For all of you who have ever said, “I can’t believe this app is free,” you may soon have your chance to pay for the app. Twitter has revealed that it is upgrading its free platform with a few new paid features users can subscribe to.
This week, the social network announced the launch of its first-ever paid subscription service, Twitter Blue, designed to empower users with exclusive new tools to enhance their social media experience for a small monthly fee.
Twitter Blue marks the company’s first attempt at creating a subscription business model that also has the potential to diversify Twitter’s revenue streams — much of which comes from advertising, according to its first-quarter earnings report.
The new service is being introduced as a response to the consistent feedback it’s gotten from users asking for perks to help elevate their profiles and tweets.
“We’ve heard from the people that use Twitter a lot, and we mean a lot, that we don’t always build power features that meet their needs. Well, that’s about to change,” Twitter wrote in a blog post on Thursday (June 3). “We took this feedback to heart, and are developing and iterating upon a solution that will give the people who use Twitter the most what they are looking for: access to exclusive features and perks that will take their experience on Twitter to the next level.”
For users who have been pleading for an editing button since the app’s inception, you may just get your chance with Twitter Blue. CNBC reports that one of the new features will allow Twitter Blue users to use a customizable timer of up to 30 seconds to fix a tweet that they’ve sent before the timeline sees it. It’s not quite an edit button, but it does grant subscribers extra time to screen their tweets before they officially publish.
Other new features for Twitter Blue include:
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- Bookmark Folders so users can organize tweets they save.
- A Reader Mode that makes it easier to read long threads.
- An option to customize the Twitter app icons on their phones.
- Access to color themes for the Twitter app.
- Dedicated customer support.
As of this Thursday, the subscription service began rolling out to users in Canada and Australia respectively for $3.49 and $4.49 in local currencies per month. The company has not yet announced when Twitter Blue will make its way to U.S.-based users.
Earlier this year, Twitter laid out its company set goals with a plan to both reach upwards of 315 million monetizable daily active users and double its revenue to $7.5 billion by the end of 2023, CNBC reports. Additionally, the social media company hopes to increase the speed at which it launches new products.
While free Twitter itself isn’t going anywhere, users will now have the option to take advantage of these new enhanced features to better their existing Twitter experience.