Twitter’s new feature will show ‘half ads’ to Blue subscribers

Twitter is rolling out additional features for Blue subscribers including showing 50 percent of ads in their timeline compared to non-paid users and a visibility boost in search.

Elon Musk had long promised that Twitter Blue subscribers would get a feature to see fewer sponsored tweets. Now, the company has finally implemented the feature, and will be applicable to the “Following” and “For You” timelines.

“As you scroll, you will see approximately twice as many organic or non-promoted Tweets placed in between promoted Tweets or ads. There may be times when there are more or fewer non-promoted Tweets between promoted Tweets,” Twitter’s description of the feature says.

The social network specified that this feature doesn’t apply to ads shown on the profile or in replies, promoted accounts and trends, and promoted events on the Explore page. Twitter also said that the half-ads feature will be applicable only once a subscriber’s profile has been reviewed and gets the verification mark.

While Twitter is claiming to reduce ads on paid subscribers’ feeds, it is hard to prove if they are actually seeing fewer ads apart from anecdotal experiences.

Last year, Musk also said that Twitter was exploring introducing a costlier paid tier with no ads.

In addition to the ad-related feature, the company has also tweaked its priority-boosting perk for Blue subscribers. Earlier, the company said that paid users will get priority in replies. Now the feature reads “Prioritized rankings in conversations and search.” The support page for the Blue subscription elaborates that if a paid user interacts with a tweet, they get a “small boost in their ranking.”

Last month, Musk said that starting April 15, Twitter’s algorithmic timeline will only show posts from verified accounts and the people you follow.

 

A few weeks ago, Twitter rolled out the Blue subscription plan globally. Data suggests that despite the widespread availability, Twitter hasn’t managed to attract a lot of paid users. Analytics company SensorTower’s observations noted that Twitter had earned $11 million through mobile purchases until late March. Earlier this week, Similarweb’s data suggested that less than 1 percent of the social network’s monthly users are subscribed to Twitter Blue despite 116,000 signing up in March.