Twitter reemphasizes retweets after quote tweets didn’t work as hoped

Well, it was worth a shot. 

Twitter announced Wednesday that it will cease prompting users to quote tweet in lieu of the standard retweet. That’s right, you can now retweet — without first adding a comment — to your heart’s content (just like you always could).

According to Twitter, the initial hope was that asking people to add their own words to a tweet would lead to “more thoughtful amplification” on the platform. Unfortunately, as the company noted in a Dec. 16 thread, that didn’t really happen. 

“The use of Quote Tweets increased, but 45% of them included single-word affirmations and 70% had less than 25 characters,” wrote Twitter.

The initial push to favor quote tweets over retweets kicked off in early October of this year, and was initially met with confusion. 

“Hey everyone, we made a temporary change to the Retweet function,” the company wrote at the time. “When you hit the Retweet button, you can either add a comment to Quote Tweet or leave it blank and hit the Retweet button.”

As noted back in October, this change was clearly a temporary one. We now know its expiration date: right now.  

SEE ALSO: Twitter says retweets change helped slow the spread of election misinformation

Wednesday’s announcement means Twitter users can go back to retweeting without first being forced to reckon with the thought that they might have nothing to add to the conversation. We’re sure it will be heralded with plenty of quote tweets.