How to delete a tweet and a retweet

Posted a joke that wasn’t funny? Retweeted someone else’s joke, but didn’t notice the unsavory source? We’re not here to judge. We’re just here to make it all go away.

(FYI: In case you got here because you were hoping to delete someone else’s tweet from your timeline, that’s not possible, sorry. But there are ways of managing what you see and what others say about you.)

Here’s how to perform this digital vanishing act:

How to delete a tweet

Once you’ve logged on to Twitter, find the tweet that you want to delete. Click the icon with three dots in a horizontal line in the top right corner of the tweet.

Find the three dots icon on the tweet you want to delete.
Credit: Twitter

Then in the dropdown, hit “Delete.”

Then hit delete in the dropdown.
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When you delete a tweet, all of its contents, including metadata, will be removed from your account, the timeline of any accounts that follow you, and the Twitter homepage feed.

That being said, if someone retweeted a tweet with a comment (more on that in the next section) or copied and pasted content from your tweet into a new tweet, that content will not be deleted.

The same thing goes if your tweet has been cached, cross-posted, or screenshotted. It will not be deleted if it’s published on a third-party platform.

Basically, you can delete a tweet, but it might be saved somewhere else, so tweet with caution.

But there are other ways to delete something you’ve posted to Twitter and no longer want around. First we’ll explain what those other features are, followed by how to delete them.

How to retweet

Retweeting means sharing someone else’s Twitter post to your followers. Self-retweeting is also possible, but (thankfully) somewhat rare.

There are two ways you can share a tweet: as a retweet, unchanged, or as a “quote tweet” by adding your own comment to the tweet.

Retweet

Find the tweet you’d like to retweet. Click/tap on the icon that shows two arrows circling each other.

This is the icon for retweeting.
Credit: Twitter

Click/tap “Retweet” to share the tweet without adding any comments.

When you click on that, you have two options: retweet or retweet with a comment (quote tweet.)
Credit: Twitter

To undo a retweet, click/tap the retweet button again. This is how you “delete” a retweet.

Quote tweet

Find the tweet that you’d like to retweet and click/tap on the same icon. This time, click/tap “Quote tweet.”

Hit quote tweet to add your own comment.
Credit: Twitter

A pop-up window will show up with the tweet you want to retweet and a space above where you can add your comment. Once you’ve added your comment, click/tap tweet.

Add your comment above the tweet your want to share to your followers.
Credit: twitter

To undo a quote tweet, follow the same steps for deleting a tweet.