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How to Post and Delete Direct Messages (DMs)

Bug Alert:
  • Some users are currently experiencing an issue with direct messages disappearing, without the sender or receiver deleting them from their inbox.
  • Some users may experience a delay in DM delivery. A notification may arrive to your email inbox, but the DM won't appear for some time after the email delivery.

These are bugs, and our engineers are hard at work to solve these issues. Follow @support for updates!

Definition: A direct message (DM) is a private message sent via Twitter to one of your followers. You can only send a direct message to a user who is following you; you can only receive direct messages from users you follow.

How to send a direct message via the web:

  1. Log in to your Twitter account.
  2. Click on the person icon in the top right and select Direct messages from the drop down menu. 
  3. You'll see a pop up showing your direct message history. Click the New message button, highlighted below.
  4. In the address box, type the name or username of the person you wish to send a message to. 
    Tip: Make sure that user follows you. You can only send a direct message to your followers even though you can receive messages from all users you follow. 
  5. Enter your message and click Send message.
    Please note: t.co links, even those shared via DM, are neither private nor public. Anyone with the link will be able to view the content.

How to delete a direct message via the web: 

  1. Click on the person icon and select Direct messages from the drop down menu. 
  2. You'll see a pop-up showing your direct message history. Click the conversation containing the message you'd like to delete.
  3. Locate the desired message and hover your mouse over it. A trash can icon will appear. Click it.
  4. A message will show at the bottom of the DM inbox asking "Are you sure you want to delete this message?" Click Delete message.
  5. Please note: deleted DMs disappear from both the sender and the recipient's history. If you are missing DMs, check with the person you messaged to verify that they deleted the DMs you are missing.

How to send and receive direct messages from your phone and apps:

In addition to sending direct messages from the web, you can also send direct messages from:

Note about DM fails: Your service provider may split SMS messages greater than 160 characters into multiple messages. In this case, the second message will post as a normal Tweet because it doesn't begin with d+username, as the first message did. Please be careful to ensure that your messages are under 160 characters.

How to receive direct messages on your phone via SMS:

If your Twitter account is connected to your mobile phone, you can receive direct messages via text.

If you are receiving DMs (direct messages) from yourself:

Please take the following actions:

  1. While logged in, visit your Apps tab in your Settings. Revoke access for any third party application that you don't recognize.
  2. If you're still experiencing this problem after you've revoked unwanted applications, or if you weren't expecting this behavior when you approved this connection, please contact us.

If you are not seeing all of your direct messages:

  • Twitter shows only your 100 most recent messages.
  • Remember, your old DMs are not gone, they're just stored in our database. We're working to make more DMs available in the future.

Having Trouble?

Check out our Tweet & DM Troubleshooting section for solutions to commons problems.

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