X character limit: how many characters a tweet can have

The X (Twitter) character limit is 280 characters per post on a standard account. X Premium subscribers can write longer posts, up to 25,000 characters, but on the timeline readers see the first part followed by a "Show more" link.

The 280 is not a plain count of letters. X weighs characters: most English text counts 1 per character, every link counts 23, and every emoji counts 2. This guide explains the rules, so you know why a post that looks short can still be over, and what you can leave out of the count.

X character limits at a glance

What	Limit
Post (standard account)	280 weighted characters
Post (X Premium)	25,000 characters
Bio	160 characters
Handle (@username)	4 to 15 characters: letters, numbers and underscores
A link, any length	Counts as 23
An emoji	Counts as 2
A Chinese, Japanese or Korean character	Counts as 2
Photos, GIFs, videos and polls	Don't count

How X counts characters

X publishes its counting rules in its developer documentation, in the page "Counting characters" at docs.x.com/fundamentals/counting-characters. The X character counter follows those rules. In short:

1. The text is normalized first. An accented letter typed as two parts (an "e" plus a separate accent mark) becomes one character before counting, so "café" is 4 however it was typed.
2. Most characters count 1. Every character from U+0000 to U+10FF counts 1. That range covers the Latin alphabet with its accents, numbers, spaces, common punctuation, Greek, Cyrillic, Hebrew, Arabic and the Indian scripts. A few typographic marks also count 1: curly quotes, dashes and primes.
3. Everything else counts 2. Chinese, Japanese and Korean characters, the ellipsis character (…), and the bold and script letters that font generators produce all count 2.
4. Links count 23. X wraps every link in its t.co shortener and reserves 23 characters for it, whether the address is 12 characters or 300.
5. Emoji count 2. An emoji counts 2 even when it is made of several parts, such as a flag, a family or a thumbs-up with a skin tone.

Some examples, counted the way X counts them:

Text	What you see	X counts
Hello world	11 characters	11
café	4 characters	4
日本語	3 characters	6
👍🏽 (thumbs-up with a skin tone)	1 emoji	2
Read more at example.com	24 characters	36
A 60-letter sentence in a bold "font"	60 letters	120

The "Read more at example.com" row shows a detail people miss: X treats a bare domain as a link even without https:// in front, so example.com counts 23, not 11.

Why a Japanese tweet runs out at about 140

Because each CJK character counts 2, a post written entirely in Japanese, Chinese or Korean fits about 140 characters. A post mixing English and Japanese sits somewhere in between. Arabic, Hebrew, Russian and Hindi text counts 1 per character, so those posts get the full 280.

Why other counters give a different number

A generic character counter usually measures the length of the text string. That counts a skin-tone emoji as 4 and a family emoji as up to 8, counts a long link at its full length, and counts a Japanese character as 1. On X those are 2, 23 and 2. If your post is plain English with no links or emoji, any counter gets close. As soon as it has a link, an emoji or a non-Latin script, paste it into a counter that applies X's weighting, like the X character counter, before you post.

What doesn't count toward the 280

• Media. Photos, GIFs, videos and polls attached to the post use none of the 280.
• The @names at the start of a reply. When you reply, X adds the @usernames of the people in the conversation. Those added names are not counted.
• The link length. Only 23 is counted for each link, so a long tracking URL costs the same as a short one. A link shortener saves nothing on X.

What does count: every @mention you type yourself (letter by letter, including the @), hashtags, spaces and line breaks.

Word limits: there aren't any

X limits characters, not words. How many words fit in 280 depends on your words: a post of everyday English usually fits somewhere around 40 to 50 words, and a post with links or emoji fewer again. The counter shows the word count next to the weighted character count if you need both.

Bio and handle limits

Your X bio can be 160 characters. Your handle, the @username, can be 4 to 15 characters of letters, numbers and underscores. If you are writing a bio, the X bio generator suggests ones that fit.

Styled text counts double in both places. Bold, italic and script letters from a font generator are separate Unicode characters outside the range X counts as 1, so each one costs 2. If you use the X font generator for a bio or a post, keep the styled part short.

A short history of the limit

Twitter launched with a 140-character limit. In November 2017 it doubled the limit to 280 for most languages; posts in Chinese, Japanese and Korean kept the same effective length, which is why those characters count 2 today. Longer posts later became part of the paid subscription, now X Premium, which allows up to 25,000 characters.

Writing a post that fits

• Count the link first. A post with one link leaves 256 characters for the text and the space before the link.
• Cut filler, not meaning. Openers like "I just wanted to say that" cost 25 characters and add nothing.
• Watch emoji and styled text. Five emoji cost 10. A styled phrase costs twice its length.
• Use a thread for longer points. If it needs more than one post, split it and make each post stand on its own.

If you schedule posts ahead, check the final text before it goes into the queue. SociaHive schedules posts to X alongside Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn and others, and checks each platform's limit before anything goes out.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the tweet character limit?

A post on X can be 280 characters on a standard account. X Premium subscribers can post up to 25,000 characters, and readers see the first part with a "Show more" link. Paste a draft into the X character counter to see how many of the 280 it uses.

How many characters is a tweet?

Up to 280 weighted characters. Most English letters, numbers, spaces and punctuation count 1, Chinese, Japanese and Korean characters count 2, every emoji counts 2, and every link counts 23 whatever its length.

Do spaces count in a tweet?

Yes. Spaces and line breaks count 1 each, like any other character in the basic range.

Do @mentions count toward the character limit?

A mention you type yourself counts, letter by letter, including the @ sign. The @usernames X adds automatically at the start of a reply do not count.

What is the Twitter bio character limit?

160 characters. Your handle can be 4 to 15 characters of letters, numbers and underscores.

When did Twitter change from 140 to 280 characters?

In November 2017. Posts in Chinese, Japanese and Korean kept the same effective length, because those characters count 2 each.