Twitter has been spotted working on a new feature that will allow users to opt in to push notifications for specific search terms.
When you subscribe to a search term, users will receive alerts when new Tweets with that word or phrase are posted.
This feature was discovered in a pre-release version of the Twitter mobile app by Android developer Dylan Roussel:
Twitter is working on a feature that will let you subscribe to search results. Once you subscribe, you will receive instant notifications of tweets about your search query! 🤯 pic.twitter.com/plTlt484oN
– Dylan Russell 🇺🇦 (@evowizz) May 31, 2022
called ‘search subscribeThis addition to Twitter is being prepared for a future version of the mobile app.
It looks like a feature taken straight from TweetDeck. Considering that the last remaining TweetDeck app will be shutting down next month, it’s nice to see one of the app’s best features found elsewhere.
Subscription search seems simple enough to use. Russell’s tweet shows the two-step process for setting up notifications.
Enter a word or phrase in the search bar and hit the bell icon on the right. Twitter will then display a message letting you know that you are subscribed.
Russell notes that he hasn’t received any notifications yet, so it’s unknown what the notifications will look like when the feature eventually launches
It is also not known how frequently the alerts will be sent.
On the one hand, this could be a useful way to track things like mentions of brands. You can subscribe to Tweets with your company name and get alerts even when people don’t @ mention you.
On the other hand, depending on how notifications are delivered, this can be an intrusive nightmare if you subscribe to a term that gets tweeted dozens of times a minute.
Will Twitter notify users All Tweet, or just higher Tweets?
Maybe Twitter will offer the option to customize your notifications so you can set the frequency you want.
We’ll have to wait for the feature to roll out to be sure. It is currently available in Twitter Alpha, which is recommended for use by developers.
It will be more widely available in a future update, which may be the next update or a few versions in the future.
Featured image: Sandy Herta/Shutterstock
