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Q. Help! I have a work colleague who is on Twitter constantly, tweeting about his kids’ softball games, his golf scores and what he had for lunch. I’ve never read a tweet of his that interested me at all. I can’t unfollow him, I tried that once but he found out and was pretty mad about it.
Is there any way to remove this guy’s tweets from my Twitter stream without unfollowing him? I’m almost ready to give up on Twitter, this guy is so annoying.
A. Great question. You’re not alone, people can have very different views of what is “tweet-worthy”. In an ideal world you’d be able to follow only the people whose tweets truly interested you.
Sometimes we have to follow people on Twitter for reasons having nothing to do with our interest in their tweets. They may be a work colleague, friend, neighbor or customer who would get upset if they found out you unfollowed them. Services such as Who Unfollowed Me make it easier for you to get caught unfollowing people.
Muting People on Twitter
Twitter has introduced a feature that lets you mute people so you don’t see their tweets. If you mute someone on Twitter you won’t see their tweets but they can still see your tweets. The good news is they won’t know that they’re muted — your Twitter stream will be free of their tweets and they won’t have a clue.
How to Mute Someone on Twitter
Muting someone on Twitter is easy. You can mute someone from their Twitter profile or from one of their tweets from your computer, phone or tablet.
From their profile:
Click on the Gear icon and click Mute @username. That person is now muted and you won’t see their tweets.
From a tweet:
Click on the three dots below the tweet and choose Mute @username from the drop-down menu.
Why You Would Mute Someone
Besides wanting to clear your Twitter stream of uninteresting tweets from friends, you may have other reasons to mute someone on Twitter:
Events — If one of your favorite tweeps is live tweeting an event you’re not interested in, you can mute them during the event.
Avoid spoilers — If you’re not able to watch a sporting event, season finale of a TV series, etc., you may want to mute people who are tweeting about what’s happening.
⇒ See, How to Block Spoilers from Ruining Your TV Fun! for more ways to block spoilers.
Twitter Chats — If one of your tweeps is actively involved in a Twitter chat, you may want to mute them for an hour to avoid your stream being flooded with their tweets during the chat.
Spammy Spammers — If you do a search for a popular #hashtag, you may find a spammer uses that tag to send out spammy tweets. You can mute that spammer so your search results don’t show that spammer’s tweets.
Testing — If you’re finding a person’s tweets less interesting you could try muting them to see if you’re missing out on anything. If you change your mind and want to see their tweets again you can unmute them without them knowing.
Ranting — Some people go off on rants on Twitter, posting tweets to get their issue out there and then go back to normal tweeting. You can mute that person until their rant is over.
What Else You Need to Know about Muting
You can see whether you muted someone by going to their Twitter profile. A mute symbol will appear next to the gear icon.
To unmute someone, click on the red mute symbol on their profile page.
You can mute someone temporarily. Just be sure to go back to their Twitter profile and un-mute them.
If you mute someone but still follow them, they can send you a Direct Message on Twitter.
You’ll still receive notifications of replies and mentions of your @username by people you’ve muted.
Muting works in the present and future. Past tweets of people you’ve muted will still appear in your Twitter stream.
Your Thoughts
Have you ever wanted to mute someone on Twitter? Have you ever been caught unfollowing someone? What reasons do you have for muting people? Do you wish there were a mute button in real life? Let us know in the Comments section below!
* Twitter image by Slava Murava Kiss (edited)
** Twitter Tshirt image by Bernard Goldbach
That is pretty useful. People really think the world wants to know their every waking moment in life. I am not a fan of that type of tweeting.
Hi Terrence, I’m glad you found this useful. Yes, different people have different ideas about what is interesting to tweet. Some people love quotes, some people overshare their daily lives, some people only seem to retweet. If you want to block someone from your stream without unfollowing them, muting is a very handy tool!
Hi Carolyn,
I’m glad to learn of the Twitter mute. I think it will be especially useful for someone I know who gives a running play of everything he does… I’m at the gym working out… Just finished a great work out, going for a refreshing smoothie… Smoothie wasn’t as smoothe as yesterday. Gonna try an ice cap tomorrow… MUTE!
Thanks kindly,
Bill
Hi Bill, Sounds as if your friend might be the same guy as the questioner was writing about! Yes, muting would be a great solution. He never has to know. 😉
Hi Carolyn,
So, this is a new feature of Twitter I guess. 😀
Yes, I understand the feelings of people who are bothered with those tweet. Honestly, I have experienced it as well. However, I never unfollow someone, which I do just ignore them. 🙂
It’s a very useful feature for many people. Maybe I’ll use it if it has the right moment. :-bd
Thanks for sharing this info, Carolyn.
Do have a splendid week ahead.
Nanda
Hi Nanda, Yes, you can try muting people to see if Twitter becomes more enjoyable for you. If someone just tweets an irrelevant post once a year, you may not want to bother with muting. But if someone constantly tweets boring stuff, feel free to use that mute feature!
