a more in-depth look at how your X/Twitter posts are performing, head to the Analytics tab of the web dashboard. To dive straight in, learn about our X/Twitter metric descriptions, select X/Twitter on the left-hand side of your analytics dashboard, and peruse the tabs:
- Overview: gives a breakdown of your overall engagement levels for your profile over time. Learn more about the Performance overview on your analytics dashboard.
- Posts: provides a history of all of your published posts and how they are performing. Learn more about Analyzing your posts within your analytics dashboard.
- Answers: shares answers to questions such as the best day, type, and frequency to post. Learn more about Answering questions about your social media strategy.
:::info When you first connect an X/Twitter profile, we can backfill up to 28 days of data. Learn more about Why your data in Buffer might differ from your native analytics here.
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X/Twitter error library
If you're (unfortunately) hitting X/Twitter errors in Buffer, our X/Twitter error library is the place to go for solutions. If you don't find the listed error, feel free to get in touch at hello@buffer.com and let us know—we'll be happy to help!
FAQ
Do you support scheduling X/Twitter polls?
At this time, we do not support creating X/Twitter polls through Buffer. If you'd like to see us support them in the future, you can upvote this suggestion on our feature request board.
:::info Do you have an X/Twitter feature suggestion? We’d love for you to submit or upvote it here on our feature suggestions board.
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