How to Delete Twitter (and Your Terrible Tweets)

Twitter can be a virtual snark den populated by trolls, spambots, and scammers. And now it’s got a controversial new owner in the form of Elon Musk. How a Twitter under Musk’s control shakes out remains to be seen. But if you’re ready to move on, you can delete your entire account or just clean up any unfortunate tweets from the past.

How Do I Delete My Tweets?

You’ve posted a tweet that you feel has come back to bite you or might in the future (politicians, pay attention!), so you want to remove it. You can directly delete a fresh or easy-to-find tweet (or edit it, if you have Twitter Blue). But what about older tweets that may not be so simple to locate? And what if you want to easily and quickly delete multiple tweets? No worries. With the right tool, you can go back in time and erase your more ill-advised musings.

Of course, deleting an older tweet doesn’t undo all the damage. People have already read and possibly reacted to your tweet. (Screenshots are forever.) But you still may want to kick out the tweet for the sake of permanence and posterity. Here’s what you need to know.

Delete a Single Tweet on Twitter.com

Deleting a recent tweet isn’t difficult. On Twitter.com, select the option for Profile. Scroll down until you find the tweet you want to remove. Click the three-dot menu next to that tweet and select the option for Delete. Twitter asks if you’re sure you want to delete the tweet. Click Delete. The tweet vanishes.

Delete a Single Tweet in the Mobile App

In the Twitter mobile app, tap your profile photo on the top left and then tap your name to get to your profile. Find the tweet you want to erase and tap the three-dot menu on the top right of the tweet. Tap Delete. To remove a tweet that you retweeted from your profile, simply tap the retweet button again, and confirm that you’d like to axe it by selecting Undo Retweet.

Delete Older Tweets

Scrolling through your long history of tweets to find an older one to delete is time-consuming. And even then, you can go back only so far. Instead, a couple of third-party websites can help you find and delete older tweets.

Tweet Deleter

At the Tweet Deleter site(Opens in a new window), click the button to sign in with your Twitter account. At the Authorize window, type your Twitter username and password. You’ll have to give Tweetdeleter.com permission to access your Twitter account. The Authorize window explains what the site will be able to do if you go ahead. Click the Sign in button.

The site then displays your tweets from latest to earliest. Narrow down the list by typing a keyword, selecting the type of post (tweets, retweets, and/or replies), or by entering start and end dates. Select the tweets you want to delete and click Delete Tweets to remove them.

With Tweet Deleter, you can also tell the site to automatically delete tweets of a certain age, upload an archive of your last 3,200 tweets, or delete all your tweets. If you have more than 3,200 tweets, you’ll need to upload your Twitter Archive to Tweet Deleter (here’s how(Opens in a new window)). With a free account, you can delete up to five tweets per month, conduct five free keyword searches, and use the service’s profanity filter. For more options, upgrade to a premium plan(Opens in a new window), starting at $3.99 per month.

TweetDelete

Want a way to automatically delete all tweets older than a certain date? Check out TweetDelete(Opens in a new window), which can also quickly erase your last 3,200 tweets (the 3,200 limit is one set by Twitter). A premium version that lets you delete an unlimited number of tweets after uploading your Twitter data file runs $14.99 per month.

First, review all tweets before a certain date to make sure you want to delete them all. You can do this in Twitter by requesting an archive of all your tweets. On Twitter, navigate to More > Settings and support > Settings and privacy > Your Account > Download an archive of your data. Enter your password and click Confirm.

If you’re still sure you want to delete your older tweets, click the button for Sign in with Twitter at the TweetDelete site. At the Authorize window, type your Twitter username and password and then click the button to Authorize app.

Click the drop-down menu to select the number of months you want the site to go back to delete your tweets. You can also add a word or phrase to remove only corresponding tweets. Make sure you want to do this because after the tweets are deleted, you can’t get them back. Click the button for Activate TweetDelete. Your older tweets are now history.

Revoke Access to Third-Party Apps

If you’re just doing a one-time cleanse with any of these third-party delete apps, you may want to revoke the access they have to your account after you’re done. Head to More > Settings and support > Settings and privacy > Your Account > Security and account access > Apps and sessions > Connected apps. Select the app you want to delete and tap Revoke app permissions.

Permanently Delete Your Twitter Account

Bumping off your Twitter account is an easy enough process. And there’s even a 30-day grace period (12 months if you’re verified) if you have second thoughts about leaving Twitter behind. You can just sign back into your account within 30 days to reinstate it, and it will be like nothing happened. However, if you don’t reinstate within that period, all your data will be permanently deleted from Twitter’s servers, meaning #Erased.

You should also know that while your account will disappear a few minutes after deleting it, the company claims that “some content may be viewable on twitter.com for a few days.” Furthermore, Twitter states(Opens in a new window) that it has no control over how your tweets are indexed by Google and Bing. So your previous content may remain searchable through those services. (Yes, it’s difficult to disappear from the internet.)

Before you get started, know that if you want to make your username or email address available for re-use (each Twitter account must be associated with a unique email address), change them before your account is permanently deleted. Navigate to More > Settings and support > Settings and privacy > Your account > Account information and change your username and email in the fields at the top. When you change your email, you’ll need to confirm the move via an email link that will be sent to your new address before that change goes into effect.

With that done, go to More > Settings and support > Settings and privacy > Your account > Deactivate your account. Twitter will ask you to enter your password to verify that you truly want to say goodbye. If you do, click Deactivate, and you’re good to go. If you regret the decision within 30 days, just sign in with your username and password, and you’re free once again to tweet.