Awesome.
I think that the ideal socially useful mute feature would be to see any tweets in which the muted person has included your Twitter handle.
Hi Stan, Great point and that’s exactly how Twitter’s mute function works! You still receive notifications of replies and mentions of your Twitter ID from muted tweets. Less chance of getting caught that way! :-bd
If I really don’t like what I am hearing/seeing and it is consistent I just unfollow.
Hi Josh, That’s what I thought at first too, why not just unfollow someone? But that can cause problems if you get caught by someone who’s offended (and someone you can’t afford to offend).
I used mute on Twitter this weekend to block spammers from appearing in the search results for a popular hashtag – #BB16. One quick step and the tweets were all relevant.
Hi Carolyn,
It is a great twitter feature as it enables you to stop seeing what you don’t wanna see without letting anyone know.
At this point, I don’t use twitter much but will try out this awesome feature whenever I would follow someone who I can’t unfollow.
Thanks for the mute tutorial. Have a great day.
Hi Anurag, You’re right, muting can make Twitter more enjoyable. Even if you only mute one person, that move can make a big difference.
Hey Carolyn Nicander,
It’s nice to hear that twitter is having this type of feature. I don’t know about this but now i am going to use this.
As my own experience, I don’t want to see tweets which are don’t important for me.
I think this article helped me a lot. Thanks for sharing and keep sharing articles like this. Good Luck.
Hi Swapnil, Yes, many people want to streamline their Twitter streams without being caught unfollowing anyone. Even if you just want to mute someone temporarily, muting can be very useful.
Thank you -your post is a necessary answer to a big number of those who are looking for such a feature. And there’s a lot of them. I’ve been looking for such possibility on facebook, and now it’s on twitter too
Hi Victoria, Yes, muting seems to be a very welcomed feature at Twitter. It seems many people will be making good use of muting!
For tips on how to mute people on Facebook, check out: Fix Your Flooded Facebook Feed (Without Unfriending Anyone)
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Hey Carolyn,
I read about this and wasn’t exactly sure why you wouldn’t just unfollow them. If someone gets upset with me because I did unfollow them then maybe they should think about what they’re tweeting. So far though I haven’t had this issue at all.
I have blocked some annoying people though. They keep reaching out to me for favors although I’ve kindly told them that’s inappropriate. I have three people and they have either got to be related, they’re working together or they are the same person with different profiles. Either way they tweet me the exact same thing constantly and then everyone they’ve sent that to is responding to everyone and it just got way out of hand.
I guess for those that really don’t want to hurt anyone’s feeling then this would be good. Thanks for at least showing me how to see if they’re muted and how to unmute them if I were ever to decide to do that.
~Adrienne
Hi Adrienne, Excellent points. You illustrate well the benefits of blocking and unfollowing someone.
You may want to mute someone if they appear in your search results. For example, I’m a big fan of the TV show Big Brother (don’t you love Donny?). I search #BB16 on Twitter often to find out what’s going on with those houseguests.
Believe it or not, some spammers use the #BB16 hashtag for spam. So I mute them and then I never have to see their spammy tweets in my search results. Very handy!
Hey Carolyn,
I never thought about that so I can definitely see the benefit of that. I haven’t gone online to find out the chatter about BB yet but I definitely shouldn’t want to get all these other responses either. And by the way, I LOVE Donny!
Yes, many people only want to know what’s going on in the Big Brother house from the show, others are fans of the Live Feeds. I check out Twitter to find out what’s happening between the shows. This year’s houseguests are very active!
Hi Carolyn,
Well this one really caught my eye. This post is a life saver for me because I have some people I cringe when I see. You know the type of person that keeps on putting up the latest and greatest then goes on to try to send private messages from hell!
Thanks so much for explaining this to me because I had no clue how to get rid of them.
-Donna
Hi Donna, I’m glad you found this helpful, but muting won’t affect people’s ability to send you Direct Messages on Twitter. If someone sends you a spammy DM on Twitter, you have every right to unfollow them!
Good luck clearing out your Twitter stream, Donna!
Carolyn you just flashed some light to my mind this moment. I never thought I could mute someone on Twitter and I think I need this 😉
thanks too for giving those reasons to use the feature. I got it 😉
Hi Entstine, Yes,it took me a while to figure out why you wouldn’t just unfollow someone. But the more I used muting the more I understood its value.
I’m so glad this was helpful to you, Enstine. Have a wonderful weekend ahead.
Hi Carolyn,
Lol this is so true, I recently ran into same problem with one of my old friends, He would constantly tweet events and videos of his parties. I couldnt find a way to mute him so I deleted him from twitter. Just a week ago I bumped into him and he said ” thanks for deleting me from twitter FRIEND”, I think Im going to add him again and mute him thanks for sharing great info 🙂
Hi Kevin, Welcome to The Wonder of Tech! This is a perfect example of how muting someone can keep your Twitter feed interesting without upsetting anyone. Your solution sounds like a good one?