Twitter’s been thinking about adding a downvote feature for ages, but now the company finally appears to be serious about it.
On Thursday, Twitter said it will be expanding the availability of the downvote button on replies globally, after testing the feature in a limited number of countries. Twitter originally launched the feature in July 2021, having teased something similar for years before that.
The downvote button comes with several limitations. First, it’s only available on replies, not posts. Second, the downvote counts aren’t public, though Twitter says they’ll “help inform us of the content people want to see.”
Finally, the downvote button is coming to the desktop version of Twitter first, though the company says it’ll start showing up on iOS and Android “soon.”
Twitter also shared some insights it has gathered while running the test. According to the company, most users used the downvoting feature to flag content they don’t want to see, and they mostly did it when they perceived the reply as offensive, not relevant, or both.
According to Twitter, the people who have tested the downvoting feature found that it improved the quality of conversations on Twitter. While this doesn’t necessarily mean Twitter will make the feature permanent, it does make it more likely, especially if it fares well in the global test.
