The character limit for a standard X (formerly Twitter) post is 280 characters.
This has been the limit since November 2017, when X doubled it from the original 140 characters. Premium subscribers on X can post up to 25,000 characters with X Premium, but standard free accounts remain at 280.
What counts toward the 280-character limit
- All text characters, including spaces and punctuation
- Emojis (each emoji counts as 2 characters due to Unicode encoding)
- Hashtags (the
#symbol plus the text) - Mentions (
@usernamecounts toward the limit)
What does NOT count
- Links — URLs are shortened by X’s t.co service and always count as 23 characters, regardless of the actual URL length
- Media attachments — images, videos, GIFs, and polls do not count toward the character limit
- Quoted tweets — the quoted post content does not count
X thread limits
When posting a thread (multiple connected posts), each individual part has the same 280-character limit. There is no official limit on the number of parts in a thread, though most users keep threads under 20 parts.
Tips for writing within 280 characters
- Front-load value — put the most important information first
- Use line breaks — they count as characters but make posts more scannable
- Abbreviate intentionally — common abbreviations are fine, but avoid making your post unreadable
- Let media do the work — pair a short caption with an image that tells the story
- Use threads for longer content — break complex ideas into a multi-part thread instead of cramming everything into one post
Character limit in BulkPublish
BulkPublish enforces the 280-character limit when you compose posts for X. The character counter turns red when you approach or exceed the limit, and posts that exceed it will not be published. When composing X threads, each part is tracked individually.